“Flat-Pack” Exhibition Design Becomes an Eco-Functionalist solution for the First International Exhibition to Survey Ritual as a Focus in 21st Century Art and Design.

On view at The Jewish Museum from September 13, 2009 to February 7, 2010

About the Exhibition Design

For the design of this installation Incorporated introduced the notion of “exhibition as ritual.” Formal elements of ritual, like repetition, order, and symmetry have been mobilized in the organization of the exhibition to reinforce the curatorial mission.

“Exhibitions, like ritual, make claims on the body, and can operate on a number of different emotional and intellectual levels simultaneously. The exhibition design takes full advantage of this.”
- Daniel Belasco, Exhibit Curator, The JM

Another major element of the exhibition design is the system of tables, bases, and panels that were designed to display the range of art and design objects included in the exhibition. Raw plywood is cut and slotted so the pieces smoothly join together as tables, bases and panels. The plywood boards are held together by gravity; there is no glue or nails to affix them. After the exhibition closes in New York, all the cases and panels can be popped apart, stacked, and shipped to San Francisco Jewish Museum, where they will be reinstalled.

Call it eco-functionalism: the old modernist ideals of rationality stripped of ornament, combined with the postmodernist values of environmentalism and sustainability.

Finally, the Piano Nobile (2nd floor) of the Warburg Mansion have been beautifully restored for this exhibition. •

About the Exhibition

New York, NY — Artists and designers’ rising interest in ritual since the 1990s inspires Reinventing Ritual: Contemporary Art and Design for Jewish Life, the first international exhibition to survey this phenomenon.

Reinventing Ritual features nearly sixty innovative works, created between 1999 and 2009 by leading artists in diverse media.  Visitors will see outstanding examples of industrial design, architecture, installation art, video, drawing, metalwork, jewelry, ceramics, comics, sculpture, and textiles, revealing the intersections of creative freedom and Jewish life.

A mix of emerging artists and accomplished leaders in the field, most of whom are American and Israeli, with a smaller number of Europeans and South Americans, are represented.  Among the 58 artists are Oreet Ashery, Jonathan Adler, Helène Aylon, Deborah Grant, Sigalit Landau, Virgil Marti, Mierle Laderman Ukeles, Karim Rashid, Galya Rosenfeld, Lella Vignelli, and Allan Wexler.

All incorporate an active experimentation with contemporary Jewish life and culture into their work.  Following its New York City showing, Reinventing Ritual travels to the Contemporary Jewish Museum, San Francisco, where it can be seen from April 22 through September 28, 2010.•