The beginnings of Latvian design and contemporary trends. Changes in expositions in the Museum of Decorative Arts and Design / Article

The exhibits on the third floor cover the development of Latvian design over the last sixty years. The organizer of the exhibition – the design office H2E – has divided the message into five sectors, looking at it from different points of view.

Inguna Elere, the designer of the design office “H2E”, says that it was important to talk about the ecological aspects, shapes, materials, interactions, as well as the modern city, covering one cycle of society, because “everyone is a user of design”.

This permanent museum exposition is united by the title “Design Process”. The process begins with a task, white pages and sketches. That is why there is a table in the center of the room. This is how the dishes, furniture, textiles, clothes made by Latvian authors, microphones, bottles and other design items were born here. Most of them are unique exhibits, as the exposition only slightly touches the industrial side of the design.

Velta Raudzepa, the head of the collection of the Museum of Decorative Arts and Design, emphasizes that not everything can be shown in the exhibition, because many objects can be seen in other museums: “For us, this design story goes through unique design, because every work of art is also design.”

But the first exhibit of the exhibition is the collection catalog of the textile factory “Rīgas audums”. Samples from the thick album factory have been transferred to an interactive screen that can be enlivened by any visitor. The exposition “Classical Values” located on the second floor of the museum has also acquired interactive elements. Now the design items of Madernieks, Cīrulis, Suta and other old masters are accompanied by video illustrations and an audio message of 31 stories, which can be used by any visitor with the help of a square code. The existing exposition has also been slightly supplemented.

Thus, the Museum of Decorative Arts and Design strengthens a new concept in its permanent exhibition – the beginnings of Latvian design can be seen and heard on the second floor, and contemporary trends on the third floor. And, according to the representatives of the museum, the latter is planned to be supplemented with new exhibits.

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