Rethinking Everyday Myths: Updating Roland Barthes’ Mythologies within the Exhibition "Mythos Handwerk"

On November 12, 2025 – the 110th Birhday of Roland Barhtes, the Japanisches Palais in Dresden will host the book launch of Updating Roland Barthes’ Mythologies (Mimesis International, 2025), edited by Hans Leo Höger. The event is embedded within the exhibition Mythos Handwerk – Zwischen Ideal und Alltag (The Myth of Craft: Between Ideal and Everyday Life), an exhibition that explores the social, cultural, and symbolic narratives that shape our understanding of craftsmanship.

Kunstgewerbemuseum SKD, Dresden: Foto: Alexander Peitz

Craft as a Living Myth

Mythos Handwerk invites visitors to question the images and ideals surrounding craft and craftsmanship. We usually encounter only the finished product—rarely the processes, labor, and conditions behind it. Out of this distance, myths emerge: stories about passion, authenticity, mastery, and the artisan’s role in society. Through six thematic chapters featuring objects, interviews, photographs, and films, the exhibition examines these narratives and challenges visitors to rethink the relationship between manual skill and social imagination.

The exhibition does not romanticize craft. Instead, it addresses the tension between idealization and the realities of contemporary practice—bureaucracy, shortage of skilled labor, and the everyday risks of workshop life. Yet it also celebrates craft’s capacity to build community and social cohesion, showing that “making by hand” remains a fundamental human act. With its participatory workshops, talks, and discussion formats, Mythos Handwerk positions the museum as a social space—one where cultural myths are not only displayed but also actively reworked.

Book Series: Design Meanings (Mimesis), Volume 3: Updating Roland Barthes’ Mythologies

Updating Barthes’ Mythologies for the 21st Century

Roland Barthes’ Mythologies (1957) dissected the hidden meanings embedded in everyday phenomena—from wrestling and advertisements to wine and laundry detergent—revealing how ideology resides in the ordinary. Nearly seven decades later, Updating Roland Barthes’ Mythologies revisits this analytical lens through the perspectives of design, architecture, and art.

Edited by Hans Leo Höger as the third volume in the Design Meanings series (curated by Renato Troncon and Tom Bieling), the collection gathers over thirty short, incisive essays by international authors. Each contribution unpacks a contemporary myth of everyday life: from objects such as the water bottle, the Swiss Army knife, or the Monobloc chair, to digital phenomena like Instagram, streaming, or ChatGPT. Other essays probe conceptual and political themes—algorithms, democracy, sustainability, or the metaverse—revealing how the designed world continues to generate new systems of meaning and belief.

The book includes contributions by Grit Weber, Enrico Baleri, Anna Berkenbusch, Annette Bertsch, Tom Bieling, Gianluca Camillini, Giorgio Camuffo, Andrea Facchetti, Thomas A. Geisler, Claudia Gelati, Gesine Gold, Markus Hanzer, Oliver Kartak, Andreas Koop, Stefano Maffei, Matteo Moretti, Axel Müller-Schöll, Daniela Piscitelli, Kuno Prey, Peter Putz, Arno Ritter, Ursula Schnitzer, Erik Spiekermann, René Spitz, Karl Stocker, Sonja Stummerer, Martin Hablesreiter, Gerrit Terstiege, Uli Weidner, u.v.m.

Kunstgewerbemuseum SKD, Dresden: Foto: Alexander Peitz

A Dialogue Between Making and Meaning

Placing the book launch within the framework of Mythos Handwerk is more than a curatorial coincidence. Both projects share a concern for the cultural narratives that shape our perception of labor, value, and everyday aesthetics. While Mythos Handwerk foregrounds the tangible and social dimensions of making, Updating Roland Barthes’ Mythologies extends the analysis into the symbolic and conceptual realm—revealing how myths continue to structure our understanding of the ordinary, whether in the workshop or on the screen.

Together, the exhibition and the book invite a reconsideration of what it means to create, interpret, and live among myths today—reminding us that even in the most practical acts of making, cultural meaning is never absent.

Kunstgewerbemuseum SKD, Dresden: Foto: Alexander Peitz

Book Launch
Wednesday, 12 November 2025, 5:30 p.m.
Living Room, Japanese Palace
Palaisplatz 11, 01097 Dresden

As part of the exhibition
Myth of Craft. Between Ideal and Practice
at the Museum of Decorative Arts,
Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden

Welcome:
Thomas A. Geisler, Director of the Museum of Decorative Arts / Design Campus

About the book:
Hans Leo Höger, editor and Professor of Theory and History of Design and Communication, Free University of Bozen-Bolzano

Renato Troncon, Professor of Aesthetics at the University of Trento and co-editor of the book series Design Meanings

Authors in conversation:
Kerstin Stöver, art historian and co-curator of Myth of Craft, Museum of Decorative Arts, SKD

Tom Bieling, design researcher and Professor of Design Theory at the University of Art and Design Offenbach/Main, and co-editor of the book series Design Meanings

Carola Zwick, product designer and Professor of Design with a focus on Interaction at the Berlin-Weißensee School of Art and Design

Moderation:
Thomas A. Geisler

Updating Roland Barthes’ Mythologies
Wednesday, November 12, 2025, 5:30 p.m.
Venue: Japanisches Palais, Dresden
As part of the Special exhibition Mythos Handwerk. Zwischen Ideal und Alltag
https://kunstgewerbemuseum.skd.museum/