Hasta La Ideas

Contemporary artists Michael Elmgreen and Ingar Dragset have turned five galleries at the V&A museum in London into the apartment of a fictional architect for an exhibition that opens next month.

The V&A invited Elmgreen & Dragset to develop an installation for its former textile galleries, which have been closed to the public for several years.

The artists appropriated over 100 objects from the museum’s collections and combined them with their own artworks and antique market purchases to create a mock up of a domestic interior.

“Making this exhibition is like creating a detailed set for a film, but with access to the incredible collections of the V&A to choose from,” said the artists. “While selecting objects to furnish the apartment we began to envision pieces of dialogue between characters that we could imagine might inhabit the space.”

To accompany the set design, Elmgreen & Dragset have written a script that describes the lifestyle of the disillusioned retired architect who inhabits the space.

Visitors will be given a copy of the script and invited to wander through the rooms, interacting with character’s furniture and possessions so they can better understand the societal issues of ageing, disappointment and alienation that inspired the story.

“We are excited to be working with two of the world’s leading contemporary artists on this ambitious project,” said V&A director Martin Roth. “The result will be unsettling and provoking and above all will present the V&A’s collections in a radically new and memorable way for our visitors.”

The exhibition opens to the public on 1 October 2013 and will continue until 2 January 2014.

Elmgreen & Dragset are known for their subversive sculptures and installations, which draw on diverse influences including social politics, performance and architecture. Previous installations by the duo include a sculpture of a boy on a rocking horse on top of the vacant fourth plinth in London’s Trafalgar Square and a full scale replica of a Prada boutique built in the Texan desert.

For the London Design Festival, the V&A is currently showing a set design depicting a dinner party in progress by designers Scholten & Baijings, an installation of 5000 paper windmills that fills an enormous doorway, and a colourful chandelier that descends from the ceiling of its main hall.

Recent exhibitions at the V&A include an overview of fashion influenced by London’s clubbing scene of the 1980s and an exhibition dedicated to David Bowie memorabilia.

See more stories about the V&A »
See more exhibitions »

Photography is by Stephen White, courtesy of the artists and Victoria Miro, London © Elmgreen & Dragset.

Here’s some more information from the V&A:

Tomorrow – Elmgreen & Dragset at the V&A In partnership with AlixPartners 1 October 2013 – 2 January 2014

The V&A has commissioned a major site-specific installation over five galleries by leading contemporary artists Michael Elmgreen and Ingar Dragset. Opening in October 2013, Tomorrow will transform the V&A’s former textile galleries into an apartment belonging to a fictional, elderly and disillusioned architect.

The installation will feature over 100 objects from the V&A’s collections, which will sit alongside works by the artists, as well as items sourced from antique markets. The juxtaposition of objects, which will be arranged as a grand domestic interior, will create ambiguity and raise questions about cultural heritage. Martin Roth, V&A Director, said: “We are excited to be working with two of the world’s leading contemporary artists on this ambitious project. The result will be unsettling and provoking and above all will present the V&A’s collections in a radically new and memorable way for our visitors.”

Elmgreen & Dragset’s exhibition Tomorrow will appear like a set for an unrealised film. To accompany it, the artists have written a script, which will be available to visitors as a printed book. The drama centres on a retired architect who had great vision but very little success in his professional life. In his twilight years, and with the family fortune long gone, he is forced to sell his inherited home and all his possessions. The script comments on issues of ageing, disappointment and alienation in today’s society.

Within the domestic setting, visitors will act as uninvited guests, able to curl up in the architect’s bed, recline on his sofa, or rifle through books placed by the artists to hint at the imagined events that could have taken place here.

Tomorrow will examine interests that have abided throughout the artists’ careers – those of redefining the way in which art is presented and experienced, issues around social models and how spaces and objects both inflict on and reflect our behavioural patterns. Such ideas are visible in many of the artist duo’s previous exhibitions, including The Welfare Show at Serpentine Gallery in 2006, The Collectors at the 53rd Venice Biennale in 2009 and The One and The Many at Museum Boijmans van Beuningen in Rotterdam in 2011.

Michael Elmgreen & Ingar Dragset said: “On one of our early visits to the V&A to discuss the show, we encountered the former textile galleries which were being used for storage and closed to the public. When we found these spaces we knew right away what we wanted to do. Making this exhibition is like creating a detailed set for a film, but with access to the incredible collections of the V&A to choose from. While selecting objects to furnish the apartment we began to envision pieces of dialogue between characters that we could imagine might inhabit the space. So we wrote a script. It was sort of a reversed process where the props in our film set initiated the narrative. Now it’s our hope that visitors will interact freely with this set and discover their own clues as to who our fictional and quite eccentric inhabitant might be.”

