Design and the Elastic Mind

MoMA EXHIBITION DESIGN AND THE ELASTIC MIND EXPLORES THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN DESIGN, SCIENCE, AND INNOVATION

Over 200 Objects, Including Four Special Commissions, Highlight How Design is the Bridge Between Advanced Research and Everyday Life

NEW YORK, February 20, 2008—Design and the Elastic Mind is an exhibition about the latest developments in design, and a glimpse into what the future holds. It explores the reciprocal relationship between science and design in the contemporary world, bringing together more than 200 objects, installations, and concepts that marry the most advanced scientific research with attentive considerations of human nature, limitations, habits, and aspirations. The exhibition shows designers’ ability to grasp momentous revolutions in technology, science, and history that demand or reflect major adjustments in human behavior, and to convert them into objects that people can actually understand and use. The objects in the exhibition range from images of nanoscopic devices to vehicles, from appliances to interfaces, and from pragmatic solutions for everyday use to provocative ideas meant to influence our future choices. The exhibition, on view from February 24 to May 12, 2008, is organized by Paola Antonelli, Senior Curator, and Patricia Juncosa Vecchierini, Curatorial Assistant, Department of Architecture and Design, The Museum of Modern Art.

Ms. Antonelli says, “This exhibition highlights current examples of successful design translations of disruptive scientific and technological innovations, and reflects on how the figure of the designer has changed from form giver to fundamental interpreter of an extraordinarily dynamic reality.”

Over the past 25 years, under the influence of such milestones as the introduction of the personal computer, the Internet, and wireless technology, people have experienced dramatic changes in several mainstays of their existence, as well as in their notions of time, space, matter, and individuality. People cope daily with dozens of adjustments of scale and pace: working across several time zones, traveling with relative ease between satellite maps and microscopic images, and being inundated with information. Adaptability is an ancestral distinction of intelligence, but today’s instant variations in rhythm call for something stronger: elasticity, the byproduct of adaptability plus acceleration.

Design and the Elastic Mind includes objects, projects, and concepts by teams of designers, scientists, architects, and engineers from all over the world, ranging from the nanoscale to the cosmological scale, and includes four commissions made especially for this exhibition: a Web-based imaginary city by Peter Frankfurt, Greg Lynn, and Alex McDowell; a Web site by Jonathan Harris and Sep Kamvar that explores Web dating and the dynamic of relationships in a digital world; a transformable structure by Chuck Hoberman; and an architectural exploration of self-assembly and modularity across scales by Aranda/Lasch.

The installation begins at the very small scale, with the display of scientists’ experiments with nanostructures and of designers’ interpretation of the possibilities and implications of nanophysics, biology, and biomimicry. Visitors then encounter a large area devoted to the human scale, with an array of scenarios and design ideas meant to spark debate and reflection on the way people live and will live, as well as to inspire individuals to design future behaviors with equal care and elasticity. The exhibition ends with the large scale, and explores the dimension of the city, the world, and the Internet, as well as the analysis of large quantities of data in genomic research. Within these different scales, there are examples of projects that address particular areas of research related scale, responsiveness in time and space, and elasticity.

Design and the Elastic Mind
Kuratoren: Paola Antonelli, Patricia Juncosa Vecchierini

