Open is more (freedom is in the details)

The “HYPER ACTIF” (HYPER ACTIVE) exhibition is a progression and an explicit illustration of the project matali crasset has been developing since 1991.  “HYPER ACTIF” shows how objects try to be more than what they are supposed to be, how they fight constraints, automatisms and confinement to specific functions.

matali crasset always gives users the opportunity to touch, twist and turn her creations.  This ability to transform is always visible, sometimes in the form of tiny details which can be seen nestling on the surface of the object (outgrowths, cuts, projections, recesses, tabs, etc.)

matali crasset - Seul-ensemble (alone-together) 2008 - seating to share - photos: Charles Duprat

“Seul-ensemble” (alone-together) is an armchair which can be turned into a table for 4 to 6 guests: the back of the chair becomes the table top, with recesses showing where the guests will be sitting. The seat serves as a trestle and the cushions are used to sit on the floor. This concept is reminiscent of the “Permis de construire” (license to build) toy-sofa (2000) which allowed various combinations, and of the “Link” line of tableware designed for the Hi hotel in 2002.

Each piece of furniture in the “HYPER ACTIF” exhibition takes the concepts developed by matali over the years a step further.  This physically mutant furniture affects the mind like Trojan horses or Russian dolls:  you transform an object, open up your mind and liberate yourself (at least partly or symbolically).

Unlike radical or political design in the 70s, this desire for liberation does not consider the individual as an end but rather as a starting point. matali believes that our power of adaptation goes beyond the limit of everyday objects. matali asserts that she does not design objects so much as she offers “life scenarios”. However, we tend to confuse “scenario” with “personalized need” which does not take into account changes needed at specific times. matali crasset says: “Change is poorly thought of.  And yet, life is nothing but a succession of transformations and sudden developments. So why don’t we imagine a more active structure, furniture with less specific functions which could evolve with the needs of our multiple activities within one space.”

In order to overcome this “specificity”, matali crasset has created her own conceptual and practical tools. Used independently or jointly, these tools allow her to consider every project, from the simplest to the most complex, with the same rigor, lightness and versatility. Objects and furniture presented at the “HYPER ACTIF” exhibition illustrate four of these conceptual tools.

matali crasset - Formel-informel (formal-informal) - seating attitudes - photos: Charles Duprat

“Formel-informel” (formal-informal) is a throne-like chair consisting of a “box of tranquility” and a side table.  This concept of a dual object reminds us of “Chaise travesties” (transvestite chairs) (2002) which consists of a single structure dressed up to look like the silhouettes of famous designer chairs (Branzi, Thonet, Jacobsen).

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The David Report Bulletin is a quarterly trend report with a design perspective and a humanistic approach. The latest issue is called 'The Sustainable Wheel':
It’s important to have a holistic mindset when talking about sustainable design. Quite often ecological matters are overbalanced. In this bulletin David Report is describing an imaginary wheel (created by Designboost) which could work as a tool for designers, companies and organisations when defining sustainable design. You will also find an interview with designer researcher Jennifer Leonard.

An Exploration of a Neglected Problem in Design Education
 
By Jan MICHL
Department of Industrial Design, OSLO SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE, Norway
Jan Michl's website | Jan Michl's e-mail
 
 
“… every picture owes more to other pictures painted before than it owes to nature.”  E.H. Gombrich, art historian, 1954
 
“… one of the most important properties of all fields of production [is] the permanent presence of the past of the field, which is endlessly recalled even in the very breaks which dispatch it to the past.”  Pierre Bourdieu, sociologist, 1984
 
“Any new thing that appears in the made world is based on some object already in existence. (…) each new technological system emerges from an antecedent system, just as each new discrete artifact emerges from antecedent artifacts.”  George Basalla, historian of technology, 1985
 
“ if anybody were to start where Adam started, he would not get further than Adam did…”  Karl Popper, philosopher, 1979
 
We talk of design day in and day out – but is design really the right word for what designers do? This article [1] is based on a sense that we lack a perspective encompassing more than the individual designer’s creative activity and more than merely the most recent designer’s contribution – in other words, more than the term design is able to embody. We also need a perspective that will capture the fundamental incompleteness of all design activity, the fact that, contrary to what the word design is normally seen as implying, no solution will ever be the ultimate solution.