Elmgreen & Dragset have worked closely with V&A curator Louise Shannon to research and select objects from the V&A collections.

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at the V&A appeared first on Dezeen.

London Design Festival 2013: fluorescent lights are controlled by analogue toggle switches in this interactive installation by Faye Toogood for design brand Established & Sons (+ slideshow).

London designer Faye Toogood responded to Established & Sons‘ invitation to produce an installation for the London Design Festival by replicating the appearance of a giant equaliser inside the brand’s 550 square-metre showroom.

A hundred and sixty fluorescent tube lights flicker in alternating sequence and can be controlled by toggling switches mounted on a central switchboard.

The switches are embedded in blocks of coloured resin, through which the cables can be seen.

Beneath the switches the cables drop down through a metal mesh table and spill onto the floor, creating a tangled pile that carries current to the lights.

Iridescent panels fixed to the wall behind the lights are made from zinc passivated steel, a material commonly used to provide insulation from electronic interference.

Toogood developed the installation in response to a new series of colourful resin furniture by Japanese architect Jo Nagasaka, which Established & Sons is also launching during LDF.

Faye Toogood recently designed the interior for a London boutique with a bright white basement and a moody blue ground floor, and used raw concrete and colourful fabrics for the interior of a fashion store in Dubai. See more Faye Toogood »

Established & Sons launched a table supported by four chairs in Milan earlier this year and commissioned designers including Jasper Morrison and Edward Barber and Jay Osgerby to design benches for an exhibition at the V&A museum during last year’s London Design Festival. See more Established & Sons »

Here’s some more info from Established & Sons:

Established & Sons at The London Design Festival

14th–22nd September 2013
Established & Sons – A Vivid Interval
The Conductor

Established & Sons is delighted to announce an artistic collaboration with London designer Faye Toogood during the London Design Festival.

Faye has been invited to create an interactive installation at Established & Sons’ 6,000 square foot studio showroom. Titled, ‘The Conductor’ the creation will allow guests to watch and control a rhythmic symphony of light played out on a giant circuit board of iridescent zinc passivated steel – an industrial material used to provide insulation from electrical interference.

Echoing the graphic of an equaliser, 160 fluorescent bulbs fed by intertwined wires and cables, light up in alternating sequences. The circuit is completed by the audience themselves, who can ‘conduct’ this electrical spectacle from the centrepiece switchboard; itself an array of intricately pigmented resin blocks and archaic-looking analogue toggles, which operate the light orchestra. The result is a macro-electronic display that redefines the notion of son et lumière.

Maurizio Mussati, CEO of Established & Sons says, “We are delighted to welcome Faye Toogood to transform our showroom this year. Established & Sons provides a creative platform for innovative concept ideas inviting the use of visual imagination in design. Faye’s interactive creation will be an immersive and inspiring visual experience, with light and colour dancing across the eyes. It provides the perfect platform for the launch of our stunning new resin series, designed by Jo Nagasaka and should make a memorable impression. I recommend bringing a pair of sunglasses!”

Japanese architect, Jo Nagasaka’s new resin series, was the inspiration behind ‘The Conductor’; the idea of a symphony of colour and industrial materials. These stunning pieces; a coffee table, side table, credenza with sliding doors and a new chair, remain true to Japanese minimalist style whilst being elevated to avant-garde status through the use of brightly coloured resin.  The elegant and smooth finishing highlights the beautiful properties of the natural grain of the wood.

Opening Times/ 16-21 September:
10am – 6pm, 22 September: 12pm – 4pm
Established & Sons Showroom, 5-7 Wenlock Road, London, N1 7SL

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for Established & Sons appeared first on Dezeen.

Danish office BIG has designed a triangular viewing platform for Brooklyn Bridge Park that angles up from the ground like a huge fin (+ slideshow).

The wooden platform will be constructed as part of BIG’s overhaul of Pier 6 – the southernmost end of the park that is located beside the famous suspension bridge between Manhattan and Brooklyn.

Raised off the pier by over five metres, the structure will feature a stepped surface that leads visitors up to two corner viewpoints. From here they will be able to look out towards the bridge, the Statue of Liberty and New York City beyond.

A series of thin steel columns will hold the platform in place, creating a sheltered space underneath that will be furnished with tables and chairs, but could also function as a small events area.

