Constructed Narratives
The Chandigarh Chair
“The working methods that I discovered in India finally taught me self-esteem after so many failures in France. Chandigarh was for both of us a kind of glade in the human jungle. Le Corbusier’s works brought us up against nearly unsurmountable execution problems in terms of the technical and ethnic considerations of the country. I’ve thought long and hard. […] Finally, when all is said and done, I’m sure that Le Corbusier was right — subsistence solutions are not solutions for fighting for a state of civilization.” — Pierre Jeanneret
In the 1950s when Pierre Jeanneret (1896-1967) was tasked by his cousin, the renowned modernist architect Charles-Édouard Jeanneret-Gris (1887-1965), better known as Le Corbusier, with designing what he called “le blah blah blah” (at least according to Charlotte Perriand (1903-1999), or rather, furniture, to the rest of us) for the utopian city of Chandigarh, one thing was certain: people would need somewhere to sit. In answer to the problem, Jeanneret’s solution was to design a teak-and-cane chair, just one of several site-specific designs that would eventually be produced in their thousands. An essay in practicality, the chairs now iconic V-shaped legs (inspired by an architect’s drafting compass), were sturdy, hewn by local artisans from inexpensive humidity and bug-resistant Burma teak — thereby integrating Corbusian modernity with the rural spirit of Indian tradition. Indeed their inherent durability was fortunate, or else there might be very few surviving examples; as decades later, when residents of Chandigarh deemed Jeanneret’s designs dated, and gravitated towards furniture that was considered more à la mode, they were thrown out on the street, quite literally, piled up across the city and left to rot — from the roof of the High Court, exposed to the sun, wind, dust and rain, to the balconies of the Secretariat and corridors of the university building. Unloved and unwanted, many were sold for pennies as scrap at local auctions, or ended up as fuel for heating and cooking. Then along came the big guns, dealers like Eric Touchaleaume of Galerie 54, François Laffanour, Philippe Jousse and Patrick Seguin, who recognised the inherent beauty in Jeanneret’s designs — and so, they started making regular trips to the remote city so as to snap up and store these junked treasures. “We said, Let’s take the risk of buying these, and we’ll see what happens,” recalls Laffanour, who has since written a number of volumes on Jeanneret’s work, as well as more specifically, the city of Chandigarh. It proved a canny bet as after displaying his cache of carefully restored Chandigarh furniture at Design Miami — the humble “Chandigarh chair” very quickly became a cult item. Somewhat late to the party, the Indian government only very recently caught on to the import and significance of Jeanneret’s designs, and to export such furniture now requires explicit permission from the country’s Ministry of Culture; but, to employ a somewhat hackneyed phrase, the horse has already bolted. “It’s not the collectors that were the problem,” explains Rajnish Wattas, who in 2008 founded Chandigarh’s Heritage Furniture Committee. “The problem is our perception of heritage. We thought it was junk; our government thought it was junk.”
Pierre Jeanneret (standing) and his cousin Le Corbusier, sitting in an “Advocate” armchair, designed by Jeanneret for the city of Chandigarh
“Easy” armchair, detail (1955-56) designed by Pierre Jeanneret and featuring his typical compass, or V-leg. construction, image c/o Magen gallery
Jeanneret designed his distinctive, highly functional and now iconic V-leg “Office” chair for the city’s administrative buildings, courtrooms and colleges; they were produced over time in a number of small workshops and often their crudely painted or stencilled building codes are still visible — something which, for many aficionados, only serves to enhance to their charm and mystique. Since being “rediscovered” and re-marketed, Jeanneret’s graphically stylized creations have become a hit with dealers, decorators and collectors alike, especially so for e.g. with Belgian designer Axel Vervoordt and French architect Joseph Dirand, who often use the Swiss architect’s furniture in their interiors. “It’s so simple, so minimal, so strong,” Dirand told Architectural Digest. “Put one in a room, and it becomes a sculpture.” No longer are these chairs the preserve of discreet niche collectors, they’re seen frequently in the homes of celebrities, and it seems have become almost de rigueur when creating fashionable, contemporary interiors. The Kardashian’s now seemingly have too many to count between them, as seen in the frequently published homes of Kourtney and Kim — decorated by Clements design and Vervoordt respectively. Perhaps partly as a result of their being caught up in the Kardashian’s PR slipstream, the humble “Chandigarh chair” has become ever increasingly popular (actress Ellen Pompeo even has a child size iteration in her daughter’s nursery) and for some years thousands of unofficial reproductions (aka fakes) have been creeping their way onto the market. At the same time the price of originals has been on the up; last October London auction house Bonham’s sold a “lot” of ten pieces from Chandigarh — included a writing table, bench, eight easy armchairs and a folding screen (made for use in the Punjab and Haryana High Court, the Secretariat and the Panjab University) — for a cool £2.2 million. Italian furniture behemoth Cassina has even gone as far as creating a series of chairs and tables dubbed the “Homage à Pierre Jeanneret” collection, which takes “inspiration” from the architect’s iconic modernist designs, including, in particular, the distinct V-shaped constructions and woven detailing (Jeanneret never applied for patents or copyright); comprising the “Capitol Complex table” and three iterations of the “Capitol Complex chair”, the collection was clearly dreamt up as a means of capitalising on the demand for Jeanneret furniture.
