The Brooklyn Museum will present the special exhibition Thinking Big: Recent Design Acquisitions from March 4 through May 29, 2011. The installation of forty-five twentieth- and twenty-first-century objects from the Museum’s permanent collection of decorative arts that have been acquired since 2000 will include a number of large-scale objects that will be exhibited for the first time.

Several important themes that have guided these acquisitions will be highlighted, including Brooklyn-designed objects- young designers- unusual materials and innovative methods of production- designs for children- and mid-twentieth century modernism.

The Brooklyn Museum has been actively acquiring twentieth- and twenty-first-century objects since the 1970s. Among the works featured in the exhibition are &#8220Cinderella&#8221 Table by Jeroen Verhoeven, 2005- Chest of Drawers, Model #45, &#8220You Can’t Lay Down Your Memories&#8221 by Tejo Remy, for Droog, 1991- &#8220Nirvana&#8221 Armchair by Wendell Castle, 2007- Spacelander Bicycle by Benjamin Bowden, 1946- and Womb Chair by Eero Saarinen, 1947-48. Objects by Charles Eames, Cindy Sherman, Konstantin Grcic, Francois Jourdain, and Harry Allen will also be included.

Thinking Big will be the first exhibition in a gallery that has been reclaimed from nonpublic space. The gallery is part of a renovation that is the first phase in a program that will redesign and transform much of the Museum’s first floor beyond the Rubin Pavilion and Lobby, which opened in 2004.

The exhibition is organized by Barry R. Harwood, Curator of Decorative Arts, Brooklyn Museum.

Illustration: Designer and Maker: Wendell Castle (American, born 1932). &#8220Nirvana&#8221 Armchair, 2007. Place made: Scottsville, New York, U.S.A. Fiberglass, 62 3/8 x 33 5/8 x 33 3/4 in. (158.4 x 85.4 x 85.7 cm). Gift of the artist, Brooklyn Museum.