POST FOSSIL

Curated by Lidewij Edelkoort for Carpenters Workshop Gallery in London, THE GRADUATE(S) brings together 15 young designers from Europe’s best schools. Here, Adrian Madlener from DL Magazine interviews Lidewij about the show.

 
Having mounted many shows of a similar nature in the past, what was the initial spark that inspired you to curate a survey of emerging European talents this time around? What has changed in your practice and the world around us that will make this showcase stand alone from the others?

I try to foster the talents of young designers, creating exhibitions with my curatorial partner Philip Fimmano, centred on what will happen in design next. Our selection for Carpenters Workshop Gallery is rooted in our belief that archaeology and fragmentation are leading principles for young creative people today. Material research is the most exciting component of this process, at times literally excavated. We baptised this design movement as Post-Fossil (a title we used for a first exhibition at Tokyo’s 21_21 DESIGN SIGHT in 2010). However, these most recent graduate designers live at a time when the world and their futures exist in disarray, a geo-political landscape in shambles that is governed by fear, terrorism, bigotry, inequality and a loss of faith in politics and the economy. Young designers try to make sense of this mess by creating contemporary archaic forms; simply conscious of ecology and overconsumption. They provide us with the arts and crafts we need to project an alternative future.

 
Though you are now creating a textile masters program at Parsons in New York, what drew you back to looking at Europe? What can student designers from Belgium, Denmark, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom teach the rest of the world? Why have these countries remained important bastions of the design zeitgeist?

While I live in New York half of the year, the majority of my work is still connected to Europe and the design industry there, which continues to fuel the most innovative design ideas, pushing culture forward. This is for a large part because Europe has excellent conceptual art and design institutions, which are the birthplace of fresh creativity and taking risks. These are societies that have a tradition of alternative thinking, linked both to craft and industrial production; one could say that there’s a little more design in their DNA. With the exception of Switzerland (!) these countries are all quite flat so maybe it’s the permanent presence of an imposing horizon (= perspective) that allows creative people to keep a more open mind.

 
In 1985, Andrea Branzi coined the idea of Domestic Animals as being a series of objects that combine globalized technological advancements with revived vernacularity; reinterpreted craft traditions specific to different locales. How are today's recent design graduates exploring the concept of archaeology by drawing from the past to shape the future?

There is definitely a very primal aspect to a lot of these design disciplines. This is perhaps best encapsulated in Aurelie Hoegy’s wild Dancers, which are chairs that merge animal and human, supple fibres with hard matter, fusing object with performance. In the aftermath of the longest financial crisis in decades, a period of streamlined design for design’s sake has come to an end. Society is getting ready to break free of its materialistic past by replacing it with the materialisation of modest earth-bound and often recomposed materials. In this process, young designers formulate objects around sustainable ingredients, favouring timber, hide, pulp, fibre, earth and fire. Like contemporary cavemen, they reinvent shelter, redesign tools and manmade machines, and conceptualise archaic rituals for a more modest lifestyle.

 
What materials, forms, textures and colours make up the language you're identifying in this exhibition?

The Graduate(s) features works by fifteen designers made from a variety of both poor and precious natural materials. Martin Laforet has wired LEDs to a rough slab of concrete to create a beautiful lamp. Thomas Ballouhey coats found ingredients with sand to envision rudimentary porous furniture for the future. Carlo Lorenzetti forges earthen recipients for water and botanicals, ritualistic tools for a new kind of well-being. Crackling clay grows over the polished marble and granite assemblages by Priyanka Sharma. Steel is rendered in varying oxidised patinas by Anton Henrik Denys.

The translucency of cow intestines is lit up in a chandelier by Kathrine Barbro Bendixen, recalling the emotional vocabulary of Eva Hesse. And textiles take on tactile dimensions in sensorial rugs by Sofie Genz, woven in wool, paper and sisal. These objects are all tinted in natural shades ranging from brown and beige to red ochres and bronze. An accumulation of shapes and materials brings some brightness in a spectacular cabinet-collage by Kostas Lambridis.

 
Why is it important that the exhibited projects reflect a sense of impulse and experimentation, expressed through the primal rawness and roughness of new material generation, collage; resourcefulness; reconsideration, and reconfiguration?

