Carlo Scarpa © Svegliado and his son Tobia Scarpa © Riccardo Crosetta

Since 2003, the Museum of Decorative Arts of Bordeaux organizes regularly exhibitions of design. This year, the museum presents the work of the venetian architect Tobia Scarpa and the work of his father, Carlo, who died in 1978 and with whom he was first an apprendice, then a business partner. Tobia took an active role in the organization of this exhibition which gathers, for the first time, the work of both creators.

Carlo Scarpa - Monumental Complexe Brion, 1969-1978, San Vito © Alberto Vendrame, Studio Scarpa

More than thirty years after his death, Carlo Scarpa (1906 Venice–1978 Sendai, Japan) is still considered one of Italy’s more important architects. During his long career from the 20’s until the 70’s, most of his work is settled in Venetia. His name is renown due to the restaurations of historical buidings such as the Correr museum, the Castelvecchio museum, and the Querini fondation among others.

Carlo Scarpa - Sculpture Crescita © Alberto Vendrame, Studio Scarpa

One of his last projects, left incomplete at the time of his death, was completed in 2006 by his son Tobia: the Villa Palazzetto in Monselice. Besides the mentioned projects, Scarpa’s most significant works are the Gipsoteca Canoviana at the Canova Museum in Possagno (1955-1957), the Castelvecchio museum in Verona (1954-1956), and the Fondazione Querini Stampalia, Venice (1961-1963) where his great awareness of the city’s history provides a new dimension. One of the most ambitious landscape and garden projects of his career is the Brion Sanctuary at San Vito d’Altivole in Veneto, realized between 1969 and 1978.

Tobia Scarpa - Carafe Moretta, 1990 © Tobia Scarpa

Tobia Scarpa, Carlo Scarpa’s son, has been working in architecture and design for almost 40 years. First with Afra Bianchin, then alone, he has designed objects, furniture, lamps, office buildings, houses, factories, museums, and showrooms –more than 400 realizations–. In all his work we find beautiful experiments of the potential of the materials, the change of the relationships between forms and functions, and a new understanding of the space where they reside.

The first design pieces of Tobia Scarpa dates back to 1957 at the Paolo Venini's glass factory in which his father worked during years. In 1957, he meets Afra Bianchin (Montebelluna, on 1937 - Trevignano, on 2011) at the Istituto Universitario di Architettura di Venezia. For a test at the Istituto, he designs a prototype of a wooden chair, the armchair Pigreco, an example of simplicity, that is edited first by Santabona, then by Gavina. During almost 40 years, they imagined design objects: furniture, lamps edited by big manufacturers (Knoll, Molteni, Maxalto, Flos), while leading at the same time architect's activity.

Tobia Scarpa - Pigreco, 1959, for Santabona © Giorgio Furla

In 1970, their armchair Soriana was rewarded with the Compasso d'Oro. Generally Tobia Scarpa's seats are made by elements such as construction sets. The chair Libertà from 1989 is an assembly of two parts folded and screwed. Afra Bianchin and Tobia Scarpa drew tens of lamps, most for a new brand: Flos. Thanks to the manufacturing process Cocoon, they created the lamp Fantasma, then the lamp Jucker. In 1968, they designed the table lamp, Biagio, made of Carrara marble; they also designed the floor lamp Papillona, and created a large collection of silversmith objects for San Lorenzo.


Exhibition: Carlo Scarpa & Tobia Scarpa - Dialogo sospeso
Musée des Arts Décoratifs de Bordeaux, France
From September 14 2012 to December 31 2012 

The first Hungarian Wood Festival started on August 24, with four teams composed of young and creative students designing and making complex installations or sculptures that can be folded or disassembled, made of a kilometer of wood planks.

Students from three universities (Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design and University of West Hungary Institute of Applied Arts) formed four groups to work for a week under the supervision of a group leader each on structures exciting from the point of view of both architecture and art. All the pieces were in some way related to the environment of the host location, Csongrad Art Camp, which provided both accommodation and plenty of inspiration.

