NEW YORK.- The Museum of Modern Art presents Digitally Mastered: Recent Acquisitions from the Museum's Collection, a new installation in the Museum's galleries for architecture and design that focuses on new developments in digital design and the ways in which they are profoundly affecting the manufacturing of a wide range of objects. Twenty-six recent acquisitions—from Issey Miyake and Dai Fujiwara's mass-produced and customizable wardrobe APOC "Queen" Textile to furniture produced with computer-guided robotic machinery—exemplify the diversity of the digital technologies employed by today's most inventive designers and show how the use of these experimental digital manufacturing techniques are beginning to result in greater energy efficiency, increased consumer involvement, and a decentralized means of production that allows geographic flexibility. The Philip Johnson Architecture and Design Galleries are reinstalled annually to highlight aspects of the Museum's extensive collection of architecture and design. Digitally Mastered: Recent Acquisitions from the Museum's Collection, on view through November 2007, is organized by Paola Antonelli, Curator, and Christian Larsen, Curatorial Assistant, Department of Architecture and Design, The Museum of Modern Art.

Developments in computer software, hardware, and computer-aided manufacturing over the last two decades have provided designers with powerful tools to realize their designs. Contemporary designers are able to imagine and draft complex geometric forms using computeraided design (CAD) software, as seen in preliminary architectural CAD drawings of the Yokohama International Port Terminal (2000) by Foreign Office Architects, London (founded 1992). These drawings, acquired by the Museum as CAD files, show how computer-aided design can influence the ways buildings are conceived, structured, and built. In some instances, CAD drawings are translated by computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) hardware to directly produce material objects. CAM first appeared in the automotive and aerospace industries in the 1960s, and was heralded by Jaguar's E-Type Roadster (1961), which is presented in the exhibition as a predecessor to the algorithmic foundation of the digitally designed and manufactured objects on display. The curves and swells of the car's body resulted from spatial coordinates derived through complex mathematical calculations based on the ellipse.

Computer numerical control (CNC), an example of CAM hardware, is able to cut and carve through steel, wood, and other materials, and has revolutionized manufacturing by producing complex 3D forms efficiently, accurately, and with less human labor. The Cinderella Table (2004) by the Dutch design collective Demakersvan, is distinguished by graceful lines that were generated by digitally merging the profiles of two Rococo tables in a single, sweeping gesture. It was created through CNC milling, and then finished by hand.

Rapid Manufacturing, another technique (RM), "prints" three-dimensional objects directly from a CAD file, using laser beams that selectively solidify liquid or powder resin. The result is an exact copy of the computer model, produced with virtually no material waste. C2 Solid Chair (2004)—one of the first products of its scale to be produced with RM—and the One_shot.MGX foldable stool (2006), both by Patrick Jouin (France, b. 1967), demonstrate the potential of this process to be a force in manufacturing as well as a tool for expressive experimentation.

Innovative works requiring involvement by the user are represented in the exhibition by the Garland Light (2002) by Tord Boontje (Dutch, b. 1968), a flat sheet of brass cut in a floral pattern that the customer wraps around a bare lightbulb to create a customized effect. Issey Miyake's (Japanese, b. 1938) A-POC "Queen" Textile (1997) is a complete and customizable wardrobe cut out of a roll of fabric that was produced industrially on a digital loom. Consumers can visit Miyake's boutiques and cut the clothes to their specifications.

Examples of the first interactive design objects acquired by MoMA are shown with John Maeda's (American, b. 1966) five Reactive Books, printed works with digital interactive components, all five digital components of which—12 o'clocks (1996), Flying Letters (1995), The Reactive Square (1994), and Tap, Type, Write (1998), and Mirror Mirror (2006)—are included in the installation.

Within the exhibition is a display of all 69 issues of Emigre magazine (1984-2005), an alternative graphic design culture publication that set the standard for digital typography and design. An example of digital experimentation, it provided a forum for a growing community of digital designers. Emigre Graphics, the digital type foundry, is represented in the exhibition's graphics and labels with their bitmapped typeface Lo-Res Teens. Digitally Mastered also includes examples of laser-cut models, digitally rendered architectural projects, and a CNC milled blade from a jet engine.