How are love and emotion embodied in material form?

Love Objects explores the emotional potency of things, addressing how objects can function as fetishes, symbols and representations, active participants in and mediators of our relationships, as well as tokens of affection, symbols of virility, triggers of nostalgia, replacements for lost loved ones, and symbols of lost places and times.

Addressing both designed 'things with attitude' and the 'wild things' of material culture, Love Objects explores a wide range of objects, from 19th-century American portraits displaying men's passionate friendships to the devotional and political meanings of religious statues in 1920s Ireland.

Anna Moran is Coordinator of the MA in Design History and Material Culture at the National College of Art and Design, Ireland.
Sorcha O'Brien teaches Design History and Theory to Product and Furniture Design students in Kingston University, UK.