Neil Fraser
February 17, 2003
"Art Deco belongs to a world of luxury and decadence, the Golden Age of the 1920s and 1930s. The very term conjures up a multitude of romantic images: huge ocean liners gliding effortlessly across moonlit seas; the sounds of clinking cocktail glasses and a raucous jazz band emanating from a sumptuously decorated ballroom; a Busby Berkeley spectacular showing in one of the newly built cinemas ornamented with Egyptian-revival columns and Aztec motifs; or the gleaming skyscrapers of the Manhattan skyline and sun-soaked white stucco villas of Miami Beach.
"Art Deco is characterised by a range of exquisitely designed art and craft products ... even mundane objects, like vacuum cleaners and Bakelite radios, were given the Deco treatment, adorned with smooth surfaces and sleek lines reminiscent of the most modern automobile."
Iain Zaczek's introduction to his beautiful book "Essential Art Deco" plunges the reader into a period of exuberance, vitality and beauty that was at the same time fantasy and escapism. But that period, the 1920s and 1930s, left the world with a wonderful legacy.
Johannesburg, the brash, upstart mining town, as incongruous as it might seem, was one of the beneficiaries of this eclectic style.
Incongruous because whilst a building boom was at full swing in the city in the mid-1930s, the Native Land and Trust Act and Representation of Natives Act were being promulgated in Parliament effectively disenfranchising black citizens. Incongruous because whilst the city gaily celebrated its 50th year in 1936 at the height of the "Golden Age", toasting its progress and illuminating its stunning buildings for all to wonder at, the townships remained dark and cold with no electric power, its dwellers with nothing to celebrate!
The term Art Deco was derived from the French, Arts Decoratifs, and evolved from a major international exhibition titled L'Exposition Internationale des Arts Decoratifs et Industriels Modernes held in Paris in 1925 which was billed as a 'celebration of modernity'. Essentially the style was a fusion of the industrial and the artistic but equally a fusion of history and modernity resulting in a legacy of great beauty, craft and imagination.
Typical of that legacy, and, without any doubt my favourite building, is the Chrysler Building built in New York between 1928 and 1930 and still today one of the most famous of the Art Deco office buildings. Walter P Chrysler wanted a building that would clearly reflect the glory of the automobile industry. The apex of the building features the chevrons which formed part of the Chrysler logo. At the corners of the fortieth floor you'll find a frieze of car wheels and sculptures of winged hubcaps. Chrysler even had a set of car tools placed beneath the spire as a celebration that it was the tallest building in the world. But competition was fierce and as work started on the 967 foot Chrysler building, the Empire State building was being designed as a 1000 footer. Walter Chrysler decided to add a 179 foot spire to ensure the pre-eminence of his building but John Jacob Raskob, the developer of the Empire State then added a 240 foot mooring mast for airships to his building. Chrysler removed the tools from below his spire, an acknowledgement that his building was lower than Raskob's!
I tell this story only because owning the tallest building was equally aspired to in Johannesburg. Castle Mansions was built in Eloff Street and was the first of the modern buildings of the '30s. Clive M Chipkin records that "it was regarded as the most modern building of its day, noted for its modern plate-glass shopfronts with Art Deco brass trim…"
The top ferrule of the flagmast mounted on the central attic tower measured 180 feet and seven and a quarter inches above the pavement, beating the previous height holder, Astor Mansions (150 feet) which in turn had topped the Barbican (140 feet) as well as Shell House the height of which was recorded as 148 feet 9 inches!
But it was also a New Yorker, I.W.Schlesinger, who really promoted the Art Deco style in Johannesburg - Chipkin says this about him. "Schlesinger represented the counter-culture of Americanisation set against the Edwardian and post-Edwardian sensibilities and sheer fuddy-duddiness of the anglophile establishment…all the unwritten assumptions - the parochialism and elitism, the reticence - of Anglo-South Africa came to be challenged by the brashness and drive of American populism. And Schlesinger was its local emissary."
Broadcast House, the renovations and extensions to the old Carlton Hotel, the great cinemas on Commissioner Street such as His Majesty's and the Colosseum, the Transvaal Automobile Club in Killarney and further afield, the Polana in Lorenco Marques, the Edward in Durban and the Riviera on the Vaal at Vereeniging were all were the product of his vision and energy.
But, in so far as the city was concerned, Chipkin also points out that the city's sheer abundance of Art Deco examples records the city's "transition from a provincial mining centre to a world metropolis."
Fast forward to the present and a group of heritage aficionados got together recently to identify what remains of that abundance and in fact came up with a list of seventy five Art Deco buildings in and about the city. From the list they determined the 'top twenty' and are now seeking to have these buildings identified with Art Deco plaques.
The reason for this initiative is that, even with Joburg's abundance of Art Deco buildings, Cape Town has stolen the march on Johannesburg by organising an International Art Deco conference in that city in March. This despite the fact that Johannesburg's Art Deco building collection is far greater, much more exciting and illustrates the period in greater depth. Durban is also in on the act. Their tourism website claims "Another coup for Durban - the city has landed the 2003 Art Deco Convention which is scheduled to be held at the Elangeni Hotel (hardly an example of any form of architecture - my comment) in the last week in March. An expected 150-200 high level international delegates will be attending".
But we have to face facts. Many of our buildings are generally not just a little tatty, indeed a number are a great embarrassment. The group researching our Art Deco stock recorded that many of the buildings they identified were being plundered by "antique traders", were being generally neglected by their owners and abused by the public. Yet that was also the situation in Miami in 1976. But there it led to an Art Deco lover, Barbara Capitman, establishing the United States' very first conservation scheme. Specifically targeting Miami's Art Deco heritage, the Miami Design Preservation League had 900 buildings in the South Beach area placed on the National Register of Historic Places by 1979, at the time the only collection of 20th century buildings to be protected. The result? Miami is a mecca for Art Deco sightseers. The Deco District provides an eighty block living record of the vibrant era of mid-30s. Many of the buildings are painted in bright, candy-stripe colours and the Art Deco motifs are in keeping with the tropical nature of Miami's climate.
Whilst Joburg with the best and most exciting examples in Africa of this bygone era, will undoubtedly attract a visit from delegates attending the Cape Town and Durban conferences and conventions, we will come a poor third. Apathy, disinterest and a lack of vision by property owners and the City Council have resulted in another missed opportunity.
