Clara Porset. Passion for knowledge and industrial design

History and life

Clara Porset was born in Matanza, Cuba, on May 25, 1895 into a wealthy family with a Spanish tradition, where traditional Hispanic values ​​and education were instilled in her. This allowed her to travel through Europe and the United States and train in different countries. She allowed her to move on to high school in New York. Following this, she entered Columbia University, where she completed a Bachelor of Arts at the School of Fine Arts, in 1925.

Years later, she continues to focus on the world of design, which led her to travel to Paris where she studied at the "National School of Architecture and Design with the architect Henri Rapin from 1928 to 1931, taking courses in the history of architecture and art, as well as architectural theory at the École de Beaux Arts de Aesthetics at the Sorbonne and Art courses at the Louvre Museum." ³

Cuba

In 1932, she returned to Cuba after an extensive trip around the world that took her to the Bauhaus⁴ in Germany and to experience first-hand the design and artistic life that she was creating there with great teachers like Meyer. But she decides to return to Cuba to work as an architect, although focused on industrial design in which she began to stand out with fixed furniture such as the project to create two pilot houses for Banco Mendoza or furniture for hospitals, schools, clubs, and other fixed environments in the city. Havana In 1935, she had to emigrate due to the political instability of the country.

Mexico

With her departure from the island, she relocated her residence to Mexico City, where she began to work combining "abstraction and Mexican popular art and highlighting the physical traditions of the ancestral cultures of the country." ⁵

In 1941, she participated in the Organic Design for Home Furnishing contest organized by the MOMA in New York. She won first prize under the design of the abstraction of folk art embodied in furniture and chairs. She continued to participate in contests, this time for the New York Prize Design for Modern Furniture where she did not win the first prize, but her works were included in the museum's catalog where she manages to stand out with a wicker chair and a metallic structure.

These works led her to the artistic-revolutionary movement and to be able to meet eminent artists of the time such as Frida Kahlo or the muralists Diego Rivera and Xavier Guerrero, who years later became her partner. She was invited as a teacher to teach art history for UNAM at the National School of Architecture in the Department of History and Criticism of Architecture. She subsequently began working in architecture and design magazines such as Espacio since 1947, both works she continued to develop until the end of her professional career.

Multifamily housing President Miguel Alemán

Under the direction and creation of the architect Mario Pani, an ambitious housing project is being developed for the low-income population in the city who lived in informality.

For this reason, a series of tall towers were built in the southern area between 1947 and 1949, where the same architect commissioned Clara to design the internal furniture of some apartments for sale. This was due to the fact that she was able to highlight Mexican culture in a good way in good quality furniture, which prompted the creation of wooden and wicker chairs, armchairs, tables and armchairs for the innovative apartments. This fact continues to give her fame as a great furniture designer by being able to engage in low-cost projects in the same way as higher-cost projects and she encouraged her to continue with all kinds of works in the country and abroad.

In 1952, she organized the exhibition Art in Daily Life. Exhibition of objects of good design made in Mexico for the National Institute of Fine Arts, being considered the first exhibition of this type in Latin America.

University teaching

In 1960, she was called back to Cuba by Fidel Castro to design again in her country and commissioned the fixed furniture for the recently created Camilo Cienfuegos Educational Institute where tables and chairs for 5000 students were essential. She achieves the commission and is awarded more projects within the island, especially in Havana, and collaborates with "the National School of Arts, Plastic Arts and Modern Dance of Havana of the architects Ricardo Porro, Vittorio Garatti and Roberto Gottardi (1961 -1965)." ⁶

She did many other projects that dubbed her an excellent designer and professor. This was so much so that she was the rector of the University of Havana and Ernesto Guevara asked her to found the first design school in Cuba, "Instituto Superior de Diseño Industrial" in 1962, where the government awarded her a trip around the world to see schools of architecture, art and industrial design and thus be able to put the school to work. But due to ideological differences and the instability of the country, she retired as director of the institute in 1963.

When she returned to Mexico, she was allowed to work at UNAM again and to teach at the National School of Architecture until 1969. The then rector, Pablo Gonzales, and the director of the School, Ramón Torres, created the first degree in Industrial Design for her country and create the CIDI (Center for Research in Industrial Design). They ask her to participate as one of the 10 teachers, with only two women invited to work together and create the first group of 17 designers. All this in a country that was leaving the case of Tlatelolco 68 in the past, where students were being seen as revolutionaries and mercenaries rather than researchers.

The Clara Porset scholarship to Mexican designers

In 1988, the Faculty of Architecture, under the direction of CIDI, created the "Clara Porset National Industrial Design Scholarship Award"⁷ for the eminent life project that she developed as a designer in the country.

The award is held every two years, a task that now falls to CIDI. It is done under a design contest to women who manage to highlight the indigenous design of the country through their works and generate well-being and comfort for the community, always with the low cost look to be able to be easily acquired by all. This award promises to develop over time under a commission that was left by Clara herself to be able to reward and value Mexican popular art through physical objects and which is delivered each year at the university.

End of his career

For many years, Clara has focused on research and teaching rather than creating, which leads her to a large compilation of historical documents of Mexican popular culture, from the first pre-Hispanic settlements to the 1950s. All this wealth of information is donates as a fundamental part of cultural development to CIDI.

She continues to teach in the Design degree and over the years she can no longer transfer to the university, so the students come to her house. This demonstrated an excellent job as a teacher and professional to become an icon in the industrial environment. As in 1971, when the "National Institute of Fine Arts awarded her the gold medal for her importance as a pioneer of modern industrial design in Mexico, the highest distinction of this institute." ⁸
 
She passed away in May 1981 at the age of 86 in Mexico City, leaving an incomparable work of life as a woman and as a professional of the time.

Last conclusions
A whole life's work for a singular woman who faced an unknown market in two countries that were facing great social and economic changes. On the one hand, the nonconformity of education and, on the other, a social and economic turnaround. These two actions marked her life and her professional career to the point of wanting to contribute in some way. She achieved this with low-cost physical works and materials that were available to the entire community at large.

But the most remarkable thing about her was her passion for knowledge and traditional Mexican culture that led her to create great objects of very good quality and with an unmatched identity. This meant that all Mexicans were rooted in national designs rather than imported ones.

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