A breakfast table setting for two, which is part of the 'Britain at Table' display in The Design Centre, July - September, 1956. Formica-topped table, two stacking chairs 'Jason’, Irish linen tablemats and napkins. 'Green Wheat' stoneware. Electric coffee percolator. Water jug and glasses. Cutlery and flatware with walnut handles.

A breakfast table setting for two, which is part of the ‘Britain at Table’ display in The Design Centre, July – September, 1956. GB-1837-DES-DCA-30-1-38-8-1-2-1

As artist-in-residence at the University of Brighton Design Archives, Gabriel Kuri’s intervention As Selected for the Design Centre, London moved photography quite literally out of the archive and into the public arena.

Taking as his starting point a pristine black and white image from 1956 of domestic tableware from the Design Council Archive, Kuri’s project reflected on the immaculate and unsoiled pictorial aesthetic that was characteristic not only of the Design Council’s post-war photography but also of an era of unbridled enthusiasm for modernity and progress.

Producing an installation that was then replicated and sited at different civic spaces throughout Brighton for the duration of the Biennial, Kuri created an encounter with the past that embraced mass produced objects and the rituals of the everyday.

A University of Brighton Design Archives Public Art Project in collaboration with Brighton Photo Biennial.