Künstler: Michael Anastassiades, Rudolf Bannasch, Anthony Dunne, Fiona Raby, Benjamin Aranda, Chris Lasch, Clay Coffey, Kamau Amu Patton, Ron Rosenman, Aranda / Lasch, Matthew L. Scullinof Usa, Julien Arnaud, James Auger, Jimmy Loizeau, Leif Kniese, Markus Fischer, Marie-Virginie Berbet, Fernanda Bertini Viealgas, Martin Wattenberg, Constantin Boym, Laurene Leon Boym, Colin Bulthaup, Yves Bealhar, Bret Recor, Acques Gagneal, Eyal Burstein, Michele Gauler, Peter Marigold, Michael Burton, Elio Caccavale, Rauall Caalrdenas Osuna, Oron Catts, Ionat Zurr, Guy Ben-Ary, Oron Catts, Ionat Zurr, Morgan Clements, Samuel Cabot Cochran, Benjamin Wheeler Howes, Matali Crasset, Martino D´esposito, Frealdealric Kaplan, Brendan Dawes, Paul Degnan, Martin Demaine , Noam Toran, Ammar Eloueini, Oded Ezer, Amy Franceschini, Michael Swaine, Stijn Schiffeleers,Noah Murphy-Reinhertz, Felice Frankel, Greg Lynn, Alex Mcdowell, Ben Fry, Michele Gauler, Noel Gorelick, Michael Weiss-Malik, Noel Gorelick, Matthew D. Hancher, Michael Joseph Broxton, Noelle Steber, Roman Kofman, Patrick J. Auld, Toby Hadden, David Cameron , Jayden D. Harman, Jonathan Harris, Sep Kamvar, Lothar Harzheim, Sam Hecht, Kim Colin, Ippei Matsumoto, Gwendolyn Floyd, Simon Heijdens, Hugh Herr, Jeff Weber, Bruce Deffenbaugh, Chuck Hoberman, Matthew Davis, Ziggy Drozdowski, David Wight, Adrian Holovaty, Young Hyun, Robert Jan De Heer, Gavin Jancke, Agata Jaworska, Jon Ardern, Crispin Jones, Graham Pullin, Anton Schubert, Mat Hunter, Crispin Jones, Stuart Karten, Simon Sollberger, Sheila Kennedy, Sloan Kulper, Jason O´mara, Patricia Gruits, Heather Micka-Smith, Casey Smith, Tobie Kerridge, Nikki Stott, Ian Thompson, James King, Elias Maria Knubben, Markus Fischer, Aaron Koblin, Hannes Koch, Florian Ortkrass, Stuart Wood, Laura Kurgan, Eric Cadora, David Reinfurt, Sarah Williams, Janne Kyttanen, Jiri Evenhuis, Joris Laarman, Sofia Lagerkvist, Charlotte Von Der Lancken, Anna Lindgren, Katja Saanvstroanm, Robert J. Lang American, Roderick Hyde, Sham Dixit, Arnie Heller, Mathieu Lehanneur, David Edwards, Juanrg Lehni, Uli Franke, Amanda Levete, Tomaals Gabzdil Libertialny, Johan Liden, Yifei Zha, Shu-Feng Liu, Li-Qing Zhou, Guo-Ning Hu, Sang-Jun Yoo, Damien Lopez, Andrzej Loreth, Stefan Spoerl, Manuel Saez, Brad Augustine, Barrett Lyon, Lualex Adai, Thomas G. Mason, Carlos J. Hernandez, Eriko Matsumura, David Mcnamara, Alberto Meda, Francisco Goalmez Paz, Mikael Metthey, Ana Mir, Hidenori Miyazawa, Keisuke Ueda, Miquel Mora Spanish, Volker Morawe, Tilman Reiff, Rainer Mugrauer, Guannther Mugrauer, Clemens Gebert, Markus Fischer, Janis Mussat, Adam Putter, Shigeru Naito, Etsuro Okuyama, Nicholas Negroponte, Rebecca Allen, Mary Lou Jepsen, Mark Foster, Michail Bletsas, V. Michael Bove, Yves Bealhar, Bret Recor, Jacques Gagneal, John Hutchinson, Michiko Nitta, Sebastien Noel, Damian O´sullivan, Kara Oehler, Christopher Allen, Jesse Shapins, Brian House, Geoffrey Guinta, Nathan Phillips, Kapono Chung, Chahn Chung, Alan Outten, Hannah Tobin, Roisin-Flora Culligan-Hughes, Roisin Sheahan, Gagandeep Chawla, Maddi Neye Swift, Amara Hameed British, Sophia Ivanetic, Jessica Wallace, Mateusz Iwaniec, Neri Oxman, Emili Padroals, W. Bradford Paley, Peter Pfeiffer, Dan Phiffer, Julius Popp, James Powderly, Evan Roth, Theo Watson, Matt Pyke, Karsten Schmidt, Eric Rodenbeck, Michal Migurski, Shawn Allen, Tomas Apodaca, Gabriel Dunne, Nicolas Roope, Sebastien Noel, Kam Young, Paul W. K. Rothemund, Takaya Fukumoto, Keith Schwab, Michael Roukes, Carlo Ratti, Kristian Kloeckl, Assaf Biderman, Margaret Ellen Haller, Francisca Rojas, Aaron Koblin, Andrea Vaccari, Saskia Sassen, William M. Shih, Susana Soares Portuguese, Ian Spiro, Lars Spuybroek, Bailey Stevens, Lisa Strausfeld, James Nick Sears, Christian Marc Schmidt, Takaaki Okada, Walter Bender, Eben Eliason, Marco Pesenti Gritti, Christopher Blizzard, Alex Tingle, Noam Toran, Nobumichi Tosa, Ryota Kuwakubo, Nobumichi Tosa, Barry A. Trimmer, David Troy, Marcel Twohig, Peter Sheehan, Demetrie Tyler, Jeroen Verhoeven, Judith De Graauw, Moritz Waldemeyer, Michael Watling, Peter Haythornthwaite, Andrew Haythornthwaite, David Haythornthwaite, Dean Edgington, Martin Wattenberg, Marek Walczak, Bernhard Weigl, John Gerdes, Paul Yager, Phil Tarr, Scott Wilson, Rachel Wingfield, Mathias Gmachl, Christopher Woebken, Robert J. Wood, Keijiro Yamamoto, Tomoaki Yanagisawa, Viktor Zykov, Stathis Mytilinaios, Hod Lipson ...