Beneath the Orange Ball: ArtCenter Grad Show

Yongmei Wang at ArtCenter Grad Show (Photo – W.K.).

Beneath the orange ball that is its dominant visual motif, the ArtCenter College of Design 2018 Grad Show, at the Pasadena Convention Center, suggests a future not only previewed but shaped.

By Garret Rowlan

Although one senses, walking around the exhibits while a DJ pumped a background obbligato of drums and bass, a certain shapelessness: objects that suggest other objects—particularly the many and impressed car designs, all of which look capable of either flying or sailing—and environments that are multi-use, and realities capable of being altered by the strapping on of a headset, as in VR Designer Janet Hwang’s cartoonish room with its bright colors and mirage-like walls that can change into the real thing if one wanders too far with the headset on.

Even the gap between species is fluid, too, as in Su-Sun Kwak’s Two Tails Furniture, a two-tiered set-up designed for reading to dogs. Ms. Kwak cites frequency of voice as the key to canine calm, and the furniture is designed to have Rover at one’s foot like a child in a nursery school.

The ArtCenter Gradshow takes place at the Pasadena Convention Center (Photo – Nora Ames).

Dogs make great companions, but are limited as conversationalists, despite how many books have been read to them, which is why Maggie Kang’s Reading Code, a fusion of library-coffeeshop-and meeting room is a perfect solution for book lovers with eclectic taste. The tiered space is “coded” in terms of interests: literature, philosophy, fiction, et cetera, all would have their individual space to gather and discuss.

Every year, the Art Center grad show produces a variety of art that never fails to intrigue, and this year is certainly no different.

ArtCneter Grad Show
Date/Time
08/18/2018
1:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Location
Pasadena Convention Center

Garrett Rowlan’s first novel, “To Die, To Sleep,” is newly published and available on Amazon.