Insecurities: Tracing Displacement and Shelter at MoMA

The exhibition Insecurities: Tracing Displacement and Shelter opened this weekend at MoMA, the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, as the UNGA week came to an end at the UN headquarters.

Sean Anderson, curator of the exhibition, aims to explore a variety of solutions for refugees rather than to offer answers to a complex global political problem: “For over 60 million persons in the world today, shelter is defined through constant movement or escape. Insecurities: Tracing Displacement and Shelter explores the ways in which contemporary architecture and design have addressed notions of shelter in light of global refugee emergencies. From the strengthening of international borders to the logistics of mobile housing systems, how we understand shelter is ultimately defined through an engagement with security. Refugee camps, once considered temporary settlements, have become sites through which to examine how human rights intersect with the making of cities. Bringing together projects by architects, designers, and artists, working in a range of mediums and scales, that respond to the complex circumstances brought about by forced displacement, the exhibition focuses on conditions that disrupt conventional images of the built environment”.

UNICEF’s School-in-a-Box – the School-in-a-Box has become part of the UNICEF standard response in emergencies, used in many back-to-school operations around the world. The kit contains supplies and materials for a teacher and up to 40 students. The purpose of the kit is to ensure the continuation of children’s education by the first 72 hours of an emergency.
A Better Shelter
A collection of structures developed for or in refugee camps for temporary settlement.
Tiffany Chung’s images from Homs in the work “Finding one’s shadow in ruins and rubble” (2014).
Reena Saini Kallat’s ‘Woven Chronicle” (2015) deals with worldwide borders and barriers.
Mid-Upper Arm Circumference (MUAC) measuring tapes by Doctors Without Borders (MSF) are used to measure the nutritional status of a child or adult.

More material from the exhibition is available here.

Reviews

Dezeen: MoMA’s Insecurities exhibition to address the global refugee crisis

Curbed: Upcoming MoMA Exhibition Will Explore Refugee Shelters

The Architects Newspaper: MoMA to open exhibit on refugee displacement