Martino Gamper – DesignApplause

masters of disguise see••ds at london design festival 2019.

Sep 5, 2019

see••ds is pleased to present masters of disguise as part of brompton design district 2019, an exhibition that seeks to interpret this year’s theme nature/nurture by looking at the notion of human nature.

in the current age of the anthropocene, designers need to reflect not only on their work, but also at their own identity as creative professionals. who we are and how we choose to represent ourselves to the world is deeply rooted in how we interpret the relationship to the environment. this is the essence of human nature.

masters of disguise will explore this concept by exhibiting the work of key contemporary artists/designers including jochen holz, martino gamper and sabine marcelis, and more who have been invited to design masks that address questions of identity, visibility and image. together with their interpretation of their individual identity – their ‘human nature’ – in the form of a mask. questions of identity, performance and display are at the core of this exhibition. in the current era of hyper-visibility and obsession with image culture, a mask is a powerful metaphor for the changes of identity that we perform in our everyday interactions across different media and realities.

during the exhibition, a performative dinner will be hosted at the space where artists will be playing with their masks in a social gathering where the expression of hiding/revealing an identity will be presented to the hosts. the exhibition setting will be specifically created for the occasion using low-impact materials. artists/designers will also be contributing to the exhibition with a number of objects that will be used during the performative opening event (including furniture, lights, tableware, cutlery, glasses, vases etc).

curated by m–l–xl / m–l–xl is a design studio that works across different disciplines, including furniture design, installations, type design and publishing. the studio, with offices in venice and london, was founded by marco campardo and lorenzo mason, and focuses on research, experimenting with languages, techniques and materials.

14-22 september 2019
mon-sun 10am-6pm

35-36 thurloe place
south kensington
sw7 2hp

tube > south kensington

#ldf19 #mastersofdisguise #seedslondonstrong>

idiosincratico by martino gamper at london design festival 2019.

Sep 4, 2019

to coincide with martino gamper’s london design festival commission – disco carbonara at coal drops yard – samsung presents idiosincratico: an exposition of the designer’s creative practice.

the samsung space will offer a unique vantage point on gamper’s installation below. as well as viewing the exhibit, visitors can also interact with the latest technology, and take part in an ongoing series of events, workshops and performances.

presenting three significant projects, idiosincratico gives insight into gamper’s creative process – exploring his distinctive and playful approach to dissembling and reinventing familiar domestic objects. at the heart of each of gamper’s projects is the notion of thinking through making and examining how process informs the physical outcome.

for hookaloti, gamper takes a single typology – the wall hook – and riffs on it, improvising with the form, material and expressive possibilities of a simple everyday object. in metamorfosi, a project to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the italian furniture company moroso, gamper takes pieces from their catalogue and cuts and splices them to create a design mash-up. by contrast, arnold circus stool is a project for the public realm initiated to support the regeneration of the landmark site on shoreditch’s boundary estate, london’s first social housing project.

supported by samsung.
14-22 september 2019
monday-saturday 10am-8pm, sunday 10am-6pm

coal drops yard
stable st, kings cross
london
n1c 4dq

tube > kings cross

#ldf19 #idiosincratico

legacy by various designers at v&a museum. london design festival 2019.

Sep 4, 2019

sir john sorrell, chairman of london design festival, invited leaders of london’s cultural institutions to collaborate with some of the world’s most prolific designers to create a ‘legacy’ piece of design – an object of personal or professional relevance to them.

each of the pieces – 10 in total – are beautifully crafted in american red oak, an exciting and sustainable hardwood species that grows abundantly in american forests, and will be fabricated at benchmark furniture in berkshire. nine of the pieces will be presented as a group exhibition at the v&a, after which they will relocate to the homes or institutions of each of the commissioners. the 10th piece, the nest, will be installed at the natural history museum.

“we called upon cultural leaders in london and asked if they would like to contribute to this thought-provoking project,” says sorrell. “we then invited some of the world’s top designers and were delighted when everybody immediately said yes.”

“ahec (american hardwood export council) is always pushing the boundaries for american hardwoods and we wanted to create a project that celebrates the use of red oak to demonstrate not just how beautiful it is for furniture making, but also to test the performance and quality of this abundant wood,” says david venables, european director of ahec. “it’s a fabulous project with incredible designers. we can’t wait to see what emerges from these unique collaborations.”

the 10 commissioners and designers are;

alex beard cbe chief executive, royal opera house, with terence woodgate

amanda nevill cbe ceo, british film institute, with sebastian cox

hans ulrich obrist artistic director, serpentine galleries, with nina tolstrup and jack mama, studiomama

sir ian blatchford director and chief executive, science museum group, with marlène huissoud

iwona blazwick obe director, whitechapel gallery, with yael mer and shay alkalay, raw edges

sir john sorrell cbe chairman, london design festival, with juliet quintero, dallas-pierce-quintero

kwame kwei-armah obe artistic director, young vic, with tomoko azumi

dr maria balshaw cbe director, tate, with max lamb

tamara rojo cbe artistic director, english national ballet, with martino gamper

dr tristram hunt director, v&a, with jasper morrison

supported by american hardwood export council.

tube > south kensington

#LDF19 #LEGACY

alpi at the london design festival 2019 with the “disco carbonara” installation by martino gamper.

