education

The development of design as a field of activity also brought with it the problem of how to teach it, and the need to establish a new educational framework. While isolated attempts at training industrial artists had already begun, it was only in the early 1960s that higher education in the arts also began restructuring to accommodate design programmes.
The new curricula often took inspiration from the trailblazing schools of the early twentieth century—particularly Germany’s Bauhaus and the Soviet Union’s Vkhuthemas—while also trying to keep up with rapid developments in technology and science. A number of progressive and experimental courses were established, often associated with prominent figures like Oskar Hansen, Bruno Tomberg, Edvard Ravnikar, and Feliksas Daukantas, among others.
Although the directive to establish the relevant faculties often came from above, these eventually turned out to be new sites for avant-garde experimentation. This was paradoxically due to the ideological importance and role of design in the development of an ‘advanced socialist society’. In contrast to the visual arts, the design field saw the opening of unimagined possibilities, including innovative projects in collaboration with scientists and engineers—even if these frequently remained on paper and never reached implementation. The scientific and technological approach to design ran in parallel to an exploration of its artistic roots, which added a humanist dimension.