Books about Retro
Retro – The Culture of Revival
Author - Elizabeth E Guffey
(Published Reaktion Books 2006)
Retro is the revival of the style of the recent past. The recent past, as the author explains, can be as recent as fifteen years ago. This book describes the retro phenomenon from the early sixties revival of the Art Nouveau style to the late seventies and early eighties fashion for the art and graphics of the early years of the Russian Revolution.
This book is a well argued and thought provoking account of the recent history of our view of the not too distant past. It describes how Art Nouveau transformed into Psychedelia at the end of the sixties. As Art Nouveau absorbed into the mainstream culture of advertising and popular design, the cutting edge of retro naturally moved into Art Deco, only to drop that style and finally revive a past as recent as the 1950s.
Retro encompassed popular culture in the form of the films such as "Grease" and the television programme "Happy Days". Its view of the past was often given a positive glow. The violent side of Teddy Boys was forgotten, as was the shadow of the atomic bomb in the 70s' view of an innocent 50s.
The book finishes with what seems to be retro’s finale – the revival of the future as seen by the past. The rocket-ship images of the 50s’ vision of a Utopian future are more attractive than today’s uncertain present and even more so than our view of tomorrow.
I found this book an elegant and very readable account of the rise of retro. It certainly made me think about my own perception of the past. My only criticism is that I wanted more. The author stopped short of describing in too much detail the more recent aspects of retro – the revival of the sixties and seventies style that we are seeing today.