DANIEL ARSHAM – OBJECTS FOR LIVING: COLLECTION II
Friedman Benda is pleased to present Objects forLiving: Collection II, Daniel Arsham’s first solo exhibition at the gallery. Arsham, whose approach has included art, architecture, performance, fashion, and film, poetically blends multiple universes into his ambitious design practice.
Through this exhibition, Arsham expands upon his first collaboration with Friedman Benda,Objects for Living, which debuted as an immersive environment at Design Miami in 2019. The acclaimed installation was a fictionalized recreation of his Long Island home built in 1971 by the noted modernist architect Norman Jaffe. Continuing his dialogue across time with Jaffe, he conceived of Objects for Living: Collection II during the COVID-19 pandemic while spending extensive time at home to reflect on what objects he himself would want to live with. The result is a body of work informed by personally significant cues and motifs taken from his daily life, with many of these forms originating from freely sculpting with his children’s playdoh and exploring the immediacy the material allows.
An interest in upholding the integrity of his chosen materials pervades his process from start to finish as each work exists at the convergence of his drawing, sculpture, and design practices. Through this exhibition, Arsham crafts a transportive landscape outside of this current time and place as interpreted through his distinctive lens.
About Daniel Arsham
Born in 1980 in Cleveland, Ohio, Arsham was raised in Miami, where he attended the Design and Architecture High School. He was awarded a full scholarship to The Cooper Union in New York, where he received the Gelman Trust Fellowship Award in 2003. Upon graduation, Arsham toured worldwide with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company as the company’s stage designer for over four years—an experience that informed his ongoing synergistic practice. In 2007, he founded the pioneering architecture firm Snarkitecture with partner Alex Mustonen. Collaboration continues to be a key cornerstone of his practice—realizing high-profile projects with music producer Pharrell Williams and designer Hedi Slimane, as well as Dior, Porsche, and Rimowa. Arsham has participated in numerous major international exhibitions, including at the Contemporary Art Center, Cincinnati, OH; High Museum of Art, Atlanta, GA; the HOW Art Museum, Shanghai, and the Moco Museum, Amsterdam. His works are included in the permanent collections of the Centre Pompidou, Paris; Pérez Art Museum, Miami, FL, and Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN. He lives and works in New York, NY.
About Friedman Benda
Friedman Benda identifies and advances key narratives in postwar and contemporary design with a commitment to a critical view of design history. We aim to expand the dialogue in the field from its established sources, exploring perspectives that have previously been marginalized. Spanning five continents and four generations, Friedman Benda represents a roster of seminal established and emerging designers, as well as historically significant estates. Since 2007, the gallery’s exhibitions, publications and collaborations with institutions have played a vital role in the development of the contemporary design market and scholarship. Dedicated to archiving the pioneering voices in our field, the gallery hosts Design in Dialogue, a weekly series of online interviews with leading architects, designers, curators, and critics. For further information please visit www.friedmanbenda.com and the gallery’s Instagram @friedman_benda and YouTube channel.