The Pasadena Museum of California Art recently hosted the 2010 California Design Biennial, titled "Action/Reaction." The exhibition attempted to display "how California's established and emerging designers are responding to and finding inspiration in today's economic, political, and environmental challenges and uncertainties." The objects curated into the exhibition focused on themes such as environmental sustainability, consumerism, and urbanization. The featured artists were chosen for their work's ability to "challenge the notion that design is just aesthetics by showing it as a vital cultural force that shapes and responds to our changing world."
The overarching theme of the exhibition was broad enough to encompass a number of smaller subjects. For example, the work of Tanya Aguiniga responds to the modern feeling of isolation. The modern person finds him/herself struggling to accept globalization while at the same time maintaining a sense of individuality. Aguiniga reacts against this sense of loneliness and lostness, claiming that her woven rope necklaces speaks to the "interconnectedness of societies, the beauty in struggle and the celebration of culture."
Michel Berandi's First Earth Battalion (2009) struck me as one of the most extreme representations of the exhibition's theme. His sculpture takes the form of a women clad in a black leather jacket and heels constructed of antelope horns while a shock of hair resembling "a compressed billow of smoke" erupts from the back of the biker helmet. His vision is brooding, characterized by a "darkly romantic aesthetic colored by an apocalyptic reaction to modern life." Though many of the designs featured in the biennial displayed bright colors and hopeful themes, Berandi's work sat at the head of the opposite end of the spectrum. He represented a more pessimistic view of the future, where people must turn inward to protect themselves, rather than opening out to embrace tomorrow.
I found Raven Kauffman's work the most interesting of the exhibition. Her designs were, first and foremost, aesthetically beautiful (and also gloriously curated -- the suspended objects projected eerie, gorgeous organic patterns upon the wall that added an additional dimension to the display), which I have always considered the primary purpose of both art and design. But not only that, but her work was conceptually fascinating as well as functional. She designs purses and handbags in the image of objects in nature. Each of her accessories are painstakingly intricate and one of a kind. Her work challenges the conformity of modern materialism, responding with consumer goods that are unique instead of mass-produced, crafted by hand rather than machine.
Meanwhile, I found the work of Koi Suwanngate to be the least compelling. Her fashion designs, while constructed of recycled materials, struck me as very conventional. Floral influences, feminine ruffles, traditional silhouettes -- classically beautiful motifs, but also very common tricks. Perhaps this aesthetic is her intent. While fashion pretends to move forward, it often falls back upon tradition for tried and true molds of success. Nevertheless, I did not see her work as particularly innovative, merely pretty.
As a whole, I found the exhibition to be fascinating. It encouraged me to consider Design in ways I tend to neglect. I habitually think of "design" in terms of graphics, ad campaigns, and other such obviously aesthetic objects. I forget to also consider the beauty in functionality. Product design is as vital a branch of Design as a flashy iPod commercial. "Action/Reaction" reminded me that the best designers are those that adapt their work to remain beautiful and useful in an ever-changing world.
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