Hasta La Ideas

On site to present their new collection at Milan Design Week, Fernando and Humberto Campana recently sat down with CH at Spazio Rossana Orlandi to talk about their latest works—a collaboration with Corsi Design Factory called Nativocampana. The collection, 15 vases and baskets, combines fluid resin with the Brazilian designers’ most loved materials, leather, natural fibers and wooden benches. Mixing Italian craftsmanship (each piece is handmade in Corsi’s lab in the heart of Milan), highly-technical resins requiring extensive experimentation and production, along with their signature natural and recycled materials, the resulting gorgeously amorphous forms toe the line between high and low in true Campana fashion.

Is beauty spontaneous or does it emerge from hard work?

Fernando Campana: For me it’s from hard work, everything I do starts from the hands and sometimes things come unconsciously without even knowing if is going to be beautiful. I learn from my mistakes because sometimes the ugliness can be attractive and you can construct beauty from the ugliness.

Humberto Campana: For me beauty starts from your eyes, from the education of your sight. It can be spontaneous or come from hard work, but you get and process it through the way you look at things. This is the procedure to get to beauty. Some people have this sense more easily, but it certainly relies on the education of the eyes.

Your projects seem to be a process of taking order out of chaos.

FC: The concept of beauty has changed drastically in the past 10 years. For instance, when you use gold, it’s already beautiful, but sometimes you have to build nice things from very ugly materials. This is the trick whenever you work with pieces of discarded things—you have to find order into chaos and build something elegant.

HC: Part of our work is to out point beauty within something, which is not so for most people, and so we find beauty wherever it’s not clearly visible. This attracts me a lot. We live in São Paulo, a city with 20 millions inhabitants, which isn’t an easy city at all. The city is also unattractive, you really have to work hard to find and build beauty, because it’s necessary for your well-being.

FC: In Rio de Janeiro instead everything is already beautiful—the nature, the beach, the people, everything is more gentle.

During a 2008 interview Brazilian artist Vik Muniz said that the Campana’s aesthetic relies on gambiarra, a Brazilian concept that describes the local attitude to always get along, to succeed despite all the obstacles. Is that still true in your work?

HC: Gambiarra in Brazil can be a bad word, since we also use it to describe those who steal electricity from their neighbor! It can also be something very amateurish, but on the contrary we try to use this attitude to make very professional things. In our point of view there’s a dose of improvisation there, which is something connected to our work. We are passing through a very bad crisis that makes people do gambiarra, they are finding solutions in order to survive. It’s something very contemporary, even in the European society, meaning smart solutions for very crucial problems with lots of added creativity.

FC: The vases we made with Corsi for example are a kind of gambiarra, but from this Brazilian concept we have deleted the idea of dirt and unclean approach to things, finding a nice, clean solution.

What is the best aesthetic for sustainable products? If there is any, does it have to be rich, poor, surreal, or absent?

HC: Today sustainable products can have any kind of style. Before it was different, because a few years ago it had to be an abhorring aesthetics. Now we can add more elements and make it happier.

FC: Whenever you work with your hands we can talk about sustainability—creating by hand is human ecology.

Nativocampana at Spazio Rossana Orlandi runs through 18 April 2010.

With Milan Design Week 2010 barely underway, Mad Agency set the bar high with their celebration of Mark Newson‘s fourth collaboration with champagne house Dom Pérignon at their brand-new Mad House in the heart of Milan’s hip Isola neighborhood. A polycarbonate container, Black Box houses a bottle of Dom Pérignon Vintage 2000, while keeping it cold for hours, even on the move. The sleek design proves essential for any luxe traveler or serves as a beautifully futuristic sculpture for the home.

Black Box will sell during Design Week at Dom Pérignon’s temporary shop as well as selected retailers around Milan, such as Antonia, Triennale Design Cafè, Wok, Spazio Santerasmo and The Special for a suggested price of €220.—Paolo Ferrarini

Dom Pérignon Black Box Temporary Shop

Via Lepontina, 8

9-15 April 2010

This year’s installations at the Salone promise to be highly interactive and engaging and the Foscarini event stands out as one of the peak examples. Visitors will enjoy two different experiences in two separate contexts.

The first, designed by Vicente Garcia Jimenez, features video installations by Massimo Gardone and Fabio Bressan and original music by Francesco Morosini. The second introduces the new elements of the Foscarini collection in a 3D setting. The experience, simultaneously immaterial and physical, drives guests to discover the accuracy and poetry of details, sounds, materials and designs. Check out the above video to get a sense of the immersive environment. At the end of the tunnel, the the new items in the 2010 collection–the Troag, Aplomb, Tua, Bahia and LumiereXXS—greet visitors.—PF

Foscarini Inside

Superstudio Pi&#249

Via Tortona, 27

14-19 April 2010

A consistent can’t miss, Designersblock is always one of the hottest hubs of activity away from the main exhibition site.

