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Museum of Applied Arts deputy director Zsombor Jékely said 320 objects would be part of the Art & Design for All show which opens on June 16. He noted that the scale of the temporary exhibition was unprecedented both for the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Museum of Applied Arts.
Jékely, who is also the curator of the show, said the history of the Victoria and Albert Museum?s collections would be presented in 16 parts. The first six cover the period before the museum?s establishment, including the 1851 London World Exposition, and the rest present its activities as a collector and an educator, with a special view to objects from Asia and the Middle East, as well as contemporary work.
The exhibition also presents two examples from a wave of museums that were established based on the model of the Victoria and Albert Museum: the Kunstgewerbemuseum in Berlin and the Museum of Applied Arts in Budapest.
A selection of the Victoria and Albert Museum?s latest acquisitions will round out the exhibition.
Jékely showed journalists some of the highlights of the show, including a bust by Auguste Rodin called La France that was acquired by the Victoria and Albert Museum in 1914. The sculpture has the face of Rodin?s assistant and lover Camille Claudel but the body of another woman, Mariana Russel.
Another remarkable piece in exhibition is a dress of silk from a Jacquard loom that was dyed with artificial colours at a time when the practice was still relatively new. The violet blue dress, likely made for the 1862 World Exposition, did not appear green in the light of gas lamps as did dresses dyed with conventional indigo.
Visitors to the exhibition will also be able to see a more than 80-centimetre-high stucco from the Comares Palace in the Alhambra made at the height of Iberian Islamic decorative art.
Art & Design for All will run until September 16.
Source: Hungarian News Agency (MTI) / Photo: MTI