The week-long creative student workshop’s theme was using wood in a versatile and creative way, and the infinite form variations of installations and sculptures created under specific conditions.

Peter Pozsar’s group, sawing the 1000 m of planks into shorter and longer pieces, built a nest into the shroud of one of the younger trees. From there, snaking around its immediate environment, they continued with the structure to form a quadrilateral cave, as an allegory of the two housing archetypes. They chose an exciting way of securing the structures: instead of nails, they used strings running through drilled holes to hold together the planks.

Andris Huszar’s less spontaneous, but more virtuoso group created a 3m egg-shaped structure, which will work as a tumble-up after being loaded it with sandbags: it will return to its original position, no matter how animated the swing is.

Not surprisingly, the most risky experiments were conducted by group leader, architect and inventor Aron Losonczi: his group left the planks their original size to create a multistorey-high structure stretching far up towards the sky. Their other installation was a grid capable of bridging large distances – its strength was even tested on location.

One can say, however, that the most popular piece of the festival was the 17 meter dinosaur, made by Gabor Miklós Szoke’s group. The peaceful herbivore was made based on a smaller model in only three days, by spontaneously screwing together planks of various sizes.

The Wood Festival was organized by MOME line - design works and Ujirany Architects.

Icone Series Bag For Louis Vuitton	Crevasse Vases For Alessi

A major retrospective on the works of Zaha Hadid Architects is taking place within the salone of Palazzo della Ragione, Padua, Italy. The exhibition examines the practice’s continued experimentation and research into digital design and construction methods at the cutting edge of the industry.   

To coincide with the exhibition, Zaha Hadid Architects have designed a 20 metre long wooden table with seating for Cavour Square in Padua.
 
Product designs include some of Hadid’s most notable pieces and examine the diversity of her work including Mesa Table for Vitra, Genesy Lamp for Artemide, Aqua Table for Established & Sons, Melissa Shoes, sofas for Sawaya & Moroni and B&B Italia, and Louis Vuitton’s Icone bag.  Many of these pieces are now exhibited at museums and galleries worldwide and have become collectors’ pieces alongside design classics from previous centuries.

Scoop Sofa For Sawaya & Moroni	Mesa Table for Vitra

The salone of Palazzo della Ragione (constructed 1172-1219) is considered one of the most notable monuments in Padua. Its medieval roof remains amongst the largest in Europe unsupported by columns, whilst the frescoes that adorn the interior walls date from 1425. As with each of her projects, Hadid has organized this exhibition as a direct response to its environment within the salone, articulating the inherent contextual relationships of her work. The historic qualities of the space presented an exacting design challenge for Hadid. The exhibition design respects these spatial and contextual characteristics whilst also intervening in the unique manner of Hadid's digital, liquid fluidity. Conceived as an interior urban landscape, the exhibition should be considered as a large scale installation; a pixilated field defined by algorithmic formulae that introduce complexity and generate an interior urban condition. Space has been organized as a single fluid landscape with connecting individual fragments and clusters.

Zaha Hadid
Exhibition from October 27 2009 to March 1 2010
Palazzo della Ragione, Padua

French designer Julien Carretero did a Master's degree at the Eindhoven Design Academy under tutor Gijs Bakker of Droog Design. He then worked two years with Maarten Baas before setting up his own studio in Eindhoven.

Julien explores the possibilities of artisan creation in objects that are lively, vibrant and in constant phase-change. 

Drag (2009) 

Drag uses a traditional technique for making ornamental cornice mouldings using synthetic plaster. Half-pieces are rotated on a central axis as the plaster sets, then assembled to form a complete round turn. Several different typologies of objects (lamps, utility table, stool) have been made and each piece is unique. A minimal industrial process that integrates organic imperfection.

