We’re excited that the innovative exhibition will take Architalx’s mission of creating provocative dialogue around progressive design out of the auditorium and into the galleries of the Museum, where it will reach an estimated audience of 30,000.

Robert Wolterstorff is the curator of the exhibition. Wolterstorff has a Ph.D. in art history/history of architecture from Princeton University.  He recently completed an 11-year tenure as Executive Director of Victoria Mansion in Portland. Wolterstorff is teaming up with the award-winning and internationally known exhibition design firm, Ralph Appelbaum Associates (RAA) of New York City. RAA’s design team will be led by Tim Ventimiglia, a Portland native.  We’ve included some images of their previous work:

Here’s how curator Robert Wolterstorff describes the exhibit:

“Voices of Design: 25 Years of Architalx will consist of six pavilions installed in the museum, in complementary styles designed to invoke the range of contemporary design and respond to the design of the Henry N. Cobb Payson Building. One might be diaphanous, delicate, and composed of tensile curves, another might be firm and classical. What goes on within is even more important, for each will be the container for a complex, multi-layered, multi-media exploration of design that will immerse the visitor in light, sound, ideas, and images. Foremost among these will be voice – the voices of the lecturers of the last 25 years in sound clips sewn together to form a ribbon of ideas running on a continuous loop.

Disembodied from their sources, the voices of past lecturers will take on an unusual distance and authority. Conversely, the curatorial “voice,” upon which we usually depend to guide us to the meaning of an exhibition will deliberately be one of ambiguity and reticence. The ultimate goal of this sensory extravaganza is not to bring viewers to a particular conclusion; rather the exhibition will immerse them in an experience of images and ideas that will be open-ended, inspiring them to delight in good design, think about it more consciously, notice the world around them with greater intensity, and become more knowing producers and consumers of design. Ultimately, the most potent Voices of Design will be the ones that arise in the viewer’s mind, comprising a new awareness of design ideas and imagery that permeate life all around.”

In our blog posts about the celebration, we’ll be sharing more about the design team and our sponsors (including AW Hastings, the exhibition underwriter), as well as how you can become a Voice by sharing examples of how Architalx has inspired or informed your own work or viewpoints.

Aomori Nebuta House

Nebuta House is a museum and centre for creative culture in the Northern Japanese city of Aomori. Over the project’s course, the program evolved from housing and community facilities into a unique cultural building inspired by the craftsmanship and spirit of Aomori’s Nebuta Festival. The festival, one of Japan’s largest, is a form of storytelling during which heroes, demons and animals from history and myth come to life as large-scale, paper lanterns (Nebuta) illuminated from within. The building is a house for these mythical creatures, functionally meant to share the tradition, archive the history and nurture the future of this unique cultural art form.
molo with d/dt Arch and Frank la Rivière Architects inc.

View a slideshow of the Aomori Nebuta House

Softwall + Softblock Modular System · LED lighting

The integrated LED lighting turns the white textile softwall + softblock modular system into an amazing source of light. The luminous version of softwall + softblock emphasizes the visual delicacy of the textile fibre making the expansion, contraction and fluid movement of soft all the more magical.

View a slideshow of the Softwall + Softblock

More at: molodesign.com

Every year, the Speaker Committee @ Architalx embarks on the challenge of selecting fresh and inspiring candidates for the coming series. This is a sneak peek at some of the work that has caught our eye. More to come!

Kapoor is widely known for his site-specific installations that blend sculpture and architecture.  The Cloud Gate aka “The Bean” has become a staple in Chicago for visitors.

This summer Kapoor’s Leviathan occupied the colossal interior of the Grand Palais in Paris, France.

The sculpture, in the form of a giant 4-armed balloon, could be observed both from its exterior and interior.

Reminiscent of the monster that is its namesake, color, texture, form and scale were used to create the effect of something that threatens to “turn the building inside out.”

More at: anishkapoor.com

Every year, the Speaker Committee @ Architalx embarks on the challenge of selecting fresh and inspiring candidates for the coming series. This is a sneak peek at some of the work that has caught our eye. More to come!

Cloud Modules 2002: This is a beautiful project they did for Capellini in Italy.

Textile Field 2011: London Design Festival, Victorian and Albert Museum.

‘An invitation to lascivious reverie. Our intention is to propose a different, casual approach to freely experience what can be a quite intimidating environment, such as a museum. We conceived an expansive, coloured foam and textile piece with gentle inclinations to produce a sensual field on which to comfortably lounge while meditating on the surrounding Raphael Cartoons. Everyone can immerse into this temporary installation, for a minute, an hour or more, that is the idea. No efforts, no apprehension just contemplation.’

More at: www.bouroullec.com

Every year, the Speaker Committee @ Architalx embarks on the challenge of selecting fresh and inspiring candidates for the coming series. This is a sneak peek at some of the work that has caught our eye. More to come!