For The Global Africa Project, a 2010 exhibition on contemporary visual culture in Africa, MAD included the Taboo stool by the industrial design firm Birsel + Seck. Made of 75 percent recycled plastic and manufactured by a female-owned company in designer Bibi Seck’s birthplace of Senegal, Taboo was a groundbreaking design object in multiple ways, as was MAD’s choice to present the modest object amid an array of visually dazzling pieces. What conversations are potentially generated by the choice to display or acquire an object? And in today's world of social media and information sharing, what do display and acquisition really mean for institutions and for individuals?
