My ongoing WTF obsession
I was first just amused by the furniture in the late sixties and seventies that was partly real wood and partly photographed wood.
The "Fake and real" combination was the beginning of the end, to be sure, as it ushered in the era of particle board speaker cabinets and the like.
But then it started to grow on me. As I fought through my initial disgust at the idea, I started to secretly enjoy the sheer perversity of putting fake photographed wood right next to real wood on the same piece. Rather bold to be so up-front about the deceit.
There is something really hilarious about it, and sometimes the designers even seemed to go out of their way to create pleasing "two-tone" effects with the fake/real combo.
Historical precedents could be the now-famous formica and wood combo Danelectro/Silvertone ultra cheap guitars of the 1950s.
And much later, the New York artist Richard Artschwager did some very funny and (I think) very profound commentary along those same lines with his formica tables and door sculptures. He even did a fake elevator lined with photo wood. With sound.
These days it seems even easier to enjoy the "best" collisions of fake and real wood, as the whole post modern aesthetic seems to have made it all OK again.
But to this day it remains favorite furniture "WTF" of all time.
Keeps me entertained as I go on yet another fruitless thrift store search!
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