Tour the back streets of Chicago on two wheels on the Eccentric Roadside Art Bike Tour, or see the most up-to-date in Swedish style from emerging artists. If you are in the Big Apple, visit a forum to learn about Japanese design tendencies, or a board which explores the motives for The Return of Modernism. If you’re looking for ways to become motivated, or simply love getting out amid other style fans, here is our shortlist of events from around the nation.
textilemuseum.org
EXHIBITION — Oct. 21, 2011 — Jan. 8, 2012
Second Lives: the Age-Old Art of Recycling Textiles
The Textile Museum
Washington, DC
See how fabrics from around the world have taken on Another life in an exhibition on display through early next year. Throughout the world, fabrics were regarded too valuable to discard. The collection highlights how many cultures have repurposed fabrics to create beautiful new textile forms. Examples from the exhibit include a rare sutra cover made from a 15th-century Chinese position badge, a vest created from a Pacific Northwest coast Chilkat blanket (pictured), and a massive patchwork dangling from Central Asia stitched together in small scraps of silk ikat as well as other cloths. Also featured are a pictorial kantha from India embroidered with threads recycled from old saris, a coat from 19th-century Japan painstakingly woven from rags, and other fabrics that are recycled.
americanswedish.org
EXHIBIT — Oct. 22, 2011 – Jan. 29, 2012
17 Swedish Designers
American Swedish Historical Museum
Philadelphia, PA
Explore the functions from 17 up-and-coming female Swedish style professionals on display in the American Swedish Historical Museum. In what is a male-dominated field, these emerging designers are all early in their professions, and follow in the strong tradition of Swedish style demonstrating form and function, streamlined aesthetics, and relative affordability. The exhibitions consists of 3-10 goods from each designer, which range from small items, such as porcelain and glass to larger fabrics and furniture pieces. Their functions were originally shown at Gallery Pascale, Stockholm’s first gallery dedicated exclusively layout, and subsequently inspired a book and traveling exhibition of the same name.
shopwhitney.org
EXHIBIT — Oct. 22, 2011-Jan. 8, 2012
David Smith: Cubes and Anarchy
Whitney Museum of American Art
New York, NY
In case you are a sculpture enthusiast, stop by the Whitney to explore more than 60 works, including sculptures, drawings, paintings and rarely-seen sketchbooks by the great American sculptor David Smith (1906–1965). The exhibit Cubes and Anarchy provides new insight into the artist’s career-long involvement with geometric forms. Traditionally, the simplified geometry of Smith’s monumental Cubi and Zig sculptures of the 1960s were seen as a departure from the Surrealist and Expressionistic tendencies of the earlier work.This display shows the artist’s most iconic late masterpieces to be continuations of his long-standing explanation of geometric abstraction.
BIKE TOUR — Oct. 23, 2011
Eccentric Roadside Art Bike Tour
1 p.m. – 6 p.m., $20 / $15 Intuit Members
Chicago, IL
Get your bike pushers ready for a back-alley bike tour through the North Side of Chicago. In a collaboration between Chicago Neighborhood Bike Tours and INTUIT, you’ll be riding beneath freeways, alongside viaducts, and through parks to see some intriguing artwork. Rain or shine, the 12-mile tour begins at INTUIT with a guided tour of the exhibitions before winding through Chicago local streets. Taking inspiration in the work of Von Bruenchenhein, this tour will put emphasis on the bizarre: architectural curiosities, funky hand crafted signs, interesting murals and memorials, bizarre decorations in community gardens, and eccentric yard art. The bike tour will finish in the Roger Brown Study Collection finishing with a guided tour featuring Brown’s wide selection of roadside ephemera and work by Chicago self-taught artists.
ARCHITECT’S FORUM — Nov. 10, 2011
New Japan Architecture: Recent Works & New Trends
Japan Society
New York, NY
Connect architect Edward Suzuki and Dr. Geeta Mehta, Adjunct Professor of Architecture at Columbia University, as they discuss the latest in residential, commercial and public architecture jobs in Japan. Japanese design has always been noticed for its global tendencies: pure white cubes, bold forms, technological innovation and a move towards sustainable design. The techniques and forms of traditional Japanese design are informing a completely different generation of cutting style. Engage in this forum as they follow and follow the development of tendencies coming from Japan. A book signing and reception will follow.
KuDa Photography
PANEL — Nov. 12, 2011,
3 p.m.
The Return of Modernism
Museum of Arts and Design
New York, NY
Secure a chair in a panel discussion exploring why the go-to Modernism design in the 1960s, including the rise of designers Russel Wright, Eero Saarinen and Charles and Ray Eames, is currently experiencing a unique revival. Organized by the New York School of Interior Design in partnership with the Museum of Arts and Design, the panelists include Vladimir Kagan, Jack Lenor Larsen, Evan Snyderman, and Anna Hoffman. Engage in the conversation as the panelists — that have been included in both the revolution and present revival — offer responses to the question, “Why now?” The panel will be moderated by Judith Gura, Professor of Design History in the New York School of Interior Design.
No bookings required; seating is on a first-come, first-served basis.
More layout occasions:
Oct. 7-28, 2011, Oct. 14-Nov. 4, 2011
What is in your calendar this past month? Let us learn about your favourite forthcoming layout events below!