New West Coast Design: Contemporary Objects

January 18 - April 27, 2008

Curators:
Ted Cohen
Kathleen Hanna

Exhibition Design:
Ted Cohen

San Francisco Museum of Craft+Design gratefully acknowledges the generous support from Grants for the Arts/San Francisco Hotel Tax Fund, Baulines Craft Guild and their grantor, the Nina P. Brandt Fund, and the David and Sylvia Weisz Family Foundation. Additionally, in-kind donations by Marin Solar and MOD/Michael Osborne Design helped make this exhibition possible.

With new work and projects from over 50 California, Oregon and Washington designers and studios, New West Coast Design: Contemporary Objects offers an up-to-the-minute look at the many objects that have kept California, and its neighbors, at the forefront of innovation for nearly a half-century. This exhibition will highlight a collection of the most exciting new designs for contemporary living currently emerging on the West Coast, including functional pieces for interiors, outdoor sports gear, and landscape design. The breadth of work to be displayed will emphasize multiplicity of materials and objects, designed and fabricated by established and new artists in the field.

New materials worked into traditional forms highlight the works from San Francisco design studios Pablo, Council, and Meyerhoffer. Exploring personal ideas of innovation are unique projects like Wendy Maruyama’s digitally enhanced vanity, Wendell Jones’ retro-Pop influenced coffee table, Kim Kelzer’s turned-wood sculpture, Heath Matysek-Snyder’s molded rubber table, Lee Miltier’s lyrically hand-blown goblets and Alexis Moran’s colored concrete bookends. Also showcased will be Bruce Gordon’s elegantly styled bicycle (winner of Best of Show 2007 North American Handmade Bicycle Show); Thomas Meyerhoffer’s custom constructed surfboards; and Shinya Kimura’s exquisitely updated motorcycle.

In the sculpture garden, the Museum is presenting “Solar Terrain,” a special installation by award- winning San Francisco-based landscape architect Marcel Wilson. Solar panels on the Museum’s roof collect sunlight throughout the day and activate electroluminescent wires at night. Groups of rods measuring various heights support the wires, traveling down the building’s facade to the garden. As a field, the rods and wires create the elevations of a glowing compact terrain that undulates in response to the existing features of the space. “Solar Terrain” with its combination of high-tech materials and cartography, is a reflection of the sculpture garden itself with a contemporary twist.