MA Program in the History of Design and Curatorial Studies Newsletter Winter 2014

NEWSLETTER VOL 2 NO 2 WINTER 2014

Cooper Hewitt Reopens 1

Y OF R O T S I H E H T IN MA PROGRAM IES D U T S L A I R O URAT C D N A N G I S DE COOPER HEWITT REOPENS DECEMBER 12 Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum’s major renovation project is complete. The museum reopens to the public on Friday, December 12.

Alumni are invited to attend the official opening ceremony, which begins at 10:00 a.m. on the front steps of the museum at 2 East 91st Street.

Alumni are also invited to a special preview reception the night before. See last page for details.

The museum boasts 60 percent more gallery space to present its important collection and temporary exhibitions and offers an entirely new and invigorated visitor experience, with interactive, immersive creative technologies.

Introducing the MA Program in the History of Design and Curatorial Studies 1 Letter from the Director 2 Faculty Profile: Marie-Leen Ryckaert 2 Summer Program in Belgium and the Netherlands 3 Alumni Events 3-4 Alumni Proflie: Amy Weinstein 4 Goings On In the MA Program 5 Save the Date 6

INTRODUCING THE MA PROGRAM IN THE HISTORY OF DESIGN AND CURATORIAL STUDIES Exciting changes are taking place in the master’s program. The program has changed its name from the MA in the History of Decorative Arts and Design to the MA in the History of Design and Curatorial Studies. The new title underscores the longstanding distinctive character of the graduate program and its commitment to educating students about curatorial theory and practice in both the classroom and in Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum’s galleries and curatorial departments.

The curriculum will retain its focus on historical, object-based research with Cooper Hewitt’s renowned collection while placing greater emphasis on curatorial practice. Some classes, such as the Proseminar, will involve hands-on training with museum curators, and

in addition to doing comprehensive oral exams or writing an MA thesis, students will soon have the option of doing a curatorial project as their capstone experience in the program.

Coordination with Paris The first cohort studying at Parsons Paris began classes in the MA in the History of Design and Curatorial Studies program this fall.

Now both the New York and Paris MA programs share a name, a curriculum and a credit structure. Students in New York may choose to spend a summer, a semester, or a full year in Paris at Parsons’ new branch campus, benefitting from unique access to the curatorial staff and the collection of the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, and students matriculated

in the Paris MA program will have a chance to study in New York.

A (Very) Brief History of the MA Program 1982 MA in History of Decorative Arts founded by Parsons School of Design and Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum 2005 Parsons MA in History of Decorative Arts program becomes the MA in History of Decorative Arts and Design 2014 MA in History of Decorative Arts and Design becomes MA in the History of Design and Curatorial Studies.

