Essential Eames at the ArtScience Museum

Charles and Ray Eames. Their names might not be familiar to those who are not in the creative line. But you’ll probably still recognise these:

Hello sexy chairs!

The fact that these chairs have been widely copied reflects the pure genius of Charles and Ray Eames, who came up with the original version in 1950, then the world’s first industrially produced plastic chair.

You can see these and more at the ArtScience Museum, which is currently playing host to the Essential Eames: A Herman Miller Exhibition, an exhibition that captures the spirit and philosophy behind this famous couple in design. While most known for their timeless furniture creations, the Eames’ influence and innovation also extended to architecture, exhibition design, toy making and film. All these are celebrated in this special exhibition with over 100 artefacts, a number of which are rare and never-before-seen works and images. The highlights of the exhibition for me were a chair that was specially designed and used by Pope John Paul II, some personal letters exchanged between Charles and Ray — including one in which he proposed! — and a fascinating little film called Powers of Ten which captures a sense of scale by increasing a measurement by a factor of 10 each time. 

Before we entered the exhibition hall, I thought that the kids would be bored at the exhibition, but it turned out to be quite the opposite. There exhibition was actually quite interactive, with films to watch, toys to play with, and buttons to press, all of which kept the kids rather busy! In fact, between this exhibition and Mummy: Secrets of the Tomb, it was Essential Eames that Noey asked to return to, because “there are so many things to play with!“.

Anya with the Brick from the Materials Trail. There were a number of these materials that could be found at the entrance to the different exhibition areas, which the kids could make rubbings of in a provided booklet.

Having fun with the Eames alphabet blocks, which you can also use to build a model of the landmark Eames house and studio.

Listening to one of the short films.

Watching the balls spin round, depicting the orbit of the different planets around the sun. This one was a favourite.

Wandering through the really cool structure, entirely made from cards! (Yes, I was rather afraid he would knock it down.)

Attempting to build their own structure with the Eames House of Cards.

Even the adults really got into it! The two guys sharing the table with the kids looked like they were building a replica of Marina Bay Sands, though I never did ask them if that was the case.

Checking out pictures in a  viewfinder.

Looking at the 100 selected prints by Charles Eames.

Testing out the legendary Eames Lounge Chair. Note the glazed out look? This was easily one of the most comfortable chairs I’ve ever sat on. I didn’t want to get up!

Noey rounded off the day making a huge giraffe mask that the activity corner. We had arrived a little too late to take part in the Playing with Masks activity, but the facilitators kindly allowed him to make one, and helped him a lot too! In fact, I was able to leave him to work on his project while I checked out the showcase by SIM-RMIT on Communication in Design that was on that weekend.

Noey started out tracing the shape of the mask from the sample. He really enjoyed putting this mask together!

I have just realised that for this weekend, in celebration of Singapore’s 48th Birthday, Marina Bay Sands is offering free admission to this exhibition from 9 to 11 August 2013. So if you’re interested, this is a good time to pop down.

*Essential Eames: A Herman Miller Exhibition is on at the ArtScience Museum till 5 January 2014. Do visit their website for ticketing details. You should also visit the activities page on their website to find out more about guided tours and workshops that are available at no additional charge to ticket-holders. Good if you want maximise your visit!

*This review is written based our experience during an invited media session.