Beyond Materialism: Sacred Objects at the Walker

Banner Image: Installation views. Walker Design Triennial: Beyond Materialism. Photo by Eric Mueller, courtesy Walker Art Center, Minneapolis.

◼︎ ◼︎ ◼︎ ◼︎ ◼︎ 

In its inaugural year, the Walker’s Design Triennial is the first to kick off a new tradition of design exhibits. The show features a wealth of designers and collectives from around the world and is curated by Asli Altay, Artistic Director of Design Programming at the Walker, and outside curator Joseph Grima, an architect and founder of design studio Space Caviar. The Triennial represents an opportunity to survey the current design landscape and to give audiences an exposure to the world of design. 

 

Image: Asli Altay, artistic director of design programming at the Walker Art Center, and "Beyond Materialism" curator Joseph Grima. Courtesy Walker Art Center.

 

In many ways, this idea is in line with previous exhibits on design by The Walker, such as the Idea House project. Now recognizable as the museum’s design store, the Idea House 3 actually pays homage to two real houses that were built in the surrounding neighborhood which were used as examples of modern design and architecture. These houses were lived in by Walker staff and families but unfortunately demolished to make way for the original Guthrie theater. 

The centralization of design within a museum calls on us to see usable objects as art, or alternatively, to bring art to usable objects. The question of art or practicality is also tied to the theme for this year’s exhibit, which is titled “Beyond Materialism.” The show takes into account the history of design as a discipline originally focused on making practical or consumable objects, and explores how recent designers and firms have hoped to make objects that can fulfill not just material needs, but spiritual ones too. 

The beginning of the exhibit shows a clear spiritual impulse: the first piece exhibited is a historical Shaker chair, which showed piety and simplicity in design. Contrasted directly with this simple practical object is the “Lassu,” an unusable chair designed by Alessandro Mendini, which was designed as part of his “objects for spiritual use” series and was ritualistically set on fire. The chair is actually a repeating leitmotif throughout the exhibit, as more chairs appear in later rooms, such as the Chapel Chair by Michael Bennett and Lady Chairs by Anna Aagaard Jensen invite explorations of identity or social issues. 

 

 

Top image: The 1974 “Lassù,” a chair on a journey, by late Italian designer Alessandro Mendini sets the historical stage for the Walker Art Center Design Triennial “Beyond Materialism.” Courtesy of the Walker. Bottom image Anna Aagaard Jensen, Lady Chairs (left to right): Lady with Balls, 2018, and The Big Lady, 2018.

 

The reimagining of everyday objects as spiritual symbols is also highlighted in an obvious way by Ettore Sottsass’s vases from his Yantra series, which was based directly on the diagrams used for meditation in Tantra. Made up of precise geometric forms and meaning “machine” in Sanskrit, the idea of the Yantra is not far from the inspiration used by designers either. Laid out in clear terms, the questioning and exploration of functionality, aesthetics, and meaning is explored by other historic designers in the rooms such as Buckmister Fuller and Nathalie du Pasquier.

Later in the exhibit, objects take on stranger forms and materials. Designers use recycled materials as they contemplate climate catastrophe, while others focus on pieces that are handmade by special materials to combat mindless consumption. Others are more futuristic, like Astronauts’ sci-fi metallic see-saw. Some of the objects could be placed in a home, and others seem deliberately mystifying. 

 

 

Image: Installation views. Walker Design Triennial: Beyond Materialism. Photo by Eric Mueller, courtesy Walker Art Center, Minneapolis. Photo by Ruby Sonnek.

The last room in the exhibit features several pieces that are ephemeral in nature or meant to be interacted with. This is satisfying for an exhibit about design, as these objects were meant to be touched and used. This room also features the piece commissioned by the museum, a sound piece recorded by Spanish artist Lucas Muñoz Muñoz that recorded sounds from around Minneapolis. Another piece by Taiwanese artist Shao-Chun Hsu makes commentaries on the changing materials of funeral practices and features actively melting wax. 

It’s clear after looking at the exhibition that very few of the objects are practically useful. This is in keeping with the theme of the exhibit, which wishes to transcend materialism. Many of the objects feel similar to lavish ceremonial objects used in Catholicism, Hinduism, or Buddhism, which present the paradox in religious rites of using expensive material goods to connect to a world beyond materials. These excesses are diametrically opposed to the Protestant purity of simplicity and non-waste. There is actually a tension between the desire for impractical objects, which are usually only accessible to the rich, and to the awareness of material scarcity which therein causes guilt. This is a tension which museums frequently grapple with. 

 

Installation views. Walker Design Triennial: Beyond Materialism. Photo by Eric Mueller, courtesy Walker Art Center, Minneapolis.

Although this exhibit was complete in finding objects beyond materialism, it leaves a desire to return to the original practice of design as practical materials. In this world where people live in the digital world more frequently than the real world, focusing on real objects used every day in the home can be a reality-grounding effort. Objects of beauty can be used to embody the spirit as well as inspire it. Hopefully this exhibit inspires visitors to ask questions about this tension between spirit and matter, as well as exposing them to some efforts by the design world to address it.◼︎ 

“Beyond Materialism” is on view at the Walker through Feb. 14, 2027.