Material is the message in today’s design world, with designers looking at both low and high tech ways to reinvent the elements with which they work, all the while staying connected to nature and sustainability. Many of the objects are highly process-based, illustrating the making as a sign of authenticity and transparent honesty. Designers often recompose scraps of matter or blend both natural and synthetic ingredients, creating material hybrids. Recycling and reincarnation comes naturally to young people today; giving objects a new life, adding texture and colour along the way.

How can sublime, universal, monolithic, and sculptural forms be understood as functional objects or as means to influence a reorientation of what design means? How can speculative projects change our perception of how we consume and use objects or tools?

Autonomous design mirrors contemporary culture and has the power to ignite new ideas for the design industry at large. For example, over the past twenty years, the movement of creating uniqueness within a range of objects has now become a central asset to many serial product collections; production technology finally catches up. Whether these objects are functional is of less importance since they are considered material expressions, aesthetic objects or three-dimensional forms. They experiment with process and technology, challenge shape and structure, honour the presence of the maker and act as vectors for the important issues of the day. The brut nature of many of the objects in The Graduate(s) indicates a shift by a young generation concerned with making and consuming less, towards a mindful and spiritual future.

 
What is your relationship with Carpenters Workshop Gallery? Have you collaborated in the past?

When contributing an essay to a forthcoming book by Rizzoli about Carpenters Workshop Gallery, I realised just how much we share a similar discerning eye. I am also very proud to see many Design Academy Eindhoven alumni in their roster of artists. We are collaborating with Carpenters because, like us, they’re not afraid to take a risk in order to support tomorrow's creative talent. The gallery has given us carte blanche to show some quite directional projects, some of which are outside Carpenters' usual comfort zone. We all hope to introduce these graduates to an international audience during London Design Week; from the press to collectors and the design world at large.

 
THE GRADUATE(S)

EUROPEAN DESIGN TALENT SELECTED BY LIDEWIJ EDELKOORT

September 4 – September 23, 2017

Monday to Friday 10 AM to 6 PM + open Saturdays September 16 and 23, 2017

Cocktail reception: Monday, September 18 from 6:30-8:30 PM

Carpenters Workshop Gallery

4 Albemarle Street

London W1S 4GA

 
www.carpentersworkshopgallery.com

Carpenters Workshop Gallery is pleased to announce THE GRADUATE(S), its collaboration with design curator Lidewij Edelkoort to highlight young talent gathered from Europe’s best design schools. The gallery’s London space, in the heart of the Mayfair Design District, is offering a platform to graduates as a steppingstone to promoting and producing their work.
 
As a renowned trend forecaster, Edelkoort has a proven record of finding creative talent that reflects the zeitgeist. She has surveyed the work of recent graduates from more than 50 academies to formulate a final selection that defines a new organic design language, observing how, “A fresh generation of designers are investigating their identity and their roots – sometimes literally going back in history to uncover authenticity and primal instincts. They create hybrids between technology and touch, innovating materials, forging form and conceptualizing rituals for a more humble lifestyle fit for our ever-evolving times.”
The exhibition will unveil works from 14 design talents from ECAL (Switzerland), Royal College of Art (United Kingdom), École National Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs (France), Royal Danish Design Academy (Denmark), LUCA School of Arts (Belgium), and Design Academy Eindhoven (the Netherlands).
 
As Edelkoort explains, “A new form of archaeology emerges. Students catalogue this experience by creating new artefacts, remnants for living that are arranged as still lives. A true sense of exploring classic of ancient beauty, rendered in quick gestures and abstract patterns, sporadically using colour in hushed harmonies. Furniture is therefore coated to look like stone, a post-fossil idea dreamt up for tomorrow’s Fred Flintstone. Amphorae resemble historical vestiges while bronze is cast into miniature monuments, decorating homes, composing collections and providing spiritual depth for the future.”
 
THE GRADUATE(S) features works by fifteen designers, made from a variety of both poor and precious natural materials. Among them, Martin Laforet has wired LEDs to a rough slab of concrete to create a beautiful lamp. Thomas Ballouhey coats found ingredients with sand to envision porous rudimentary furniture for the interior. Carlo Lorenzetti forges earthen recipients for water and botanicals, ritualistic tools for a new kind of well-being.

