Above The Renwick, JURIED DESIGN COMPETITION

ABOVE THE RENWICK, JURIED DESIGN COMPETITION
Renwick Gallery, Washington, D.C.
Competition Conducted: June – October 2016

As part of the Smithsonian American Art Museum’s goal to expand the boundaries of craft, design, and art, the competition ABOVE The Renwick invited a select group of architects to use the building’s iconic Grand Salon as a proverbial sandbox for site-specific architectural experimentation. Eight firms submitted proposals for a new installation: FreelandBuck, Ball-Nogues Studio, Collective-LOK, Ibañez Kim, Iwamoto Scott, Joseph Giovannini, Oyler Wu Collaborative and Matsys Studio. FreelandBuck’s winning design, Parallax Gap stayed on view for seven months and marked the Renwick’s first foray into commissioning large-scale works that explore craft within the field of architecture.

As curator for the Renwick Gallery’s juried design competition, Helen Bechtel shaped the competition’s vision and guided it from concept all the way through selection into installation and programming. She collaborated with the museum staff to define the themes and criteria, oversaw the national call for entries, and orchestrated the jury process, ensuring that the chosen works reflected the Renwick’s forward-looking approach to contemporary craft and design.