2

MA PROGRAM IN THE HISTORY OF DESIGN AND CURATORIAL STUDIES

LETTER FROM THE DIRECTOR

Eindhoven, inspired by Bauhaus ideas and methods, in the 1950s. The life of Dear Alumni, is an occasion to celebrate Dutch decorative arts, the enduring partnership graphic design, and product It is my pleasure to bring you between Parsons and the design has never since been the winter edition of the MA Smithsonian’s national the same. Contemporary program newsletter. There design museum. Changes Dutch designers and brands have been many exciting underway at both institulike Jongerius Lab and Droog things taking place in the tions signal an embrace of Design continue to overturn program this semester. One new audiences and fresh all expectations. of my priorities as Director approaches to curating and During this seminar these first months has display, thereby advancing students are encouraged to been meeting with Cooper design scholarship. With its study the Dutch material culHewitt curators in an effort new name and renovated ture through the objects in to further integrate the home in Cooper Hewitt, the extensive Cooper Hewitt Marie-Leen Ryckaert master’s program into the the master’s program will collection. A number of items discussed during the classes and with their surroundings life of the museum. For continue developing new will feature at the museum’s both students and faculty, routes into established and in daily situations. collection-based teaching emergent fields related re-opening exhibition. One of The professor, Marie-Leen is one of the distinguishing to historical object-based the highlights of this seminar Ryckaert, is a Senior Lecturer was an exceptional visit to assets of this program, and research and contemporary in Design History and Theory the North so one of my priorities has curatorial practice—and Delegate’s been to strengthen the will remain a home to our bonds between the Cooper program’s community, past Lounge at Hewitt and our master’s and present. the United program. Most classes I always enjoy catching Nations this term have included up with our alumni. Please Headquarcollection visits, a practice let me know if you have any ters in New that will continue in future questions or comments at York, which semesters. lichtmas@newschool.edu. has recently The eagerly anticipated been —Sarah A. Lichtman reopening of Cooper Hewitt re-designed by a Dutch team of designers, FACULTY PROFILE: VISITING LECTURER, including Students at the United Nations. Delegates’ Lounge Hella MARIE-LEEN RYCKAERT Jongerius, Irma Boom and at ArtEZ Institute of the Arts, others, followed by a visit to Arnhem, and brings with her In October, MA Program a traditionally agrarian and the photography and design thirteen years of frequent students had a chance to trading nation – industrialcollection of contribution to the Dutch immerse themselves in a ization began the Consulate Design Magazine ITEMS, as two-week intensive course modestly, and General of the well as an extensive body on Dutch design taught by so did indusKingdom of of research on European Marie-Leen Ryckaert. trial design. the Netherglass, design culture, and The seminar examined Nonetheless lands in New the intersection of material topics in Dutch design the latter York. Both studies and interior design. throughout the 20th century flowered with locations This seminar also preand across diverse media, the founding show how ludes the program’s summer while raising questions of the first Dutch decourse abroad, which will of aesthetics, crafts, European sign-objects be taught by Ryckaert in nationalism, social progress, academy for interact with Belgium and the Netherlands ideology, and commerce. industrial Nijntje (Miffy), designed by Dick Bruna each other this summer.

In the Netherlands – being design in (Dutch), 1955.

COOPER HEWITT, SMITHSONIAN DESIGN MUSEUM

NEWSLETTER 3 DECORATIVE ARTS AND DESIGN FROM THE LOW COUNTRIES: BELGIUM AND THE NETHERLANDS Alumni are welcome to enroll in the summer course abroad. This two-week course presents a unique opportunity to explore design and domestic culture in Flanders (Belgium) and the Netherlands. Starting from the medieval city of Bruges with its rich Burgundian heritage, and

Belfry of Bruges, Belgium

then travelling to Brussels, the course will examine Belgium design through the centuries. Topics include Medieval and Renaissance Decorative Arts and architecture, such as the 14th century Bruges Town Hall and the Gruuthuse Museum, showing decorative arts from the 15th to the 19th century. In addition, the course in Belgium will also highlight Art Nouveau and Art Deco architecture and interiors as well as contemporary design. After three days in Belgium, students will travel by train to the

Netherlands where the course will focus on 19th and 20th century Dutch design. Based in the city of Amsterdam with its numerous museums and galleries, the course will take several day trips to Rotterdam, The Hague, Utrecht, and other places. Highlights include the Kröller-Möller Museum and the Sonneveld House, one of the best-preserved houses in the Nieuwe Bouwen style, the Dutch branch of the International School of Modernism.

In addition, students will also visit the iconic Rietveld-Schröder House. Designers and architects to be covered include: the Belgian Victor Horta, Paul Hankar, Maarten and Fabiaan Van Severen, Danny Venlet, and the Dutch H.P. Berlage, Gerrit Rietveld, Gijs Bakker, Hella Jongerius, Marcel Wanders, Wim Crouwel, and many others.

Also viewing masterpieces by artists like Memling, Van Eyck, Rembrandt, Vermeer and Van Gogh belongs to the program.

In both countries a list with recommended places to visit during the weekend (and how to get there) will be provided.

The course runs July 13th – July 24th, 2015.

For more information: www.newschool.edu/parsons/graduate-international-summer-programs/

PARSONS THE NEW SCHOOL FOR DESIGN

ALUMNI EVENTS

Curatorial Director Cara McCarty leads alumni on a tour of the Carnegie mansion renovations.

