Modern Chairs

For the Centenary celebrations of the Whitechapel Gallery, we revisited the seminal furniture exhibition from 1970, entitled Modern Chairs 1918-1970. The exhibition was arranged by the Circulation Department at the Victoria and Albert museum under the curatorship of Carol Hogben.

The original exhibition and its installation was the first attempt in Britain of a wide ranging 'survey' of modern chairs, and in many ways prefigured the formation of the V & A's 'Boilerhouse' and London's Design Museum. Modern and 'classic' furniture was presented with all the display rhetoric of contemporary art. Chairs were elevated/reduced to objects of aesthetic or iconic status, their utility suspended.

While browsing the catalogue of the exhibition, we were suprised by how many of the selected chairs -several from the 1930's- are still in current production. We proposed to exhibit as many of the 'classic' café or dining chairs from the 1970 exhibition as it was possible to source.

But, in an attempt to reverse the polarity of the delicate tension engendered by the original exhibition, our chairs were to be exhibited in the Cafe space at the Whitechapel. Visitors would be able to 'use' the 'design classics' and consciously participate in the interface between art and life.

Buy the catalogue The Whitechapel Art Gallery Centenary Review

read Adrian Searle's review for the Guardian and visit Whitechapel