Past Exhibitions
George R. Kravis II: The Collector’s Eye
This selection of modern and contemporary design objects showcased an important gift to the Stewart Program of eighty-five designs from the estate of George R. Kravis II. A well-known collector of modern and contemporary industrial design, Kravis ultimately amassed one of the most significant collections in North America. The exhibition was on view at the Stewart Program’s Forget House in Montreal in 2020.
The exhibition has been made possible by the generous support of the Lee B. Anderson Memorial Foundation.
Objects from the exhibition George R. Kravis II: The Collector’s Eye
Past Exhibitions
Partners in Design: Alfred H. Barr Jr. and Philip Johnson
Partners in Design focused on the visionary collaboration of MoMA’s first director and its curator of architecture, who introduced modern design to North America. Tracing the development of modern design—from the Bauhaus to Barr and Johnson’s radical experiments in their homes to MoMA’s influential exhibitions beginning in the 1930s—the exhibition included furniture, industrial design, photographs and graphic design along with interactive displays and 3D technology to transport the viewer into Barr and Johnson’s world of modern design.
International tour 2016–17:
Montreal Museum of Fine Arts; Davis Museum at Wellesley College, Massachusetts; Kunsthalle Bielefeld, Germany; Grey Art Gallery at New York University.
Installation view of Partners in Design at Kunsthalle Bielefeld, Germany, 2017.
American Streamlined Design: The World of Tomorrow
American Streamlined Design, the first comprehensive exhibition on this popular American idiom, was organized thematically around the home and work spaces of everyday life in the 1930s–50s: the office and workroom, the living room, the kitchen and bath, recreation and transportation. Based on the Eric Brill collection of industrial design, a major gift to the Stewart Program, the exhibition presented over 180 works in diverse materials, from Bakelite to aluminum. Also included were international designs from 1980 to 2005 that demonstrated the revival of interest in the streamlined style.
International tour 2005–2011:
Musée des Années 30, Boulogne-Billancourt, France; Bard Graduate Center, New York; Montreal Museum of Fine Arts; Wolfsonian-Florida International University, Miami.
Awards:
The exhibition catalogue was awarded first prize in the American Association of Museums publication design competition.
Installation view of American Streamlined Design at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, 2007
Craving for Design: Kitchen Design from the 18th century to Tomorrow
This exhibition of 200 kitchen objects encompassed kitchen implements of eighteenth-century France and twentieth-century America – two areas of Liliane Stewart’s collecting interests. By pairing handcrafted eighteenth-century kitchen tools with their machine-made twentieth-century counterparts, Craving for Design showed that there has been a continuity of forms over the ages. And despite dramatic changes in the kitchen, along with new materials and methods of manufacture, these simple, functional forms from different periods and continents shared a timeless aesthetic. The exhibition was co-organized by the Stewart Program and the Stewart Museum.
Presented from May 2012-2013 at the Stewart Museum, Montreal
Installation view of Craving for Design at the Stewart Museum, 2012