Jerusalem Design Week 2024
Vaults of life exhibition
Design: YET Architecture;
Architects: Anastasiya Katliaskaya, Ilya Katliarski
Digital fabrication: YET FAB
Metalworks: Vadim Xe
Lighting: Marushkin Michael
Chief Curators : Dana Benshalom, Sonja Olitsky
Artistic Director: Roni Yeheskel
Video: Ruslan Yudovski
Photo: Dor Kedmi, courtesy of Jerusalem Design Week
The Jerusalem Design Week was held in September in Hansen House. The designs week concept is the ark. One of the spaces was devoted to the exhibition Vaults of life, a “safe room” dedicated to preserving “species”, selected collections of tiny design objects.
Space
To highlight the significance and fragility of displayed objects the goal was to design a dramatic ambiance of the space. Therefore the room was dark without natural light coming through. A directed narrow spotlight focused attention on an object, creating an intimate and reverent atmosphere.
Pedestals
The space is organized into a grid of pedestals, each spotlighting a small collection, allowing visitors to fully appreciate their importance. Visitors walk along the aisles of these pedestals formed by the industrial metal grid, allowing them to engage with each section of the display.
The design integrity is achieved through the use of 90cm mesh pedestals with various tabletops. The industrial mesh pedestals painted in black add a structured, gridded appearance to the display, with objects carefully distributed across them. This raw material makes the exhibition more “human” and less “don’t touch me” sterile museum.
Pedestals may consist of one or multiple layers of black and transparent acrylic sheets which were used in different height configuration to accommodate and protect exhibited objects.
Joint
To be able to accommodate various sizes of objects, acrylic sheets are connected with custom designed 3d printed joints. These joints allow flexibility in heights of acrylic tabletops and ease in disassembling and reassembling of the exhibition, creating secure connection between metal mesh and an acrylic sheet. The morphology of the joint is dictated by the structural forces coming from the weight it holds.
The interplay of light and shadow within the dark environment further emphasizes the preciousness of the collections, making them the sole focus of the exhibition.
In the center of the room, metal mesh pedestals are arranged in a grid, each showcasing various small objects. Above, focused spotlights cast narrow beams onto each pedestal, highlighting the items individually and creating dramatic shadows on all surfaces creating a filter for an existing space fixtures.
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