Generally, the display of major exhibitions at Australian public art galleries does not go beyond the choice of colour for the walls and adjustments to the lighting. By contrast, the NGV commissioned the well-known Paris-based architect and designer India Mahdavi to enter into a collaborative dialogue with Bonnard. She has designed decorative painted stage sets, screens, special wallpaper, carpets, and furnishings, in the form of the exhibition’s scenography, to create a unique viewing experience.
Mahdavi has generally sampled ornamental patterns or figurative motifs discovered in Bonnard’s paintings, and then employed them on a monumental scale. We move through three conceptual parts of the exhibition
