A Weekend in Amsterdam: Day 1, Stedelijk Museum

So somehow, in amongst everything, Hannah and I spontaneously squeezed in a speedy trip to Amsterdam for my birthday. We realised that we could only visit a few things in that time, we weren't about to attempt and Museumsplein escapade. And so we prioritised our two top interests - Design, and Miffy, obviously. We arrived in good time in the morning, so first stop was the Stedelijk Museum. I hadn't really had much time to research beforehand what was going on, but thankfully the Stedelijk's permanent collection was really satisfying regardless of the exhibitions they had going on. On arrival, it seemed like a pretty diverse collection of modern design, the earliest pieces (from what I remember) being from the late 1800s. This suited us pretty well, as it made most of the objects 20th century, a top period for us!

The building seems smaller, but more spacious than the V&A, and I would say the curation is a little more sparse - I guess this suited Hannah and I because it meant we could see all the rooms and exhibitions without much rushing. As well as two galleries organised in the classical chronological order, picking out specific Dutch designs in particular movements in the 20th century, several rooms were dedicated to big Dutch designers, as well as fantastic curation of contemporary art albeit with a clear design edge. While some objects were very familiar to us - Paintings by Mondrian, furniture by Rietveld, etc. etc. - it was a real discovery process for us to figure out the timeline of Western design movements, their overlapping and responses to each other (embarrassingly we had forgotten our dates for de Stijl and Bauhaus, Art Nouveau and Art Deco...it turns out its a fun game to guess what is from which movement), as well as finding some fantastic designers that we hadn't known before.

Mostly the individual rooms were small and self-contained, with a theme within the room and the objects very curiously close and easily-touchable...The Dutch clearly trust their visitors! But it was great to be able to get so close to the work and see all the details that you wouldn't normally be able to access over barriers. We also enjoyed the way they had designed some of their plinths to effortlessly float in the space, not disturbing the link between the paintings and sculpture. We were impressed with what they had chosen to collect - we liked how they had chosen to collect and display parts of the process of making 'art', such as plan drawings of Picasso's Guernica. It was nice to go around and pick out objects that seemed interesting in the context, and to pull out why they were in a design collection.

One of my favourites was Willem Sandberg, who had an almighty role of director and designer for the Stedelijk Museum from 1937 - 1962, but had been involved as a graphic designer for the museum since 1928. Dream jobs much, I imagine that doesn't happen much anymore. A typographer, printer and curator, he designed many of the museum exhibition posters and programmes, before and during his time as director of the museum. He at first resented the museum as a house of 'the past' but changed his feelings after becoming director. What's fascinating is that part of the deal of becoming director was that he would still be able to design the catalogues. He believed that the catalogue was just as important to the exhibition as the exhibition itself, designing 320 catalogues for the museum, even after he became director when he would design in the evenings after the day's work in the museum. Here's a fab article about him on the Eye Magazine website if you want to know more.

It's a shame we hadn't really learned much about him, and after seeing his work and hearing his achievements, I feel a bit embarrassed not to have known about him before... I loved looking at his catalogues, and it makes me even more excited to do a type course at some point. His use of colour and shape is playful and (to me) very illustrative, and graphically eye-catching. I would certainly have subscribed to his catalogues.

Another artists that caught our attention was Karel Appel, a Dutch painter, writer and poet who was a member of the group CoBrA, an avant-garde group of artists. Sandberg commissioned him to paint the walls of the refreshment room, and enjoyed it so much that Appel was brought back to paint a mural on the former restaurant, what is now the opening room of the museum. It's such a happy, vibrant and dynamic image, and when at this scale is just breath-taking. The central oval 'flower' is actually a window, which means the light made that particular area really sparkle. I also loved the way that he played with the space, overlapping and moving from wall to wall to ceiling, making for an energetic bunch of characters.

Our last favourite was actually from a temporary exhibition of Jan Dibbets, a Dutch conceptual photographer. The exhibition was a re-exhibiting of Dibbets Colour Studies from the 1970s, several close up colour photographs of the shiny hoods of cars. The studies had been newly printed to be several metres high, exhibited alongside Dibbets original prints from 1976, (no bigger than an A4 if I remember rightly) which he had printed as large as possible by the technology of the time. From afar, they looked like meticulous paintings, and the photographs were displayed beautifully in these vast galleries with lots of natural light. They looked amazing framed in doorways at this large scale. I really appreciated that these works were displayed in a 'design' museum, because I think it's important that contemporary art is put in the context of design, and how something like scale in the process, made possible through new technologies over time, of making art can make such a dramatic different to the way it captures its audience. In a way, the work was totally new, just because it was that much bigger.

 I was going to try and condense the trip to one single blogpost, but I can tell its going to have to be in a few posts...so bear with me while I write up the next two! Lots of fun things happening this week including (shameless plug) our publication launch! Have a look at this Eventbrite for all the details and maybe you can come down and check out what we've been up to for the last month!

