Mirror Mirror

31.05 → 01.10.2017

The idea that we live in the age of the image has been so thor­oughly drilled into us, that all discourse now defines our era in these terms. Para­dox­ic­ally, it has never been more diffi­cult for each of us to read, analyse and inter­pret them. The speed with which images are broad­cast, espe­cially with new tech­no­lo­gies, seems to be inversely propor­tional to our capa­city to under­stand them in all their complex­ity.

The one object that has been inex­tric­ably linked to the idea of image across all ages and art forms, from art to liter­at­ure, new media to design, must surely be the mirror. As well as its reflect­ive func­tion, it is has also been imbued with strong symbolic connota­tions. The mirror is thus asso­ci­ated with an array of myths across many cultures.

The exhib­i­tion Mirror Mirror takes the form of a series of chapters and aims to bridge the micro­scopic gap separ­at­ing our image from our being. Our reflec­tion is utterly specific, making it undoubtedly the most complex of all images. In it, recog­ni­tion and illu­sion are confused, giving rise to an inner disorder linked to our constant desire to read our iden­tity here.

Each chapter tackles a specific theme relat­ing to the mirror or reflec­tions, and presents an array of design objects, comple­men­ted by others from the worlds of contem­por­ary art and photo­graphy. Artists, whether famous or emer­ging, offer their take on the idea which, on the frozen surface of the window, now defines our being in the world.