The brainchild of Piers Robers and Rory Dodd, Designersblock pioneered the off-schedule design shows, and continues to approach each exhibition afresh and encourages an ensemble approach. The results often inspire an active debate and dialogue surrounding the designs.

This year Designersblock joins Zona Isola, a new network of venues in Milan that will unite designers from all corners of the globe, including Sweden’s Johan Lindstèn and his nostalgic tapestry chairs, and the imaginative Paul Hendrikx who have vows never to make a dull item. Toby House will bring his playful work, while Sophie Hedderwick will undoubtedly display her bright neon pieces in a dark corner. A micro-trend looks set to emerge from the likes of Vesna Pejovic and Henry Ellis, with their tactile and durable metal treatments.

Also interested in processes, this year Designersblock invited a group of designers to explore traditional artisanal manufacturing techniques in a project called Bodging, the results of which will also be on display.—Richard Prime

Filling the rustically chic streets of Milan once again, design’s fervent crowd of aficionados will gather next week for the annual Salone Internazionale del Mobile—a showcase of 2010’s best in furniture and design wares.

Only a few days remain before the festivities begin, and to prepare we’ve highlighted a few of the shows we’re anticipating the most in two parts.

Dutch design always has something interesting to offer both visually and conceptually, and the innovative Weltevree is no exception. This year the product design company stretches its legs with a large-scale exhibition, bringing with it a range of stimulating and thoughtful designs. Combining carefree playfulness with high level intellect, look out for the cute Tilestove by Dick Van Hoff and the incredible Dutchtub from Floris Schoonderbeek. (pictured above)
Via Cletto Arrighi 16, Milan

A collective show organized by Svensk Form, the Swedish society of craft and design, will once again represent Swedish design. Entitled “Swedish Love Stories,” this year visitors can soak up the work of Thomas Bernstrand, who lances his strong conceptual work with cheeky humor. (pictured above and top left) Contrasting with the relatively young Bernstrand, Gärsnäs, has been making top quality furniture since 1893. (See the green “Citi” chair by Ralf Lindberg, pictured top, and Nina Jobs’ quilted chair in the slide show below.) New talent juxtaposed with the heritage of Swedish design creates an interesting tension at this year’s Swedish exhibition. The show also examines the influence of the Dalarna region and the impact of its historical and natural heritage.
Superstudiopiu, Via Tortona 54, Milan

After the successful launch last year, colorful French design company Moustache (pictured above) return to Milan for its “difficult second collection.” Hopefully, if last year’s efforts are anything to go by, it will be more of the same pop colors and more compelling pieces from this extroverted brand.
Superstudiopiu, Via Tortona 54, Milan

After taking a look at Italian design origins in one exhibit by designer Italo Rota and exploring production contradictions with curator Andrea Branzi’s “Serie Fuori Serie,” this time the Triennale Design Museum turns to another maestro, Alessandro Mendini, to conceive the latest installation “Quali Cose Siamo?”

Asking “what things are we?,” the exhibit journeys through collective and private memories, defined through over 800 objects on display. From gigantic to small and common to odd, the objects in the historic rooms of the Triennale offer both a sense of familiarity—like coffee machines and corkscrews—and surprise, such as with the Prada shoes or the Lenci ceramics.

A memorable demonstration of childlike attitude and lucid wisdom, Mendini explained “While preparing the exhibition, I thought about my life’s encounters with objects and people. I didn’t want institutional items, very well shown during the previous editions. Of course some objects are not to be forgotten, like the Olivetti Lettera 22, but I have chosen the one used by Indro Montanelli. The shift is clear, from the things to their unique stories. That is to say, a fascinating jump from critics to anthropology.”

Silvana Annichiarico, director of the Triennale, also created an interesting “path inside a path” entirely dedicated to children, who will receive a complimentary illustrated book where the character Frisello guides them through a sort of treasure hunt with the objects. Will the kids be able to find answers? And will the visitors be able to discover what things we are?

“This is an interrogative pathway,” concludes Mendini. “At the end, every guest will have some doubts cleared, but also some new legitimate questions.”

Check out more images after the jump.

Une campagne réalisée pour la chaîne de télévision Sky à propos de leur passage en haute-définition. La baseline est explicite “Goodbye low definition”, sur un travail de l’agence 1861united à Milan, une illustration de Xchanges et une post-production de German Finko.

Voir en grand format : Sky HD 1 – Sky HD 2 – Sky HD 3

Previously on Fubiz

• Sky in Dubai
• Staples Art
• Water Cube Pavilion