Core77

Rather than inspire the immediate recognition typical of Michael Graves' colorful floral embellishments on teapots and towel racks, Naoto Fukasawa's work is so grey that it even blends into the background of the cover of his monograph, the aptly named Naoto Fukasawa. Phaidon comprehensively illustrates Fukasawa's work in lavish detail to an American audience more likely to have interacted with his products than to be familiar with his name. Fukasawa's work awes with its simplicity and this book upholds that ethos.

To even imply that Fukasawa's work is somehow dull or doesn't shine, however, is a massive disservice. Instead, his objects let the user formulate his or her actions to fit into the context of the work rather than boldly announcing its presence a la Thomas Chippendale. Somewhere, Alfred Loos must be smiling, but Fukasawa takes the ideals of the Modernists from a backlash against embellishment and neatly ties them into packages hand-tailored to fit human nature.

Fukasawa himself opens the book with an introduction that talks through page fifteen, not about the author, not about the objects, but about people. The photographs in Fukasawa's introduction are all in hard-focus. No light-boxes here. Instead, the introduction is crammed with pictures of human behavior in man-made environments gone wrong: cigarettes snubbed out on Braille pads, bicycle baskets used as trash cans, and pedestrians so impaired by excessive texting that they are forced to walk blindly on bumps precisely designed for the blind to avoid.

Thinkers like Victor Papanek have thoughtfully chastised designers for manufacturing clutter, and there is much truth to that claim. As human beings, however, we are toolmakers, and the distinction between a beaver's dam or a bowerbird's nest and clutter are certainly worthy of examination. A classmate of mine once embarked down the unenviable road of trying to determine the nature of simplicity in her thesis. In the Japanese culture, white represents death, and the Buddhist ideal of nirvana, is, to all Western intents and purposes, the obliteration of self. Though Fukasawa's work is often white, it is rarely truly simple. Instead, his work is complicated in the thought that brought it about, so that the user can implement it with as little thought as possible.

Perhaps there is no way of truly creating simplicity. We human beings are masters of complexity, and we keep doing it, so clearly we like it that way. Instead, whether as complex as a CD player or as simple as a vase, there is no denying that Fukasawa's work is "elegant." It matches its environment with all that it desires from its user. So much of his creation fulfills humanist goals that it is hard to detail it all. From using a simple groove a few inches from the wall as the stand for the points of wet umbrellas to coloring the handle for the teabag exactly the shade of perfectly brewed tea, Fukasawa's works teach without forcing. I could certainly use his lamp designed with a switch near its base, which is designed to function as a tray for keys and wallets as one retires to bed. It is all too natural to put that stuff there anyway.

The occasional product seems to venture into gimmickry, such as a bag that uses a sneaker sole as a base, or the kiwi skinned juice boxes that generate visceral crawling sensations up to my neck, but as a whole the collection coheres, not only as elegant, but in what should be perceived as the most flattering word that can be said of a designer: thoughtful.