Art (D)éco 1925 | 2025 Design, Mirroring Decorative Arts

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Image courtesy of Museu del Disseny

In April 1925, Paris hosted the International Exhibition of Decorative Arts and Modern Industries—a landmark event that marked the emergence of what now is known as Art Deco. Among the participants was the Fomento de las Artes Decorativas (today’s FAD), invited to present a representative selection of Catalan decorative arts. The result was an outstanding display of creative talent, faithful to the ideals of modernity and excellence that defined the spirit of the exhibition.

A hundred years later, FAD commemorates that milestone not only by revisiting the material world of 1925 but also by holding it up to the mirror of contemporary design. As it did then, a careful selection has been made—this time of nearly 200 objects and projects that define today’s material culture: everyday products that surround us and shape the way we live and think.

If in 1925 the major questions were how to industrialize processes to democratize access to consumption, how to embrace the aesthetics of distant cultures, and how to use exotic materials such as mahogany or ivory—often sourced from colonized countries—without questioning their origins. The questions posed by 2025 are radically different: Who produces, how, and where? How is the scarcity of natural resources addressed? How can the correct inequalities be generated by the current system of production and consumption? Does it make sense to reclaim craft-based production in the age of e-commerce and artificial intelligence?

With this exhibition, FAD invites us to reflect on one hundred years of change in design and society, and on how objects continue to act as both witnesses and agents of cultural transformation.

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