A flower field and several trees will be planted at the other end of the platform to welcome visitors into the park.

BIG, led by architect Bjarke Ingels, also recently worked on a park in Copenhagen that featured miscellaneous street furniture from 60 different nations. See more architecture by BIG »

Other landscape architecture featured on Dezeen includes Louis Kahn’s Four Freedoms Park in New York and a series of undulating bridges and promenades in Copenhagen. See more landscape architecture »

Here’s a project description from BIG:

Brooklyn Bridge Park Pier 6 Viewing Platform

The Pier 6 viewing platform is a triangular structure at the northwest corner of Pier 6 in Brooklyn Bridge Park. Sloping upwards 17.5 feet (5.3m) in height from the foot of the large gathering lawn, the platform provides magnificent views of the surrounding harbour, the Statue of Liberty, the Manhattan skyline, and the Brooklyn Bridge.

In conjunction with the adjacent greenery, Pier 6 will be dominated by a flower field and treed areas giving the area seasonal displays of colour. The surface of terraced stairs, softly illuminated, will allow for large and small events and is fully ADA accessible. The pavilion, a cross-laminated timber structure supported by thin steel columns, is brightly lit with up-lights and provides shade, shelter and space for indoor activities.

Movable site furniture underneath the platform will accommodate a variety of programs, from food carts and picnicking to community events and small performances.

Program: Public Space
Status: In Progress
Size in m2: 560
Project type: Competition
Client: Brooklyn Bridge Park Conservancy
Collaborators: Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, Knippers Helbig, Tilotson Design Associates, AltieriSeborWieber,Pantocraft, Formactiv
Location: Brooklyn, NY

Partner in charge: Bjarke Ingels, Thomas Christoffersen
Project Leader: Iannis Kandyliaris
Project Manager: Martin Voelkle
Team: Ho Kyung Lee, David Spittler, Dennis Harvey, Isshin Morimoto

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by BIG appeared first on Dezeen.

At the Global Design Forum on Monday night, graphic designer Peter Saville revealed that he’s working on a logo for musician Kanye West. In this transcript of the conversation Saville had with journalist Paul Morley, he discusses the project and what it’s like to work with the rap star.

Saville spoke at the V&A Museum on Monday for the forum, which is part of the London Design Festival. Saville was yesterday officially awarded the London Design Medal.

Earlier last year Kanye West announced via his Twitter feed that he is to launch a design company named DONDA and claimed to be assembling a team that will include architects, designers and directors. We’ve previously published Kanye West’s Claudio Silvestrin-designed apartment and a seven-screen pyramidal cinema designed by OMA to show his first short film at Cannes Film Festival last year.

See all our stories about Peter Saville »
See all our stories about Kanye West »

Here’s the transcript of the interview:

Paul Morley: I must just ask a question I think puts us in two degree of separation with Kanye West because Peter’s last engagement [before coming here tonight] was with Kanye West. I love that idea that you’ve gone on to do the Manchester thing [Saville has been working as creative director for his home city], gone off to do grown up things but that there are still loads quite high up in the pop culture world that are still chasing you for your imprint. What exactly are they chasing you for?

Peter Saville: He’s charming, he nearly came [here tonight]. I said I’ve got to go, I’ve got a gig at 5. He said where and I said somewhere called the Victoria and Albert museum. He said he’s doing [TV show] Jools [Holland] tonight. He would have come.

Paul Morley: So he’s your new mate.

Peter Saville: He’s not my mate. One thing that you learn, in music I learnt this, just because you’ve been to see somebody, doesn’t mean that they’re your mate. So when you get called to meet Paul McCartney or I got to do Roxy [Music] covers, I got to meet Brian [Ferry] who I’d spent my teens trying to be like or look like, but you’re not friends and don’t call us, we’ll call you. Some of the younger ones, the dynamic changes when you’re older than them, Kanye is kind of weird, he…

Paul Morley: I guess he’s interested in you doing design for him, he wants you to be a graphic designer.

Peter Saville: He wants me to be Cassandre. Today I told him all about Cassandre and Cassandre did the Yves Saint Laurent logo. Cassandre, France’s greatest graphic artist in a way of the early 20th century. Cassandre was friends with Christian Dior, I guess they were contemporaries and pals and young Yves worked for Dior as an assistant and when Yves was leaving to set up his own label, it’s quite sweet isn’t it? He asked Cassandre to do the logo for him and Cassandre just rattled off YSL, which was pretty good.