Behind-the-Scenes Mansion Tour

Philip Johnson’s Glass House

Alumni were treated to a tour of the mansion under construction, led by Cara McCarty, Curatorial Director of the Cooper Hewitt, on September 12.

A great group of alumni— long-time alumni and recent graduates alike—enjoyed an exclusive tour of the buildings and grounds of Philip Johnson’s modernist

Students, alumni and faculty at Philip Johnson’s Glass House.

4

MA PROGRAM IN THE HISTORY OF DESIGN AND CURATORIAL STUDIES

ALUMNI EVENTS (CONTINUED) masterpiece The Glass House on October 18.

Thanks to MA program student Crista Bazoian, who is the manager of the Visitor Center and Design Store at the Glass House, for facilitating the event.

The group got to tour the iconic 1948 house, which is credited with introducing the International Style to residential architecture and explore other Johnson buildings on grounds, including his extensive subterranean art gallery and post-modern studio spaces. Afterwards, all enjoyed a catered lunch in New Caanan.

Renaissance Tapestries On November 21, alumni had a special tour of the

exhibition “Grand Design: Pieter Coecke van Aelst” and Renaissance Tapestry at the Metropolitan Museum of Art lead by MA Program graduate Sarah Mallory. Mallory is a research assistant in the Department of European Sculpture and Decorative Arts where she assisted with preparations for the newly-opened tapestry exhibition, Grand Design: Pieter Coecke van Aelst and Renaissance tapestry. Sarah also created and oversees the #tapestrytuesday initiative, which highlights Met tapestries on facebook, twitter, and pinterest; she is a monthly contributor to the Now at the Metblog, and manages the Grand Design blog.

The exhibition explores the achievements of the great northern Renaissance master, Pieter Coecke van

Aelst (1502–1550), a master designer, who devised projects across media, from tapestry series, to panel paintings, prints, stained glass, and goldsmith’s work.

The museum has pulled together nineteen of the grand tapestries van Aelst designed, woven in the great workshops of Brussels for collectors from Emperor Charles V, France’s François I, and Henry VIII of England, to Cosimo de Medici, which are displayed alongside a selection of his panel paintings and works on paper.

Parsons is also organizing a symposium around the exhibition. See the “Save the date” box for more details.

Detail of Eve, from God Accuses Adam and Eve after the Fall tapestry in a set of The Story of Creation. Design attributed to Pieter Coecke van Aelst, ca. 1548. Florence Instituti Museale della Soprintendenza Speciale per il Polo Museale Fiorentino (Arazzi 1912–25, 17). Photograph by Bruce White

ALUMNI PROFILE: AMY WEINSTEIN (’98) Amy Weinstein received her MA from the Parsons/Cooper Hewitt program in 1998. Before joining the program, she had earned a law degree and had a successful career working for various financial institutions. At the MA Program, Weinstein began researching American decorative arts, writing her thesis on a series of modernist textiles produced in New York City in the 1920s.

After graduation, she became an Assistant Curator at the Museum of the City of New York and, in 2001, Associate Curator of 20th-Century material culture at the New-York Historical Society. As a curator, her interests lay in documenting the material culture of the contemporary city, and after the September 11, 2001 attacks, the Society led the way in compiling, preserving, cataloguing and exhibiting historical

interviews with survivors, evidence of the family members, first event and its afresponders, Ground Zero termath. Weinstein recovery workers and and her colleagues volunteers. The museum’s gathered artifacts collection numbers more at the site and than 13,000 items, with a worked closely with complex role as memorial, those who played storyteller, archive, and a role in the rescue 9/11 Memorial Museum, New York interpreter of the evolving and recovery efforts, as well as with city, federal, and significance of the 9/11 attacks. non-profit agencies to collect materials Although a historical museum, it is far from a static collection, with changing documenting the destruction, loss, displays, and a steady stream of public mourning and nascent efforts acquisitions and donations. Weinstein to rebound. When the 9/11 Memorial Museum was organized, it was a natural says that she frequently uses many of the research, writing, and object fit and, in 2006, Weinstein joined the museum. She is now Associate Director assessment skills she acquired in the of Collections and Senior Oral Historian. MA Program but in ways she never would have imagined in those more In the course of her work, she innocent days. has conducted close to a thousand

