Exhibition description from Cooper Hewitt:
Art of Noise shows how design shapes the way we experience music—how and where we listen to it, how it’s communicated visually, and what we choose to hear. For many people, these design choices feel like a part of the music itself; they become a key part of how we remember and understand sound in a multisensory way—through our ears, our eyes, and our sense of touch.
Organized by the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) and adapted to the history of the New York music scene for its East Coast presentation, Art of Noise presents hundreds of works that have shaped our relationship to music over the past century. From concert posters to record albums, phonographs to digital music players, handheld radios to sound systems, the exhibition demonstrates how our experiences are built by both the sounds we hear and the objects that help illustrate or activate them, whether through color and composition or through form, material, and mechanics.
Exhibition Credits:
Art of Noise is organized by SFMOMA and curated by Joseph Becker, Curator of Architecture and Design, SFMOMA, with support from Divya Saraf, former Curatorial Assistant in Architecture and Design, SFMOMA. The presentation at Cooper Hewitt is curated by Joseph Becker with support from Cynthia Trope, Associate Curator of Product Design and Decorative Arts.
Exhibition design by teenage engineering. Architect of Record, and fabrication by Pink Sparrow. Exhibition graphic design by Associate. Exhibition photography by Thomas Barratt.