And Kanye said to me, you’re Cassandre, thats what I want. Kanye wants me to do a YSL. And he’s collecting people. He said today he likes great people and wants to put them together and get them to do some great things and get some great people to check the things by these great people and really end up with some great things.

Paul Morley: The other side of the membrane, does this still have value in the world that we’re going into? That is now being shattered into so many surfaces, does a logo or image like that have a value? Does it join the glut? Join the status quo itself no matter how stylish it might be?

Peter Saville: I think I can sometimes say I don’t know. I get asked things and I feel obliged to know something or have an opinion and actually some things I don’t know. It’s sort of significant. Depends how you work. Some people just do stuff and it’s cool. A lot of people just do cool stuff. Then there’s other people that are doing something but that’s how they do it. That’s how they work. They’re trying to achieve something. That’s the pathway by which they make something happen.

I tend to – this old-fashioned slightly analogue idea, there is a way a problem to solve and the problem to solve is as much the context of the now as the thing itself. What is a logo now, what might a logo be for Kanye in a particular context?

I mean I like him, I didn’t expect to like him. I didn’t meet him to do work. Someone said to me that he would like to meet you so I thought it would be rude to say I’m not available. So we met six months ago and had a cup of coffee and that was it. I didn’t know his music and I still don’t know his music. I met him as a person, who wanted to meet me and he was nice and intelligent and an astonishing energy and astonishing intelligence.

I mean he is alive, he’s super live and he has talents. Sometimes you meet people who are talented and they don’t have energy and you meet people with energy but no talent. Every so often you meet a talent who has energy. And Kanye without a doubt is a talent with energy. At the moment he said can I help him with something, and I said ‘I don’t know, I’ll try’.

See all our stories about London Design Festival 2013 »
See Dezeen’s map and guide to London Design Festival 2013 »

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– Peter Saville appeared first on Dezeen.

London Design Festival 2013: Swedish studio Claesson Koivisto Rune launches a collection of wicker lighting at designjunction this week.

Claesson Koivisto Rune designed the wicker lamp shades for Chilean brand Made in Mimbre by The Andes House.

Named Medusa, Chinita and Bellota, the three designs are meant to resemble jellyfish, ladybirds and acorns.

The small and large jellyfish lamps feature woven shades with long wicker tentacles left dangling below to disguise three thin metal legs.

The designers also created small, medium and large rounded floor lamps with four legs teased out from the corners of each one, which they liken to ladybirds.

The third product in the range is an acorn-shaped pendant, which is available in three sizes.

The wicker lamps will be presented at design show designjunction at The Sorting Office, 21-31 New Oxford Street, WC1A 1BA until 22 September as part of London Design Festival.

Other projects by Claesson Koivisto Rune featured on Dezeen include a stove for the developing world that uses two-thirds less wood than a traditional cooking fire.

See all our features about Claesson Koivisto Rune »

See all our stories about London Design Festival 2013 »
See Dezeen’s map and guide to London Design Festival 2013 »

Photographs are courtesy of the designers.

Here’s some more information from Claesson Koivisto Rune:

We are impressed by the achievements of the young team at Made in Mimbre. They have succeeded in creating and manufacturing their beautiful lighting collection locally. Not only that, their whole ethos of employing local artisans to create contemporary objects in a professional context and in so doing preserve their wicker weaving techniques makes us profoundly happy to be a part of.

Not only do we see great potential and intrinsic value in the handicraft of their products, the quality of the light from within their lamps is fantastically warm and atmospheric. Collaborating with Made in Mimbre on our first collection has been a pleasure and a joy!

In honour of the origins of the manufacturer we have chosen to give the lamp designs Spanish names: Medusa, Chinita and Bellota.

The Medusa lamps, with their oval-shaped lampshades, appear to balance on numerous thin, spindly supports. Rather than trimming the excess lengths of wicker, as is usually done, we have kept them and hidden three, thin metal legs amongst them. The resulting designs reminded us of jellyfish, floating, with their many trailing tendrils.

Almost as if they have been nipped and then pulled, four ‘feet’ appear to have been stretched from the bottom edge of the Chinita lamps. We think that the gesture results in a series of lamps with a cute, creature-like character. Like small, friendly bugs. Like ladybird bugs, for example.

The Bellota suspension lamps are two, similar forms combined to make a whole. Yet there is a clear division between the two. In keeping with the nature theme, the inspiration for the BELLOTA design is derived from the distinctive form of the acorn, where one form can be seen to partially ‘cover’ the other.

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lamps by Claesson Koivisto Rune appeared first on Dezeen.