DAN RUBINSTEIN

I’m proud to announce that the little design show I’m co-curating with Jen Renzi is right around the corner! A formal invite is to follow, but here’s a taste…Download the PDF here.

What: An off-site design exhibition taking place in New York during the International Contemporary Furniture Fair (ICFF), InDisposed highlights the twin dichotomies that define contemporary design today: sustainability versus wastefulness, and preciousness versus mass production. To help spark a thoughtful and lively dialogue about these issues, we invited innovative thinkers in a range of media—from furniture and graphic designers to fine artists and musicians—to envision an eco-friendly design that addresses notions of disposability, waste, and/or wastefulness. We challenged them to create pieces that are made from environmentally sustainable materials, portable (considering the object’s intended use), able to be disposed of in a responsible and convenient way, and conceivably able to be mass-produced. At the end of the show, all pieces will be ceremoniously recycled, upcycled, composted, or otherwise responsibly disposed of.

Where: The show will take place at Studio-X, a Soho extension of Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation.

When: Friday, May 15, through Wednesday, May 20, 2009. Studio-X is open to the public from 10 AM to 6 PM daily, Monday through Saturday.

Participating designers (as of 4/09/09)
* Ate Atema of Atema Architecture (New York City)
* Tom Chiu (Brooklyn, NY)
* Liz Kinmark and Kegan Fisher of Design Glut (New York City)
* Adrian Kondratowicz (Berlin and New York City)
* Paul Loebach and Christopher Specce (New York City)
* Kevin Patrick McCarthy (Beacon, NY)
* Jeff Miller (New York City)
* Takeshi Miyakawa (New York City)
* John Powers (Brooklyn, New York)
* Andrea Ruggiero (New York City)
* Carlos Salgado of Scrapile (Brooklyn, New York)
* MIO (Philadelphia, PA)
* Situ Studio (Brooklyn, New York)
* So Takahashi of Heads, Inc. (Oslo, Norway, and New York City)
* Suzanne Tick (New York City)
* Alex Valich and Christine Warren of RedStr Collective (Brooklyn, New York)
* Tobias Wong (New York City)

About the Curators:

Jen Renzi is a freelance writer based in New York. Previously a senior editor at House & Garden and Interior Design magazines, she has written for publications including Condé Nast Traveler, The New York Times Style Magazine, The Miami Herald, Surface, Wallpaper, Ocean Drive, Interiors, and Architectural Record. Jen has authored and contributed to design books for Princeton Architectural Press, Clarkson Potter, and Edizioni, among others.

Dan Rubinstein is the articles editor at Surface as well as a freelance design, décor, and culture writer. Also based in New York, he was previously the editorial associate in the design department at House & Garden and his work has been published in numerous publications, including The New York Times Style Magazine, Out, Architectural Record, and many others.

Contact: indisposednyc (at) gmail (dot) com