MoMA Announces Designer’s Choice: Norman Teague—Jam Sessions, The Inaugural Exhibition in a New Series

Norman Teague (American, born 1968). MoColor. 2024. Digital image. Courtesy Norman Teague Design Studios.

The Exhibition Will Feature the Artist’s Selection of Works from MoMA’s Collection Alongside 23 Original Works by Teague, Opening October 2024

The Museum of Modern Art announces Designer’s Choice: Norman Teague—Jam Sessions, an exhibition on view in the Museum’s street-level galleries from October 10, 2024, through May 11, 2025, that will juxtapose historic design icons from MoMA’s collection with Teague’s unique reinterpretations of many of those objects. For Norman Teague—Jam Sessions, the Chicago-based designer Norman Teague (b. 1968) draws inspiration from the historically underrepresented voices of women, people of color, and non-Westerners, remaking storied design objects anew by way of generative AI. The exhibition features over 45 design objects, including furniture, glassware, ceramics, and electronics, by a range of acclaimed designers, including Charles and Ray Eames, Mies van der Rohe, Eero Saarinen, and Gerrit Rietveld. These will be featured in the exhibition alongside 19 original commissions by Teague reimagining these design icons, including 15 posters and four full-scale 3D prototypes. Building upon MoMA’s longstanding Artist’s Choice exhibition series, this will be the inaugural installment of the Museum’s Designers Choice series, in which a contemporary designer organizes an installation drawn from the Museum’s collection. Designer’s Choice: Norman Teague—Jam Sessions is organized by Norman Teague with Paul Galloway, Collection Specialist, Department of Architecture and Design, with co-curation by Michele Y. Washington, Norman Teague Design Studios, design AI assistance by Daniel Overbey, and poster design by Narineh Seferian.

“Your world is the history that you read about, and if you’re wrapping your head around the things that say that you don’t belong here, then we have to create other books, or we have to create another world,”says Norman Teague.

For Teague, this exhibition is both a reminder of the creative power of diverse perspectives and an invitation to contemplate the past and future as realms of boundless possibility. As in a musical jam session, as the exhibition’s namesake suggests, Teague’s design approach is grounded in collaboration, respect, and improvisation, and recalls the sense of potential that sparks every act of imagination: the what if. The exhibition also engages with the instrumental role that MoMA has played in shaping the history of modern design, incorporating the voices of women, people of color, and those outside Europe and the United States to represent a more complete history of design.

Teague’s exploratory process, highlighted in Designer’s Choice: Norman Teague—Jam Sessions, incorporates tools like generative artificial intelligence to offer new visions of iconic works: Mies van der Rohe’s iconic Barcelona Chair, for example, reimagined by Teague with African motifs, or Harry Bertoia’s Metal Side Chair (familiar to visitors to MoMA’s Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Sculpture Garden), morphing into a structure that is simultaneously familiar and unknown. The exhibition’s emphasis on collaborative design is further emphasized in two videos on display: in The Fiberglass Chairs, viewers will explore the multitude of craft skills required to manufacture an Eames chair, and Back Alley Jazz documents a community project, founded by Teague and Fo Wilson, in which music and art come together in Chicago’s South Side.

Paul Galloway adds, “Norman’s reinterpretation of design history via MoMA’s collection asks viewers to question the received wisdom of what was deemed ‘good design,’ and offers an invitation to join him in his quest to imagine a different, richer story.”

ABOUT NORMAN TEAGUE:

Norman Teague is an artist, designer, and educator based in Chicago. He is also the founder and principal of Norman Teague Design Studio. Through his practice, he explores the systematic complexity of urbanism and the culture of communities of color. His studio focuses on customized furniture that delivers a personal touch rooted in distinct aesthetic detail based on a broad range of materials, from locally sourced recycled wood to local fabricators that help invest in his community.

Teague has had group and solo exhibitions in Venice, Italy, New York City, Pittsburgh, and Chicago, among others. In 2023 Teague participated in the Everlasting Pavilion for the Venice Architecture Biennale. He has also conducted numerous workshops, including at Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, Deer Isle, Maine; Penland School of Crafts, Mitchell County, North Carolina; and QDance Center, Lagos, Nigeria. Notably, Teague is part of the Obama Presidential Center artists/designer team, collaborating with other local talents to shape a significant cultural institution.

SPONSORSHIP:

Support for the exhibition is provided by the Annual Exhibition Fund. Leadership contributions to the Annual Exhibition Fund, in support of the Museum’s collection and collection exhibitions, are generously provided by Jerry I. Speyer and Katherine G. Farley, Sue and Edgar Wachenheim III, the Sandra and Tony Tamer Exhibition Fund, the Kate W. Cassidy Foundation, Alice and Tom Tisch, the Marella and Giovanni Agnelli Fund for Exhibitions, The Contemporary Arts Council of The Museum of Modern Art, Eva and Glenn Dubin, Mimi Haas, The David Rockefeller Council, Anne and Joel Ehrenkranz, Kenneth C. Griffin, The International Council of The Museum of Modern Art, Marie-Josée and Henry R. Kravis, and Jo Carole and Ronald S. Lauder. Major funding is provided by The Sundheim Family Foundation.

The visualizations seen on the posters in this exhibition were created through the use of Adobe Firefly, Adobe’s family of generative AI models, and with the invaluable assistance of the Adobe team.