Crackling clay grows over the polished marble and granite assemblages by Priyanka Sharma. Steel is rendered in varying oxidised patinas by Anton Henrik Denys. The translucency of cow intestines is lit up in a chandelier by Kathrine Barbro Bendixen, recalling the emotional vocabulary of Eva Hesse. And textiles take on highly tactile dimensions in sensorial woven rugs by Sofie Genz. These objects are all tinted in natural shades ranging from brown and beige to red ochres and bronze. Yet an accumulation of shapes and materials brings some brightness, a spectacular cabinet-collage by Kostas Lambridis.
 
A digital catalogue will be available through the gallery in early September. For further information, interview requests and full image selection available for press, kindly contact Carla Colón & Andrey Furmanovich at cwg@nadinejohnson.com or on +1 212 228 5555.
 
This special exhibition is part of London Design Week. A cocktail reception with Lidewij Edelkoort and the designers will take place on Monday, September 18 from 6:30-8:30 PM.
 
THE GRADUATE(S)
EUROPEAN DESIGN TALENT SELECTED BY LIDEWIJ EDELKOORT
Monday, September 4 – Saturday, September 23, 2017
Monday to Friday 10 AM to 6 PM
Additionally open Saturday, September
 
Carpenters Workshop Gallery
4 Albemarle Street
London W1S 4GA
 
download the press release

www.carpentersworkshopgallery.com

Time has come for extreme change.

Society is ready to break away from last century for good. To break with creative conventions, theoretic rules and stigmas that now are questioned, challenged and broken. To break with a materialistic mentality replacing it with the materialisation of modest earth-bound and recomposed matter.

In the aftermath of the worst financial crisis in decades, a period of glamorous and streamlined design for design’s sake comes to an end.

A new generation of designers retrace their roots, refine their earth and research their history, sometimes going back to the beginning of time. In this process, they form and formulate design around exactly these natural and sustainable materials, favouring timber, hide, pulp, fibre, earth and fire; like contemporary cavemen, they reinvent shelter, redesign tools and manmade machines, and conceptualise archaic rituals for a more modest, contented and contained lifestyle. Like a Fred Flintstone of tomorrow.

The animal world will keep invading and transforming the life of humans represented in a more abstract and less narrative manner.

Skins and furs are becoming dominant materials animated by organic form and skeleton structures.

Our relation to all living organisms is at stake.

Therefore humans will share and care for each other.

Soon the world will discover that we are all family.

Ecology and sustainability will no longer be enough.

Primitive matter and organic shapes will embody a need of man longing for a more meaningful and ritualistic relationship with earth and the elements.

Resulting in a revival of animism.

Therefore designers create brut and raw shapes that resemble totemic termite mounds, honeycomb shapes, spider web laces and timber structures; at times incorporating biotechnology into the making process

to inspire design systems for the future.

In 21_21 DESIGN SIGHT , the building imagined by Tadeo Ando for Issey Miyake, this exhibition brings together over 130 works of 71 participants that Li Edelkoort sees as “POST FOSSIL” creators.

This collection poses the question, “How will the designers of tomorrow look to past in order to invent the future?”

As it “excavates” and analyzes new creative trends in and for the 21st century, which are embodied in materials, colors, shapes, processes, themes, images, techniques, and other elements, this exhibition searches for clues necessary for the human beings to live and define their future.

www.2121designsight.jp/en

William Cobbing is an artist living and working in London. Starting from a sculptural sensibility his artwork encompasses a diverse range of media, including video, installation and performance.

In the artworks, people are often depicted as being fused with the surrounding architecture, or buried under layers of clay or concrete, from which they absurdly struggle to extricate themselves.

«I'm Thomas Thwaites and I'm trying to build a toaster, from scratch - beginning by mining the raw materials and ending with a product that Argos sells for only £3.99. A toaster.

After some research I have determined that I will need the following materials to make a toaster. Copper, to make the pins of the electric plug, the cord, and internal wires. Iron to make the steel grilling apparatus, and the spring to pop up the toast.

Nickel to make the heating element. Mica (a mineral a bit like slate) around which the heating element is wound, and of course plastic for the plug and cord insulation, and for the all important sleek looking casing. The first four of these materials are dug out of the ground, and plastic is derived from oil, which is generally sucked up through a hole....»

www.thetoasterproject.org