A visit to the Design Museum Holon

While in Israel last week, we had the chance to visit the Design Museum Holon, the country’s first museum dedicated exclusively to design. We met up with chief curator Galit Gaon and head of PR Eyal de Leeuw for a special guided tour of the nearly four-year-old museum, which was designed by Israeli architect Ron Arad.

Its exterior features sculptural, sinuous ribbons of ruddy Corten steel, which wrap around the museum’s two main buildings and reveal varying degrees of weathering. It’s a truly exceptional place, and the enveloping, circular steel seems to physically reinforce the museum’s goal of expressing design’s potential impact on the world and—specifically—for building and bettering community.

Inside, we were swept up by the museum’s current show, Free Wheel: Cyclepedia, Iconic Bicycle Design, which inhabits every floor. This super-fun exhibit examines the history of the bicycle and cycling culture, incorporating models from different eras that reflect developments in technology, fashion, and society. Highlights include a floor full of iconic, floating bicycles from Austrian collector Michael Embacher’s private archive (including handmade, cardboard, folding bikes, and more—as well as a very cool app for further reference, presented on iPads attached to a bike-like seats);  a selection of historical posters, photographs, and Israeli-manufactured bicycles; as well as a survey of iconic cycling moments in film (who doesn’t love that image of E.T. and Elliott riding across the moon-filled night sky?). In sum, it’s a layered, accessible, and cohesive look at a ubiquitous and often overlooked mode of transportation— and absolutely worth checking out if you’re anywhere near Tel Aviv in the near future!

Photo by Shay Ben Efraim, image courtesy of Design Museum Holon.

Tatjana Sprick and Eyal de Leeuw.

Eyal de Leeuw and Galit Gaon.

Image courtesy of Design Museum Holon.

Image courtesy of Design Museum Holon.

Thanks again to the museum team for all their great work and the incredibly warm welcome!

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    Anna Carnick

    Als ehemalige Redakteurin bei Assouline, der Aperture Foundation, Graphis und Clear feiert Anna die großen Künstler. Ihre Artikel erschienen in mehreren angesehenen Kunst- und Kulturpublikationen und sie hat mehr als 20 Bücher herausgegeben. Sie ist die Autorin von Design Voices und Nendo: 10/10 und hat eine Leidenschaft für ein gutes Picknick.