22 January - 8 March 2009 (PARIS)

The Insitut Néerlandais in Paris is proud to announce an important upcoming exhibition on the trends that shape our lives.

Archeology of the Future:20 Years of Trend Forecasting with Li Edelkoort will be the first exhibition to identify and analyze today’s most influential lifestyle trends–as seen through the eyes of the world’s leading trend forecaster,Li Edelkoort. This will also be the first exhibition to explore trend forecasting as a profession,and the first retrospective dedicated to Edelkoort’s body of work.
Archeology of the Future will demonstrate that trends are not passing fads, but rather long-term phenomena that shape every aspect of our lives from the food we eat to the color of our clothes.On display will be more than 100 elements, a variety of design, fashion and photography from around the world.Also on display will be a wealth of images and other audio-visual materials from Edelkoort’s archive.

Li Edelkoort 's portrait by Dmon Prunner

Li Edelkoort is one of the world’s most renowned trend forecasters. In 2003 TIME Magazine named her one of the world’s 25 Most Influential People in Fashion, and in 2004 she was listed in Icon as one of the 21 Most Important People in Design. In 2008, she was awarded the Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres by the French Ministry of Culture, an Honorary Doctorate of Art from Nottingham Trent University and France’s prestigious Designers Days Jury Prize for her work in fashion and design. Born in Holland in 1950, she began trend forecasting in Paris in 1975. Since then, she has pioneered forecasting as a profession, from creating innovative trend forums for Première Vision to long-ranging lifestyle analyses for the world’s leading brands.Edelkoort’s magazines,View on Colour and Bloom, have been enormously influential,as has her work at the Design Academy Eindhoven.Today Edelkoort provides trend analyses and consulting services to major international companies in a wide range of sectors, from fashion and footwear to cosmetics and cars, from food and flowers to bricks and paper. Decrypting the links between art,fashion,design and consumer culture,Edelkoort studies and advances the concepts, colors, and materials which will be important two or more years hence, because “there is no creation without advance knowledge, and without design, a product cannot exist.

” Archeology of the Future will be divided into seven sections, organized by juxtaposed trends. The fourteen trends are a selection of the key lifestyle movements of the last twenty years, bridging the two centuries from 1990 to 2010:

Body | Soul
Global | Local
Flora | Fauna
Urban | Rural
Armour | Amour
Abstraction | Narration
Nihilism | Hedonism

There will also be a special forecasting atelier which will explore Li herself – the mind behind a multitude of ideas.This section will defy the mysticism surrounding Edelkoort’s craft to explain the science behind trend forecasting and the power of color.
To commemorate the exhibition, a full-color catalogue will be published featuring the inspirational photography that has become a hallmark of Edelkoort’s work, together with essays by Edelkoort and other fashion and design authorities.
Edelkoort will also present a special trend symposium and trend workshops during the exhibition to highlight the far-reaching influence of trends and attempt to decipher trends in collaboration with people from the public.