Pattern & Ornament: Outside Visit - Art and Design in the Modern Age at the Wolfsonian Miami

Selfie at the Wolfsonian

As soon as I enter this exhibition I felt in other era and all I wanted was to take the majority of these objects home. I love how the exhibit was divided in 10 different sections such as:

Stained Glass Window 

• Forces of Modernity
• Political Persuasion
• The Irish Free State
• All the World's Fair
• Clean, Sanitary, Efficient: Improving the Modern Home
• Living with Modernity
• Modern Decorative Arts
• Portraiture and Person hood
• Constructing the Modern World
• Americans All

My favorite part of the exhibition was "all the world's a fair", "clean, sanitary, efficient: improving the modern home", and "living with modernity" because they show  objects such as cameras, souvenirs from art fairs, radios, kitchens, TV, coffee pots, etc, with such a beautiful design. 

Radios, Film Projector and Telephones

All these objects seem to have a fine material selection, handcraft manufacturing, uniqueness (few's of the same object), completely different from today house ware; mass produce, copy one from another and using the cheapest made in china industry. Also, I was impressed of how brands that we commonly see in our household like General Electric or WestingHouse had been producing, changing their designs and their process. I was engage with mostly the majority of the objects in this exhibition. I was specially excited with the electronics. I really wanted to be the owner of these treasure objects. Also, I was intrigued by some of the artwork included in the exhibition like "Doppelakt": a nude painting of two ladies embracing Nazi ideals of fertility and female body. 

Doppelakt ( double nude) c.1940
Ivo Saliger

I was impressed by the stained glass window as well; the details and the colors, plus the narrative on each panel make a really interesting piece. My favorite object from the exhibition was the "Kodak Bantam Special Camera" from 1936 designed by Walter Dorwin Teague.

Other interesting aspect of this exhibition was how in "improving the modern life" designers consider the material, the innovation and the form for these beautiful pieces. In the other hand, is sad to realize how before designers and industries seem to invest more time into their products while now days seem to only worry for their own popularity completely separating art from design.

clock selfie

Kodak Bantam Special Camera designed by:
Walter Dorwin Teague