MIAMI BEACH, FLORIDA.- The Wolfsonian presents "Art and Design in the Modern Age: Selections From the Wolfsonian Collection." Art and Design in the Modern Age provides an intriguing overview of The Wolfsonian’s exceptional holdings and showcases the museum’s collection, which spans the period 1885 to 1945. The nearly 300 works on display provide insight into the ways design has influenced and adapted to the modern world. The installation explores the many focal points of The Wolfsonian’s collection, including design-reform movements, architecture, urbanism, industrial design, transportation, world’s fairs, advertising, political propaganda, and labor iconography.
Art and Design in the Modern Age engages the observer both visually and intellectually. The wide-ranging themes and objects provide not only a picture of the past, but a path to understanding today’s cultural and political issues. Among the items exhibited are ceramics, sculpture, exquisite handmade and innovative mass-production furniture, graphic design, books, ephemera, and household objects. Some of the more outstanding objects on display include a handmade box combining Arts and Crafts tenets with Maori decorative motifs by New Zealand silversmith Reuben Watts; Electricity, a bas-relief produced for the 1933 Chicago World’s Fair; mass-produced moderne furniture by American industrial designers Kem Weber and Paul Frankl; and Alexander Stirling Calder’s sculpture, Star, a female figure he created for the Panama-Pacific Exposition of 1915.