Don’t miss Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen’s prized fashion and design collection. The museum hunts out new talent and is a treasurer of well-known designers—from the renowned Gispen tubular chairs to gowns from the fashion label Commes des Garçons.
Director of Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Sjarel Ex, is proud of all the fashion and design housed in ‘his’ museum. The museum is one of three nominated this spring for the national Museumprize 2017 for achievements in this field.
What makes the museum so good at design?
,,We do quite a bit for it. To begin with, there is no other museum in The Netherlands with a permanent design display quite like Boijmans Van Beuningen. It ranges from the earliest industrial appliances and all sorts of silverware to the latest designs. The museum makes a significant investment in designers. Richard Hutten, Hella Jongerius… we have the big international names in house, and also the new talent that is descending on the city fresh from the Design Academy Eindhoven. Good designers are drawn to Rotterdam for its spacious studios and stimulating design scene. Visit the museum if you want to find out what’s going on.’’
Any exciting new purchases?
,,We have just acquired a couple of unique pieces such as Sander Wassink’s Gispen chair. Wassink took the famous 1927 diagonal chair to Morocco where he had it reproduced using traditional methods. He was exploring the notion that objects can be easily copied everywhere these days, and reproduced in next to no time. He came back with a completely reconstructed chair. The chair is now showcased in our pavilion. We also bought a Jeroen Wand coffeetable. Wand is a young designer from Eindhoven with a great interest in the creation of layered objects. We already have a paper chair and a vase series of his in our collection.’’
And what about fashion?
,,The museum has a huge selection on display and in storage. Where other museums concentrate on the historical context, we like to focus on contemporary fashion. We regularly organize large, exciting fashion exhibitions, like The Future of Fashion, that draw in a lot of visitors and receive international attention as well. Something completely different but just as fascinating is the lace project that is currently underway. Five cubic meters of lace that was lying a little forgotten in storage is now being unravelled. What are its origins? Who gifted it? There are ornaments in amongst it, with ivory and gold for instance. A beautiful piece of heritage to enthrall visitors.’’
Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Museumpark 18-20
boijmans.nl
Editor: Evelien Baks