“Classroom" chair, with a stencilled building code (c. 1960) designed by Pierre Jeanneret, image c/o Magen gallery
“Advocate and Press" armchair, detail (1954-55) designed by Le Corbusier, Pierre Jeanneret and Jeet Lal Malhotra, image c/o Magen gallery
The basic cane version of the V-leg chair was never particularly comfortable — which is why Jeanneret designed a padded leather version for pampered senior officials; but otherwise, in the egalitarian spirit of fostering workplace democracy, the same chair was supplied to all bureaucrats in the Secretariat hierarchy — from the top ranked Secretary to the Superintendent, clerk and peon (and accordingly, most workers would bring a cushion from home so as to make their 9-5 that little bit more bearable). In the true spirit of government penny pinching, the original wicker of Jeanneret’s design was, in time, downgraded to plastic cane in white or cream and seen as nothing more than a modernist utilitarian creation, they were roughly handled and little valued by their day-to-day occupants. As a result, some dealers are divided on the inherent merit of Jeanneret’s “Chandigarh chair”, with some in the industry finding it ironic that a piece of furniture so cheaply made and mass-produced has become a collector’s item, seen in the homes of blue-chip collectors, and rubbing shoulders with the likes of Royère (1902-1981) and Picasso (1881-1973). The clean lines and geometric modular construction that make the chair so graphically appealing were of course so as to make it easier for local artisans to replicate — but is it right that there should be any distinction in hierarchy between “high” and “low” design? (To coin a distinction frequently applied within the art world.) Surely an item should be judged for its intrinsic value, and its significance within the canon of design history, and not purely on its original intended purpose — after all, in the case of the latter, one strays into Duchampian territory re elevating an everyday object into the rarefied world of fine art. Perhaps therefore it would be unwise to sneer at those who willing to pay the price for an original work by Jeanneret — questions of fakes, fads and fashion are, to some extent, an aside; after all, one sees hundreds of thousands of Louis XVI “style” chairs, everywhere from the homes of the 0.1% to hotels, offices and the high-street, yet, originals are still as desirable now as they were when they were created three hundred years ago.
Jeanneret’s designs for Chandrigha are, indisputably architectural, sculptural and aesthetically speaking, incredibly pleasing; and of course, the worlds of furniture and art are not mutually exclusive. There’s something about the work of twentieth century French makers, for e.g. Jean Prouvé (1901-1984), Perriand (1903-1999), René Herbst (1891-1982) and of course, Jeanneret, that, to put it bluntly, goes well with modern art. Such furnishings, whilst beautifully detailed and conceived, don’t tend to overwhelm a space or pull focus in the way that more heavily ornamented antique furniture might — whilst not playing “second fiddle” per se, it doesn’t ever scream for attention; as can be seen to great effect in the homes of numerous gallerists and collectors alike, and in particular, those of Emmanuel de Bayser, Miquel Alzueta and Xavier Hufkens. For many collectors, furniture by such design greats is considered entirely necessary and essential to creating a proper a seamless amalgam of design and art; arguably, on that basis, the divide between “art proper” in the traditional sense, i.e. painting/drawing/sculpture is becoming increasingly blurred — especially so as many museums and institutions are now frequently displaying furniture alongside blue chip works. Although the conversion of everyday, affordable, functional objects into sought-after collectible works of art is a relatively modern phenomena — there has clearly been a focus in design in building a narrative and shifting the focus from these being “Chandigarh chairs” to “Jeanneret chairs”, and from functional pieces of furniture to desirable design objects, moving them into the realms of “luxury” so as to enhance their value, thereby creating a new market.
The commodification of art design is of course nothing new, but a slew of recent auction records are shifting price-points out of reach of ordinary collectors and moving them into a rarefied stratosphere where they are the sole preserve of the super-rich. Design historians Nia Thandapani, Petra Seitz and Gregor Wittrick believe however, that in the case of Chandigarh furniture, the process was accelerated by the continuing impact of colonialism, and that it is in fact a form of exploitative capitalism. These three researchers argue that from the moment abandoned Chandrigha chairs were “discovered” in the late 90s — the process of changing the image of the furniture as essentially European began almost immediately, and that there was a systematic erasure of the names of those young designers who worked with Jeanneret, like Urmila Eulie Chowdhury, Jeet Malhotra and Aditya Prakash: in the majority of catalogues, even today, Jeanneret is still credited with sole authorship. “Chowdhury might have designed the Library Chair, for instance. In a Marg magazine article from the 1960s written by Chowdhury, she unambiguously credits Malhotra with designing a lamp and herself with the Library Chair,” explain the researchers. “This points to a deliberate erasure of the Indian team, and creating a closed loop of information that self-perpetuates and becomes the standard narrative.” Of course, this doesn’t necessarily mean the history books are entirely inaccurate, however the way Jeanneret worked was quite casual, he would often sketch something quickly and pass it on to his juniors, leaving them to fill in the gaps — and thereby it was collaborative process. Much like Le Corbusier for many years being assigned sole credit for Perriand’s furniture designs, questions of attribution perhaps need to be reassessed. Of course, the idea that the historical narrative surrounding the Chandrigha chair is a construct is, at present, merely a theory, as are questions of whether post-colonial politics and capitalism have played a part in turning Jeanneret’s furniture into a luxury commodity; however, in a world where accepted “truths” are being unpicked and unravelled, it’s surely merits critical analysis.