Cries of Slovakian artists have been finally answered. After several unsuccessful tries, Slovakia will have its own Museum of Design. The dream becomes reality.
Last Friday 27 January a public discussion took place in Gallery Satelit in capital Bratislava. The main theme of discussion became the Slovak Museum of Design in 2012. It was organized by the Slovak Centre of Design with fifty experts and journalists. The centre itself has been trying for the past three years to give convincing evidence of the need for the museum. The current project is aimed at gathering a collection from design, and familiar fields that are connected to this area, and it examines trends abroad as well. Its collection will include mass-produced and original designs, prototypes and documentation of productive design, graphic design and architectonical design.
The most important news from the discussion has been the fact that the Minister of Culture Daniel Krajcer has signed the Certificate of Incorporation. Now the centre can legally gather, professionally process and make available collections, and those of museums and art galleries in the field of design, which are part of the national cultural heritage. This addition allows the Slovak Centre of Design to start making collections of design work and is the first step in the establishment of the museum.
The museum should be placed in the spaces of Hurbanovo barracks in downtown Bratislava. From the 6th of February The Slovak Centre of Design needs to develop a vision of how the museum should look, and how much space is needed for exhibitions and collections. I am happy to say that it is great idea to establish a museum like this. It is not only me, who does not know all about the objects and ideas that my ancestors were surrounded by every day.
The idea of the establishment of the Museum of Design comes from the absence of an artistic and industrial museum in the city. Artists have offered to set-up a completely new museum of design, applied arts and architecture. The collection started to come together thanks to gifts. There is an old saying that a practical man does not collect old things, but throws them out. In trash cans you could recover wooden and Bakelite radios Tesla, chairs and thermos from disposed factories that were part of the life of Slovakians for more than century. In the period of industrial revolution Slovakia was part of the Hungarian empire. The process of industrialization was way behind. In total there were just a few industrial fields developed in the 19th century, and production was not competitive in international markets. The most common industries were glass and metalworking companies. After the Second World War and during the strengthening of communism’s power, production was orientated towards quantity, and heavy industry was preferred. There was not any competition; export was directed on the east. There was an absence of innovations. Official ideology dictated the priority of human needs in a socialist society. Applied graphics was acceptable only in mass production and for political posturing. The fall of communism in 1989 brought about the process of transformation in economics and industry. At the beginning of the 90s Slovakia saw a boom in graphic design. Competitive graphics was established as a dominant area, combined with information technologies, and this began a new era of graphic design in Slovakia.
The conception of the collection in the museum is initially divided into three basic groups; communicative design, industrial and architectonical design. It should include all the types of productions, short-run, industrial and unique. They want to specialize in collecting student design as well. The project of the Slovak Centre of Design believes that a Museum of design and architecture could be a reality in two years. There is also the possibility of digitalization. In the next few years, when it will gain some collections, Centrum wants to digitalize all the visible, tactile and also those forgotten pieces. The reason is, many objects have not survived the complicated political situation, and can only be shown digitally. There also arises the question of how to gather together all of the design pieces. The most achievable solution, is gifts and donations from the general public. First of all they need to get into the eye of laics through mass media, radio and television, and another quirky suggestion was to advertise in shop windows. People will then be able to collect old pieces and give them to the museum – as a gift, all for free. A little bit funny because I cannot imagine that those mass production shops, which are centered on the ordinary man, could appreciate something like art of design. But who knows.
Leave a Reply