More on Modern Kitchen Chairs

Are your kitchen chairs modern kitchen chairs?  Do you know to tell the difference?  Aren't you pretty sure that all kitchen chairs are technically considered modern?  Is there a difference between modern kitchen chairs and contemporary kitchen chairs?  If there is, should you choose one over the other?  How do you make all of these decisions?  When did choosing kitchen chairs become so complicated?For the purposes of this article, we will use the terms modern and contemporary interchangeably.  While in terms of art history the two are very different, when looking at furniture, there is not a lot of difference between the two.  Modern art is made up of everything from the last of the impressionist paintings to Andy Warhol's soup cans and everything that came between them.  Something that got painted five minutes ago could be considered modern.  Thankfully, when it comes to figuring out whether your chairs are modern kitchen chairs, there are just two criteria to keep in mind:  are the chairs multi functional and are they artistic enough to be appreciated on their own while not serving any practical purpose?  What does that mean?  If your kitchen chairs can serve many purposes while still being chairs they are modern kitchen chairs.  If the chairs can be used as works of art, they are modern/contemporary kitchen chairs.  Most modern furniture serves more than one purpose.  This is not just because the modern art movement calls for this, it is because humans are creative!  Do you use your coffee table to store blankets or games?  Do you use bookcases as places to display your photos and plants?  You have just helped your furniture become modern furniture!  To consider your kitchen chairs modern kitchen chairs, they need to pull double or triple duty:  do you use them as step stools or as small tables?  You have modern kitchen chairs!Some people might scoff at the idea of a chair being a work of art but contemporary kitchen chairs are often exactly that.  The sign of the modern kitchen chair is that it does not have to serve any real purpose for people to appreciate it on an artistic level.  Are your kitchen chairs artistic enough to fulfill that requirement?  Could you sit one of your kitchen chairs in the living room, not put anything on it and still have people admire it for its artistic merits?  If so, then you have modern kitchen chairs!Believe it or not, once upon a time, furniture was purely functional.  Furniture designers did not make an effort to put any sort of artistic design into their furniture—the furniture was strictly utilitarian.  Today, however, modern kitchen chairs are works of art!  Some people assume that modern kitchen chairs and contemporary kitchen chairs need to be painted in certain ways and be made from specific materials.  The truth is that as long as your chairs have artistic merit and can be multifunctional they can be considered contemporary kitchen chairs and modern kitchen chairs.