The following pieces of furniture were designed and commissioned by Richard Tuttle for this exhibition, and made by John Piergallini, a master craftsperson working in Mount Desert, Maine, from drawings and models supplied by the artist. There are eight examples on display, which were designed to hold the objects on view and challenge our understanding of exhibition display. Together they can be read chronologically as a theme or parallel to the development of the exhibition’s content.

When confronted by these pieces of functional sculpture, we hope visitors ask, What is the object? How do they partake in Tuttle’s artistic vocabulary? How are they different from the historical objects, which were not made by the artist but nevertheless are his? Like everything else in this exhibition, we want to challenge conventional, accepted hierarchies of value—subject versus object, active versus passive, beauty versus function, idea versus material.