This is a fan (2008)

Computers, cars, ventilators... all use fans, which although usually hidden by a grating shield are components of many everyday objects. This is a fan proposes an alternative presentation of this device, which is as functional as it is discreet. A protecting cage designed as a case/support in which the fan is simply strapped suddenly brings it to life. Fragile and naked.

The guideline of Julien's work is the production of objects considered as a process in perpetual development: alive and unpredictable.

A smile for this thanksgiving day.

When we received the info about this product our first reaction was "how silly and useless this is!". 
But after having visited their site, we thought that this is not the worst sculpture we have seen and at least this one made us smile.
Laikingland is a creative collaboration based in both the UK and The Netherlands. They design and manufacture well crafted kinetic objects that engage, and evoke a sense of play and nostalgia. Their first product, the Applause Machine, is designed by British artist Martin Smith. Just press the button and the Applause Machine enthusiastically claps its hands for you.

If you are interested in kinetic sculpture you will probably enjoy the visit of Martin Smith's website where one can see more of his works. 

Contrasts Gallery presents the Shanghai Riddle - The first solo exhibition of the work of Dutch designer Maarten Baas in China.

Featuring works inspired by the designer’s experiences in China, the exhibition will include the latest iterations of his Sculpt, “Hey, chair, be a bookshelf!” and Smoke series, as well as new versions of his carved wood interpretations of plastic furniture.

While participating in Contrasts’ residency program, which brings Western artists to China to study local artistic and cultural practices, Baas became fascinated with traditional Chinese woodcarving; this exhibition is dominated by the results of this interest. His work pushes the boundaries of this time-honored Chinese craft, while also revealing the designer’s playful imagination.

“Shanghai is a city full of contradictions: old/new, high-tech/low-tech, tradition/revolution, fake/real, cheap/expensive, original/copy, etc. Together, all these contradictions seem to form a big and interesting paradox, the complexity of which you can't exactly define. What you can feel is the atmosphere, the energy coming from it, a kind of chemical reaction to what's happening. This was what encouraged me to develop the exhibition ‘The Shanghai Riddle,’ also full of paradoxes and experiments, inspired by a city in which everything seems possible.”

The intersection of traditional craft and China’s contemporary culture of mass production are addressed with Baas’ wood carved furniture. Pieces like Plastic Chair In Wood, which reproduces a basic plastic lawn chair in luxurious hand-carved elm, reference the contrast between disposable, mass-produced goods and treasured, handcrafted objects. Baas’ Transformation installation plays with traditional Chinese furniture forms; handcrafted elm and camphor wood furniture look like they are melting into a wooden pool.

Baas’ original “Hey, chair…” series consists of found furniture and other objects assembled to form sculptures that act as multi-functional bookshelves. Baas made a unique piece from this series especially for Contrasts Gallery. The piece is made up of various objects, handpicked by Baas from the streets of Shanghai during his visits, and finished with traditional Chinese red lacquer. Chinese Objects Object is based on the “Hey, chair…” series. Baas made an assemblage of different kinds of wooden Chinese objects, which was then carved out of solid wood by local Chinese craftsmen.

The lighthearted, purposefully imperfect Sculpt series, which Baas began in his Netherlands studio in 2007, has evolved in China with the addition of two new works. The concept behind the series is to capture the spontaneity and roughness of a sketch in a fully realized, life-sized object. The Sculpt concept, which was initially applied to furniture, has expanded to include two musical instruments: a typical Chinese “pipa” and a western piano. Baas hopes the instruments can be played during the exhibition.  

New additions to the designer’s celebrated Smoke series will also be on view. The series, which began as Baas’ graduation project at Design Academy Eindhoven, consists of pieces of wooden furniture that have been set alight. The remained charcoaled pieces are preserved in a clear epoxy.

Contrasts Gallery
No. 133 Middle Sichuan Road, 5/F / Shanghai, China 200002
August 15 – September 4, 2008