Designing His Life: Victor Papanek — with Alison J. Clarke
Designing His Life: Victor Papanek
with Alison J. Clarke
Alison J. Clarke's new book, "Victor Papanek: Designer for the Real World," is the biography of the Austrian-American trailblazer in social design. In the late 1960s, Victor Papanek began writing his seminal "Design for the Real World" which argued for socially and ecologically sustainable design long before the ensuing movements years later. Published in 1971, the impact and relevance of his book persists globally.
As a teenager, Victor Papanek fled Nazi-occupied Austria with his mother to land in New York. Before he even began his studies at Cooper Union, Papanek's experiences in Vienna had shaped his socially-responsible outlook. In this podcast, Dr. Clarke explains why, to understand Papanek and his work, she had to examine his life as an Austrian-émigré.