FURNITURE OF TODAY
Gordon Washburn [foreword, Daniel Tower [essay]
Gordon Washburn [foreword, Daniel Tower [essay]: FURNITURE OF TODAY. Providence, RI: Rhode Island School of Design Museum of Art, 1948. First [only] edition. Slim quarto. Printed stapled wrappers. 32 pp. 65 black and white photographs. Catalog of 112 items. Textured yellow wrappers slightly dust, but a nearly fine copy of this scarce, early exhibition catalog.
6.75 x 9 stapled catalog with 32 pages and 65 black and white photographs. Subtitled “An exhibition presenting a cross-section of modern furniture now being manufactured, which will be on view from April 7 through May 27, 1948.” Scarce exhibition catalog from the Rhode Island School of Design that preceded both Alexander Girard’s Exhibition for Modern Living at the Detroit Institute of Art in September, 1949, and Robert Goldwate’s Modern Art in Your Life exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in October, 1949. The RISD exhibition further separated itself from the other contemporary shows by being fully interactive—all display pieces were assembled simulated room environments for visitors to interact with at their leisure.
“One large gallery of the Museum of Art in the Rhode Island School of Design will be devoted to an exhibition of “Furniture of Today,” beginning April 7th. The furniture will be arranged to resemble settings in the various rooms of a house and visitors will be free to roam through these simulated rooms and test the pieces for themselves. Modern china and table ware, textiles, paintings, sculpture, prints and drawings will augment the exhibition, which will consist of seventy-five to a hundred pieces of furniture selected to illustrate the different types and styles now being manufactured.
“The work of many of the better-known designers will be represented by the furniture to be put on display, and furniture manufacturers around the country have cooperated with the museum to make this exhibition a comprehensive one.
“And in order to make it a service to others than Rhode Islanders, the museum is publishing a pictorial check list, which will illustrate each major piece to be shown, together with information on material, designer, and manufacturer.” — For Your Information, Interiors and Industrial Design, February 1948
Designers include Alvar Aalto, Felix Augenfeld, Edgar O. Bartolucci and Jack Waldheim, Dan Cooper, Leslie Diamond, G. M. A. Dietrich, Andre Dupres, Charles Eames, Harry Handler, George W. Hansen, George Nelson, Gordon Obrig, Olderberg and Olson, Jens Risom, T. H. Robsjohn-Gibbings, Alice Roth, Saarinen and Saarinen, Simmons Company, Abel Sorenson and James Johnson, Morris Sanders, Hendrik van Keppel and Taylor Green, Walter von Nessen, Kurt Versen, Edward J. Wormley for Drexel, and Henry Wright and George Nelson.