Aug 30, 2019

after the recent collaboration for the fuorisalone 2019, alpi and the designer martino gamper go back to work together for the london design festival, one of the main international events in the design world.

the company, leader in the production of decorative surfaces in reconstituted wood veneer, contributes to the realization of the exclusive site-specific installation disco carbonara designed by gamper, on display from 14 to 22 september 2019 at king’s cross. the new london creative district will be, for the first time this year, a design district of the festival, becoming part of the most interesting addresses in london for design and architecture.

disco carbonara is conceived by gamper as a playful temporary gateway to the new coal drops yard commercial center. for this project, the designer has expressly chosen reclaimed alpi wood to cover the entire structure – 10 m long and about 8 m high – composed of a fake colored façade that evokes in an entirely new way the lively atmospheres of the discos.

by selecting waste elements that can no longer be used in production, gamper perfectly reveals his modus operandi of deconstruction and re-contextualization of the existing, with the aim of restoring new life and value to a “forgotten” material and exploring its extraordinary potential. the combinations of chromatic tones and variegated textures give shape to a highly scenographic geometric composition that reveals the unusual expressive language of the designer and his imaginative poetics.

“disco carbonara” installation by martino gamper
14 – 22 september 2019
coal drops yard,
king’s cross, n1c
london

Design miami/basel 2011. Record numbers.

Jun 22, 2011

first time participants galerie ulrich fiedler, presenting work from bauhaus and de stijl movements.

Announces strongest sales to date attracting record number of acquisitions for private and public collections.

The sixth edition of Design Miami/ Basel saw a significant increase in sales and attendance throughout its five-day run in Basel, Switzerland June 14-18, 2011. Collectors, curators, critics, designers and enthusiasts from around the globe descended upon the fair to see stunning presentations of blue-chip historical and contemporary design, alongside new commissions from emerging designers.

In total, the fair drew a record 20,500 visitors from throughout Europe, North America, South America and Asia, including collectors Jil Sander, Naomi Campbell, Will Ferrell, Jean-Pierre Lehmann, Peter Brant, George Lindemann, Larry Gagosian, Rosa and Carlos de la Cruz, Sir Norman Foster, Dasha Zukhova and Ulla Dreyfus-Best among many others. Numerous designers joined them to represent their work, including Aldo Bakker, Jurgen Bey, Ronan Bouroullec, Beatrice Brovia and Nicolas Cheng, Nacho Carbonell, Pierre Charpin, Formafantasma, Martino Gamper, Konstantin Grcic, Hella Jongerius, Arik Levy, Nicolas Le Moigne, Jerszy Seymour, Suzanne Tick as well as Catherine Prouvé and Marianne Panton of the respective estates.

Design Miami/ Basel’s audience of design devotees enthusiastically navigated the fair’s new layout, arranged in a “scatter” pattern by New York-based architects ArandaLasch. The arrangement embraced spatial eccentricities as a way to encourage guests to move about the show in an entirely new way. In addition, thousands of people from over 130 countries followed the unfolding of the show on the Design Miami/Basel blog.

“With this year’s fair, Design Miami/ Basel has once again demonstrated that it is the world’s most important destination for 20th- and 21st-century collectible design,” said Marianne Goebl, Director of Design Miami/. “The caliber of works shown in the gallery program combined with our strongest sales figures to date stand as a testament to the maturity and quality of this year’s show.”

First time participants Galerie Ulrich Fiedler, presenting work from Bauhaus and de Stijl movements, and Galerie Doria, specialized in work by the Union des Artistes Modernes, were enthusiastically received and complemented the early 20th century offering at the fair. Their sales include a Carlo Mollino chair for €100,000 and the Monofilio chair by Conti/Grassi/Forlani for €35,000 at Ulrich Fiedler and a table by Pierre Chareau for an undisclosed sum at Galerie Doria. Art Deco Galerie Anne- Sophie Duval from Paris sold a pair of Albert Giacometti wall scones and several pieces by Jean-Michel Frank for undisclosed amounts.

Going even further back in history, Paris-based Galerie Perrin (above) sold furniture developed for the Napoleonic campaigns, including a set of two chairs for €45,000 each and a day bed for €100,000.

Rare architectural structures by Jean Prouvé were also amongst the highlights of this year’s fair. Galerie Patrick Seguin (above) presented a museum-quality exhibition of Prouvé’s pre-fabricated structures, including a stunning design performance: a 6x6m demountable house from 1944 was mounted in front of the visitors every day of the fair, revealing the intelligence and beauty of the structure.

Seguin sold Prouvé‘s Salle a Manger, for €140,000 to an American collector and two stools by Pierre Jeanneret for €10,000 each to a collector from South America.

