Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum
Esperanza Spalding Selects
June 9, 2017 – January 7, 2018
Esperanza Spalding Selects is the 15th installation of Cooper Hewitt’s Selects exhibition series in which designers, artists, architects, and public figures are invited to examine and interpret the museum’s collection of more than 210,000 objects. Musician and four-time Grammy Award-winner Esperanza Spalding creates thought-provoking juxtapositions of collection objects to show how material evolves into different forms as new designers adapt it for their own locales and cultural functions; expanding on concepts Spalding investigated in the making of her groundbreaking 2016 album Emily’s D+Evolution. Through her curation of nearly 40 drawings, prints, textiles, jewelry, and furniture, as well as works from the Smithsonian Design Library, Spalding explores how design—like music—both evolves and devolves in the process of transforming.
Textile, Fan, 1985; Designed by Theo Maas ; Netherlands; 100% cotton; H x W: 548.6 x 120 cm (18 ft. x 47 1/4 in.) Repeat H x W (repeat in weft direction): 120 × 45.7 cm (47 1/4 in. × 18 in.) Copyright: Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum
