Language of Design was produced by Cine-Service. This 1950 color movie is about Australian post-war modern design, especially fabric and women’s fashion design, and how it is inspired by nature and other visual means. The film won the Cine Service Documentary Film Award for director Gerard Herbst and producer/writer Geoffrey Thompson and was shown at Lille. At the time, Herbst was serving as the art director of the Prestige fashion studio in Melbourne, Australia. The film is notable in that it uses a black person to showcase indigenous inspired fabrics (11:15), something which was considered daring at the time.
The movie intends to show the viewer how Australian designers use different methods to come up with new designs for their textile manufacturing businesses. As the movie begins, a woman comes across a piece of driftwood on the beach and she caresses it with her hand: 52. Seashells can be seen on the beach 1:15. The woman examines the shells on the piece of wood 1:33. Woman admires a tree branch 1:53. The inside of a design studio in the Australian textile industry is shown 2:07. A woman lays out flowers on a canvas for textile design 2:31. Seashells are used as inspiration for the designer’s creations 2:42. A designer speaks with the woman who puts up the seashells in the design shop 3:00. The piece of wood is used and sketched to create a design 3:19. The designers look at the piece of wood and the tree branch to create new designs 3:55. The tree branches are put into a four square piece and painted by the designer 4:14. Woman looks at a butterfly resting on a flower that will also be inspiration for the artists 4:35. Herbarium leaves are used for design 4:48. Different items from nature are shown on a tripod 4:55. Simple cubes are used to inspire an artist 5:20. Textile designer looking through a microscope to be inspired 5:48. The textile designer looking at diatoms through the microscope 6:00. An artist inspired by sunset is creating a textile 6:15. Woman examines a basket 6:36. Artist uses the basket to create a print for textile design 7:00. Artist takes photos of different pieces of clothing bunched together to create new ideas 7:17. These are similar in design to the fabric one might see on a 1940s or 1950s Hawaiian shirt. Sample pieces of fabric are arranged on a tree branch 7:31. Paper copies of designs are hung to be examined by the artists and to be approved for textile production 7:57. Small-scale models are used to test out different fabrics for clothing ideas 8:17. A model poses for an artist in a new dress 8:40. The designer paints different ideas from the model’s dress on a life-size painting 8:50. Model in a stunning dress poses for a photographer using a view camera 9:11. Purely Australian designs are shown that were inspired by nature, photos of Hollywood stars including Errol Flynn and other imagery 9:53. Models pose on the beach in new gowns 10:41. The woman who opened the movie is back on the beach picking up new items to inspire her designers 11:15. We see the driftwood washing back into the ocean as the movie closes.
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