Crafting Modernism: Midcentury American Art and Design
Museum of Arts and Design, New York October 2011 — January 2012
Memorial Art Gallery, Rochester, New York February 2012 - May 2012
Focusing on the dynamic relationship between craft, art, and design, Crafting Modernism, co-curated with Jennifer Scanlan, showcased bold new directions in craft media during the postwar years. The exhibition highlighted Peter Voulkos, Lenore Tawney, Isamu Noguchi, and Alexander Calder, among other artists who bridged the traditional divide between art and craft.
The first section of the exhibition focused on the years from 1945 to the late 1950s when the independent craftsmen lifestyle became a compelling alternative to the anonymity of the corporate world. The second portion heralded the crafted object as a work of art informed by Abstract Expressionism, Pop Art, funk, and social commentary. Domestic vignettes evoked the cool and countercultural posture of the era.
“The Museum of Arts and Design…has mounted a show far more ambitious than its intimate scale suggests. Crafting Modernism: Midcentury American Art and Design redefines crafts in terms of the social, cultural and artistic revolutions of the Mid-20th century.”
—Ada Louis Huxtable, Wall Street Journal
I worked with architect and designer Wendy Evans Joseph to develop two floors of the museum for the exhibition. We chose a stark white background to best set off the variety of media and expressions in the exhibition. Semi-circular vignettes allowed for the recreation of midcentury interiors.
Crafting Modernism: Midcentury American Art and Design
Exhibition Catalogue
As with the exhibition, the scholarly catalogue was the fourth in a series of catalogues for The Centenary Project led by the Museum of Arts and Design to chart the history American craft in the 20th century. The book explores the origins of the studio craft movement, the international influences that helped it grow, and its convergence with the fine arts and design. It reveals how a new generation of craftspeople began to express cultural identity and artistic innovation through their work, which led to a proliferation of the craft movement in museums and exhibitions worldwide. Edited by Jeannine Falino. Harry N. Abrams, 360 pages. 9.5 x 1.5 x 11 inches. ISBN 978-0810984806
Lectures & Workshops
Crafting Modernism: Midcentury American Art and Design, San Francisco Decorative Arts Forum, April 10, 2012; Spencer Museum of Art, University of Kansas, February 28, 2013
Crafting Modernism: Midcentury American Art and Design in conversation with Wendell Castle, Rochester Memorial Art Gallery, February 24, 2012