COOPER HEWITT, SMITHSONIAN DESIGN MUSEUM

NEWSLETTER 5 GOINGS ON IN THE MA PROGRAM Ian Cox On November 12, Ian Cox, Director of the Victorian Society in America’s London Summer School gave a talk on Victorian Exhibition Ceramics. A decorative arts historian with special interests in historic interiors, furniture and ceramics, Cox taught for many years in the History of Art Department at Glasgow University. He has also served as Director of Christie’s Master’s Program in the History of the Decorative Arts. For the last 15 years he has worked at the Christie’s London School of Education, first as Director of Studies and more recently as Director of Short Course Programs and The London Art Course.

Cox spoke about the innovative designs exhibited by major British ceramics firms, such as Minton, Copeland, Doulton, and Lambeth at the many local and international exhibitions held in the second Minton majolica fountain at the 1862 London International Exhibition. half of the 19th century.

The lecture was sponsored by the Victorian Society in America.

Suvi Saloniemi

“Pirkka” stool, ca. 1955, designed by Ilmari Tapiovaara. The Linda and Irwin R. Berman Stool Collection. 2008-32-1.

contemporary curatorial approaches to Finnish design history in the context of the centennial exhibition of iconic mid-century modernist Finnish designer Ilmari Tapiovaara.

Suvi Saloniemi curator at the Design Museum Helsinki, currently a Mobius Fellow at Cooper Hewitt, presented WRITE FOR COOPER HEWITT OR a lecture on November 13 BECOME A DOCENT on Curatorial Approaches to Alumni are invited to join the expanded museum docent Finnish Design program. Docents will work directly with the education and History. curatorial teams of the museum on current exhibitions.

In her lecture Alumni can also now participate in writing for Cooper Saloniemi Hewitt’s “Object of the Day” posts. These brief informative introduced the texts are featured on the museum’s website to engage audience to the readers with objects from the permanent collection. Visit Design Museum www.cooperhewitt.org/category/object-of-the-day for Helsinki, and examples. Contact the MA program office if you are intertalked about ested in becoming a docent or contributing to the website.

PARSONS THE NEW SCHOOL FOR DESIGN

6

MA PROGRAM IN THE HISTORY OF DESIGN AND CURATORIAL STUDIES

SAVE THE DATE: All alumni are invited to a special preview reception to celebrate the reopening of Cooper Hewitt, from 6:30 to 9:00 p.m. on Thursday, December 11. RSVP to chmembership@si.edu or call 212.849.8419.

The museum reopens to the public on Friday, December 12. The official opening ceremony begins at 10:00 a.m. on the front steps of the museum at 2 East 91st Street.

Symposium—Grand Design: Pieter Coecke van Aelst and Renaissance Tapestry. Internationally renowned scholars and curators present recent scholarship relating to the exhibition of van Aelst at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The symposium is co-organized

by Parsons and the Metropolitan Museum. Saturday, January 10, 2015, 10:30 a.m.–4:30 p.m. at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Sunday, January 11, 10:00 a.m.–4:30 p.m. at

COOPER HEWITT

Parsons in the John L. Tishman Auditorium, University Center, 63 Fifth Avenue, New York City.

The annual MA Program Symposium will be on Thursday, April 23 and Friday, April 24, 2015. The theme will be Color/Forms and the Catherine H. Voorsanger Keynote speaker will be Jeffrey Meikle, Stiles Professor in American Studies at the University of Texas, Austin.

PARSONS

STAY IN TOUCH 2 East 91st Street New York, NY 10128 212-849-8344 KustraS@NewSchool.edu

twitter.com/ParsonsHDCS instagram.com/ParsonsHDCS www.facebook.com/pages/Cooper-HewittParsons-MA-Program/142865462425549

Smithsonian Design Museum Smithsonian

Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum

THE NEW SCHOOL