In a booth partially constructed from a schoolhouse designed by Jean Prouvé in 1957, the Paris-based gallery Jousse Entreprise (above) sold a Pierre Jeanneret table for €150,000 and a Charlotte Perriand table for €28,000.

Continuing the trend of strong sales for French design from the 1940s and 1950s, Galerie Downtown François Laffanour (above) sold a Jean Prouvé table and six chairs to a Swiss collector for €120,000, and Galerie Jacques Lacoste sold a Jean Royere Ours Polaire sofa, armchair and pouf for €750,000 to an American collector.

Solo shows allowed the visitors to gain deeper insights in the work of specific designers. New York-based gallery Demisch Danant (above) dedicated its presentation to the French post-war modernist Joseph André Motte and sold a pair of leather chairs (€26,000) as well as a pair of floor lamps for an undisclosed amount, amongst others.

Galerie kreo (above) from Paris sold a bench and console (€28,000 each) as well as a coffee table (€24,000), all from the newly commissioned solo show by Pierre Charpin. The gallery also sold the Frozen Cabinet by Studio Wieki Somers for €38,000 and Konstantin Grcic’s Monroe Champion for €36,000.

Within the first minutes of opening, Johnson Trading Gallery (above) sold two cast bronze tables ($20,000 each) to a US collector, as well as a chair ($35,000), pair of tables ($28,000) and vessel ($18,000) all part of the gallery’s Max Lamb solo show.

Design Miami/ Basel 2011 featured a high number of work with provenance from private and public commissions. Hostler Burrows (above) saw a number of strong sales including a chandelier by Pavo Tynell ($50,000) that was a commission for the Helsinki Stock Exchange. R 20th Century from New York City sold a private commission by Joaquim Tenreiro for an undisclosed sum, as well as a rare dresser by Greta Magnusson Grossman for $60,000.

Todd Merrill Twentieth Century (above) sold a number of pieces including a towering Harry Bertoia gong sculpture, originally commissioned for a Norwegian music hall, to a Chinese artist/collector for an undisclosed sum.

Exhibitors of the Design On/Site program, dedicated to solo shows of cutting-edge contemporary designers, will see their work go to institutional and private collections alike. Particles Gallery sold an Aldo Bakker stool to the Vitra Design Museum. The blankets of Formafantasma’s Colony series, presented by Gallery Libby Sellers (above), will be integrated in the permanent collection of the Dutch Textile Musem in Tilburg. And first-time participant Galerie Maria Wettergren received a number of site-specific commissions for Astrid Krogh’s high-tech textiles.

Freedom and Function: Jonathan Monk, Jürgen Mayer H., Piet Hein Eek, and Joseph Grima

In addition to the gallery program, a regular highlight for Design Miami/ Basel attendees is the fair’s Design Talks, which shed light on topics at the intersection of art, architecture and design. This year’s talks included “The Power of Patronage: Pushing Boundaries through Private Commissions” with participants Alexander S.C. Rower, Max Lamb and Felix Burrichter; “Freedom and Function: Diverse Approaches to Design” with Jonathan Monk, Jürgen Mayer H., Piet Hein Eek, and Joseph Grima; and “Designers of the Future: Conversation Pieces” with Asif Khan, studio juju, mischer’traxler and Joseph Grima.

The 2011 “W Hotels Designers of the Future Award” winners (above), Asif Khan/UK, studio juju/Singapore and mischer’traxler/Austria, stunned the visitors with their site-specific interventions, spanning from an artificial cloud to a tent-structure and a machine, which activated itself to produce a basket when shown attention by the visitors.

Sponsor exhibition highlights included the HSBC Connection Collection IV: Hella Jongerius’ “Daylight”, a new work by Dutch designer Hella Jongerius, commissioned especially for the fair; Swarovski Crystal Palace’s presentation of “Iris” by Fredrikson Stallard, a new collaboration with the London-based design studio; and “The Vitra Design Museum: Zoom: Italian Design and the Photography of Aldo and Marirosa Ballo,” an exhibition of the work of Milanese photographers Aldo Ballo and Marirosa Toscani Ballo.

Design Miami/ Basel confirmed once again that it is the only fair that can assemble the highest caliber of international design galleries for an audience of experienced as well as new collectors. With a unique presentation spanning collectible design from around the world, the June 2011 show proved to be the most successful in the show’s history.

about design miami/
Design Miami/ is the most prominent and substantive forum for collectible design, representing a convergence of commerce and culture. Its annual shows in Basel, Switzerland (June) and Miami, USA (December) bring together the most influential galleries, collectors, designers, critics and curators from around the world. [ details ]

Design Miami/ Basel is presented in partnership with HSBC Private Bank, whose dedication to innovative international design is an example of its emphasis on the value of connections. [ details ]

[ via design miami/ | @DesignMiamiBlog | facebook ] [ photography: james harris ]

Design Miami/ 2011 (in Miami) | 29 November – 4 December 2011 | VIP Opening 29 November 2011