How the objects around us have become active participants in everyday life?
March 1, 2021 – June 5, 2022
Imagine the museum collection as an entity with numerous arms, which repeatedly attempt to wiggle out beyond the doors, walls, and multitudes of objects swallowed into it. It is enclosed within various spaces, and devotedly cared for by the museum staff – which ensures that it will not suffer from excessive humidity, dryness, light, insects or other harmful intrusions. Most of the objects were not created especially for museum collections. They were designed to be used, to interact with one another and with us human beings. Within the museum, however, few are the objects that enjoy moments of grace, during which they are temporarily put on display. There, they will be flooded by the museum’s non-UV lights, and met by the visitors’ gazes. Perhaps they will even be momentarily caressed by an unruly visitor, who will leave a mark on them. Shortly after, they will return to the dark recesses of the collection space.
Photo: Elad Sarig
The exhibition Black Box was an opportunity to expose the museum’s entrails. The removal of the collection from its dark storage space and its presentation to the public allows for a discussion of a somewhat invisible aspect of the design world – the nature of the relations between objects and people. The museum invited the audience to try and observe these relations in a new and sober manner; to attempt to abandon our definitions of object and person, self and other – turning instead to openly explore role changes and multiples points of view.
The exhibition was composed of four parts, which operated both jointly and separately. The Lower Gallery explored the essence of the museum collection – its value, composition, and hierarchical relations. The exhibition “A Research Design Collection” (curator: Adi Hamer Yacobi), which was on display in the Design Laboratory, examined the relations between a designer and his designs. The display in the Upper Gallery tracked the history of the events structuring the complex relations between people and objects. The exhibition “The Pit: Artifacts Raised Up from the Belly of the Earth”(curators: Avihai Mizrahi and Neil Nenner), in the Peripheral Corridor, was concerned with the life of discarded objects that have been abandoned by their human users. Thus, throughout the exhibition, processes of designing and collecting are revealed as continuous actions involving multiple participants, which arise out of a dialogue between those who are human and those who are not.
Photo: Elad Sarig
Designers, companies and Manufacturers on display:
Antonio Aricò | Tord Boontje | Tal Gur | Konstantin Grcic | Jaime Hayon | Arne Jacobsen | Freshwest | Issey Miyake | Kobi Franco | Richard Sapper | Ayala Serfaty | Yoav Reches | Talia Mukmel | Ami Drach | Dov Ganchrow | Edi Lehavi | Elinor Portnoy | Chiara Onida | Raw Edges Studio (Yael Mer and Shay Alkalay) | nendo | Peter Marigold | Ron Arad | Lea Gottlieb | Andrea Branzi | Alessandro Mendini | Kenya Hara | Hadar Snir | Erez Nevi Pana | Stefan Sagmeister and Jessica Walsh | Kevin Allouche | Ofer Asaf | Dana Zelig | Adi Stern | Shual Studio | Marcel Wanders | Ronen Kadushin | Gilli Kuchik and Ran Amitai | Studio Kahn (Mey and Boaz Kahn) | Adital Ela | Stefan Diez | Naama Agassi | Itay Laniado | Sarit Shani Hay | Oren Arbel | Ilan Molcho | Koby Levy | Meirav Peled Barzilay | RKS | OTOTO (Daniel Gassner and Ori Saidi) | Richard Hutten | Eran Tal | Shmuel Kaplan | Anat Golan | Hanoch Bar-Nitzan | Vlada Kirilové | Gabriel and Maxim Shamir | Yaakov Zim | Taha Afefe | Philip Starck | Itay Noy | Agnieszka Bar | Shira Keret | Dov Moran (SanDisk) | Studio Under | Studio Gilli Kuchik and Ran Amitai | Shaul Cohen | Tamara Efrat and Michal Shaham | Zohar Sally | Shachar Geiger, Michal Rinott, Eran Gal-Or, Luka Or | Netta Shanwald | Michal Leschinsky | Durrell Bishop and Robert Poll | Sharon Murro | Nastya Komarov | Amir Loval | | Ori Blich | Padwa Design Studio (Alex Padwa, Gilad Davidi) | SpaceIL | Tal Batit | Raptor nest cam | Guard From Above | Assaf Reeb | Adi Zaffran Weisler | Dana Peled | Ben Lev | Gal Sharir | Gal Cohen | Liron Peretz | Yakir Mordehay | M.Des Game Design and Development, Shenkar | HARBO Technologies | Stratasys | Medinol (manufacturer) | Autocars (manufacturer) | Oneg (manufacturer) | Copenhagen Telephone Company (KTAS) and the telephone factory GN-Telematic (GNT) (manufacturer) | Dyson (manufacturer) | Gal On (manufacturer) | Amcor (manufacturer) | J. Princenteil (manufacturer) | Netafim| Aiwa (manufacturer) | Kal-Kar Ein Carmel (manufacturer) | Apple (manufacturer) | Bezeq | Brill Shoe Industries (manufacturer) | Philips (manufacturer) | Haim Murro (manufacturer) | Bosch (manufacturer) | Panasonic (manufacturer) | PELE (tailor-made solutions for children), Innovation Center, ALYN hospital, Jerusalem | DJI (manufacturer) | Percepto (manufacturer) | Given Imaging (manufacturer) | Studio Scan The City | Guy Königstein
