Silver design tracks mood of nation

WASHINGTON – At their best, the decorative arts preserve history in fine lines, elegant form and intimate scale.

Those attributes describe the modern silver that goes on view this week at the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington. “Modernism in American Silver: 20th-Century Design” includes 200 pieces of manufactured silver made between 1925 and 2000. Aesthetically, the works range from luxurious art moderne platters to late-century tableware by architects Michael Graves and Richard Meier.

There is beauty in the objects, lent by the Dallas Museum of Art. But the compelling dynamic comes from the way the designs present a chronology of cultural change.

Candlesticks celebrate the rise of skyscrapers in the ‘30s. The end of Prohibition is expressed in cocktail shakers.