Architecture & design / Visual art
Ray Eames
1912–1988 · artist, designer
American artist and designer who studied at Cranbrook in 1940–41, where she met Charles Eames and began one of design history's great partnerships.
- Born
Sacramento, California- Died
Los Angeles, California
aged 75- Birth name
- Bernice Alexandra Kaiser
- Also known as
- Ray Kaiser
- Detroit years
- 1940–1941
01 / The Detroit story
The Detroit story
Ray Kaiser was an abstract painter trained by Hans Hofmann in New York when an architect friend suggested she spend time at the Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills. She arrived in September 1940 and took classes across disciplines, moving beyond painting into weaving, ceramics and design. At Cranbrook she met Charles Eames, then head of the industrial design department, and helped him and Eero Saarinen prepare the drawings and models for their prize-winning entry in the Museum of Modern Art's Organic Design competition. Ray and Charles married in 1941 and moved to Los Angeles, where the Eames Office turned the ideas first tested in Michigan into molded-plywood and fiberglass chairs, textiles, toys, exhibitions and films. Long credited only as Charles's wife, she is now recognized as a full creative partner.
Highlights
- Studied at Cranbrook Academy of Art, 1940–41
- Helped prepare the Eames–Saarinen Organic Design competition entry
- Married Charles Eames in 1941 after meeting him at Cranbrook
- Founding member of the American Abstract Artists group (1936)
02 / Their Detroit places
Their Detroit places 1
Where they lived, worked, performed and liked to hang out. Closed and demolished places stay here too, because they are part of the city's history.
Studied here · 1940–1941
Cranbrook Academy of Art
Where she studied, met Charles Eames and worked on the Organic Design competition entry.