What I love about art is that you can find it in everyday things. Just by going outside you can see art in nature, the grocery store, or even Starbucks (sometimes this requires taking the lid off of you Caramel Macchiato to see what design has formed in the foam). Art, in a way, is in the eye of the beholder. Things don’t simply have to be labeled “art” for them to inspire people.
According to Business Week, in an article titled “Art Museum as Research Lab,” this is the approach the MoMA in New York has taken for an exhibit that ran in February titled “Design and the Elastic Mind.” This collection showcases pieces that previously wouldn’t have been considered art, at least by museum standards. The article states:
“The show, “Design and the Elastic Mind,” features 200 projects by a host of international designers and firms, and gives a nod to “hot” technologies and new economic opportunities and consumer products. Innovative processes represented in the exhibition including nanotechnology, design for new markets in developing nations, and “three-dimensional printing” of physical objects directly from computer files.”
I love this idea! This exhibit will get people to look at everyday things such as technology or consumer goods in a whole new light. I don’t think the average consumer thinks about what goes into designing today’s products, much less appreciate it. What they don’t realize however, is that this is a very important factor when it comes to purchase decisions. The way a product is designed, the color and artwork depicted on the packaging, all influence you in some way. To buy or not to buy…
An exhibit I was fortunate enough to see last summer, “Das Auge des Himmels” at the Gasometer in Oberhausen, Germany, had a similar theme combining technology and art. The collection consisted of satellite images of different landforms on Earth, but magnificently colored to enhance the image. Some pictures didn’t even resemble anything except a fascinating work of art, until you read the title and recognize certain features. I think art like this gives people a different view of the planet we live on and helps them to appreciate it in a different way.
1 response so far ↓
heynowyeah // June 5, 2008 at 6:14 pm
there’s an interesting phenomenon in the last few years of artists specifically creating art AS a commercial good, too (sort of the inverse of what you were talking about with the amount of work that goes into designing a commercial product: the amount of commercializing that goes into some artistic pieces). there are people, for example, who make one of a kind designer soccer balls. others mass produce their pieces of art, such as marcel dzama (for example, he drew the cover art on beck’s popular album _guero_). some say it’s a contamination of the art world, others say it’s a way of bringing affordable art to the people… and still others are a bit muddled on the subject
seriously though, marcel has some very cool sketch work. it’s worth checking out http://www.richardhellergallery.com/dynamic/artist.asp?ArtistID=3
thanks for this posting! i enjoyed the read.