elegance
Elegance ( Latin ēlegantia ) generally describes 'dexterity' and in particular 'fashionable taste'. The Duden gives the meanings "refinement" in relation to "external appearance", "elegant appearance"; "Agility, suppleness in movement" as well as "cultivated, elegant form and texture".
In the natural sciences, especially mathematics, elegance means "as much as simplicity and transparency of a proof , a solution ".
The adjective elegant for 'tasteful, chosen, fashionable' was borrowed from the French élégant 'tasteful' in the 18th century . Around 1800, the noun elegant was also used to describe a 'man dressed in the latest fashion'. In the French as well as in the German language, the adjective elegant characterized from the 16th century the "perfection of linguistic and artistic representation, later also the outwardly fashionable and tasteful appearance of people and things". Initially, elegantia, as a Latin expression borrowed from rhetoric , stood for 'tasteful, fine choice, delicacy in particular of the expression, propriety '; As in French, the meaning changed from the 18th century to the current meaning.
In 1905, Meyer's Großes Konversations-Lexikon defined elegance as delicacy, grace and “linguistically” as “thecorrectness of speech associatedwith clarity in the Romans, so that the expression faithfully and truthfully reproduces what is thought and at the same time is grammatically correct, natural, appropriate and is appropriate. ”In a broader sense, elegance means“ anything that gives the impression of being pleasing , especially with the secondary concept of the new and fashionable ; especially in clothing, in home furnishings, etc. ” Paul Valéry put it more generally in 1922:“ Elegantia - that means freedom and economy transferred into the visible - informality, ease in difficult matters. Finding without giving the appearance of having searched - knowledge without revealing that one has learned. "
In the summer of 2014, a design conference on the subject of "Elegance" took place in Berlin, curated by the philosopher Hannes Böhringer, the designer Axel Kufus and the photographer Hans Hansen.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ elegance . In: duden.de; Retrieved November 21, 2011.
- ↑ a b elegance . In: Meyers Großes Konversations-Lexikon . 6th edition. Volume 5, Bibliographical Institute, Leipzig / Vienna 1906, p. 602 .
- ↑ elegance. In: Digital dictionary of the German language . Retrieved November 21, 2011
- ^ Paul Valéry: Cahiers / Hefte. Based on the French edition edited by Judith Robinson. by Hartmut Köhler , Jürgen Schmidt-Radefeldt . Volume 1. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 1987, ISBN 3-10-087011-5 , p. 424.
- ↑ http://www.kufus.de/eleganz-demo/