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Thoughts on a Button

Recently at the museum, I saw a group of geometric portraits by the artist Walter Dexel. Looking closer at one of them, something jumped at me:

Painting by Walter Dexel showing a figure with an X-shaped button on their shirt
Walter Dexel, 1933

Can you see it? the shape on the striped shirt "feels" interactive - it's a close button!

I believe most people today will first parse this shape as a "close button" and not a "clothing button". It's interesting to think that when the painting was created in 1933, the meaning that seems so natural today did not even exist.

Button with X on them from iOS 26
Various buttons with x on them from iOS 26

This also caused me to wonder where the UI element's name "button" may have originated - obviously, machines have physical buttons as well, but are they linguistically related to clothing buttons?

Well not directly, but they share a common ancestor - the french bouton, meaning bud, protruding knob or something that sticks out.

That's it, just thought it was interesting.