Just as a last note, in light of Brexit, I'm really glad Hannah and I got to visit before the trip would be tainted by the fact that we won't be part of Europe anymore. After taking this course, its even clearer to me that our industry as well as others relies on togetherness, collaboration and consistent criticality of ourselves and each other. It's without doubt that we will miss the diversity that for me, makes Britain what it is. I really think that even though I and so many of my friends voted Remain, we have to continue to believe that we can change things, change people's minds and feelings, otherwise Leave then really will have won. In spite of it, I still feel very much a European, as well as a citizen of the World. I hope that in our industry we can continue to open up, engage and develop the ways we share design with each other.

Yayoi Kusama at Victoria Miro Gallery

A short little post about this one, as I'm sure you've seen it all on Instagram, but at least you get a cute/rubbish selfie of me and Hanswan.

We somehow managed to squeeze in visiting the highly anticipated Yayoi Kusama exhibition, at the Victoria Miro Gallery in Old Street. As far as I know it's new works (I'm not really a Kusama expert, but I love spots, pumpkins and red wigs), and although there were only a few things there, Hannah and I enjoyed ourselves without having to endure a crazy queue! Top tip, get there for 10am on a Wednesday morning and you get the whole effect without the Disneyland queues.

Of course a highlight was the glowing yellow pumpkin room that everyone is taking selfies in...we got a whole 20 seconds which is well enough time to take an alright selfie, although I'm not great at them. Obviously it's only a teeny tiny box, with a little corridor bit for 3 people maximum, and then lots a great pumpkins surrounded by some very effective mirrors. Fantastic kawaii factor.

What was also lovely was that there was a few outdoor works (although one of them got flooded by the crazy storms we've had recently...) and although it was a bit smelly, I enjoyed the effect of all the floating silver balls in the pond. I loved the texture of the green spotty algae in the water and the reflective silver, and no doubt the effect was to emulate the spots that she uses in her work. I can imagine this as a beaded jacket don't you? Matt green sequins and giant baubles would be great...

Then last but not least, there were some of her paintings upstairs, overlooking the garden and the surrounding flats. They were mostly the textural sort, mirroring the baubles and confetti algae on the pond, but also to finish off, a lovely golden pumpkin painting.

I mean, I'm sure all of this has some kind of conceptual monologue. But with all things considered, I love the fun of it all, and after hearing some of the Japanese artists at a talk late last year for the Kawaii exhibition out in Farnham, I can relate Kusama's work to this timeless, transcendental concept of kawaii. What I admire about it is that it is beautiful, colourful, and wonderfully consumable. It doesn't have to be something with 'meaning' beyond its beauty and pattern, its just wonderful to be around and frankly, makes me very happy. Shame that I couldn't really get anything in the shop, never mind.

Simon Starling at Nottingham Contemporary

It's been a long time, although its the end of the year, I've been doing a lot of things recently so yet again the blog goes on the back burner. At least now that the two blogposts for Design China have now been posted, I feel a little less guilty for not blogging so much. It feels great to write for another platform, hopefully I get to do more in the near future.

But in between all of this stuff, I've visited a few exhibitions so I thought I'd write about those as a breather for all the other bits and bobs I'm doing.

In the midst of it all, I managed to squeeze in two days at home to visit Alex and my parents. Walking up from the train station in Nottingham, I thought I would pop into the Nottingham Contemporary, just because. I was not disappointed! The museum was holding a Simon Starling exhibition, who although I didn't really know much about him before, I left absolutely loving the work on display there.

The first room was dominated with two huge silver blobs, which beautiful in their own right, blew my mind once I'd read label for the piece (I believe a lot in labels). The two tiny photographs ion the back wall puzzled me for a while; the photographs are of Chinese migrant workers outside the Sampson shoe factory in North Adams, Massachusetts in 1875. The big blobs turned out to be representing two silver particles from the cut outs of these two pictures, blown up a million times. The two objects were made of forged stainless steel from Nanjing, before being shipped to Massachusetts to be exhibited at MOCA.  

Immediately I felt like Starling was 'one of us', a design historian in his thinking through objects, images and history. I love that his work is encompassed by lots of different pieces, filling up the space with narrative and a reflection on processes. The contrast between the two tiny photographs and the two enormous sculptures really excited me for the rest of the exhibition. I felt it was crucial that the photographs were a part of this first piece, 'The Nanjing Particles', clearly pinpointing this group of minuscule people in the photograph as a part of history to discover, delve into a recognise. Not only are these objects beautiful, but also socially important, there is a clear message here that is to do with people and their place in history.

The second piece that stood out to me, 'Red, Green, Blue, Loom Music' focuses on the weaving processes that Starling documented at the Antica Fabric Pasamanerie Massia Vittorio in Turin. Behind hanging threads showed a ten minute video documenting the process of weaving from the threads to fabric. In the main room stood what looked like a piano and several object hanging from the walls; it turned out that the piano was actually a pianola, a self-playing piano that uses a reel of punched paper to play. On the walls was a piece of sheet music, called 'La Machinna Tessile' (The Loom), a reel of punched paper for pianola, slatted Jacquard punch cards, and two reams of fabric.

It was exhilarating to connect the dots - During his visit to the factory showroom, Starling found the piece of sheet music on a baby grand piano, 'La Machinna Tessile' by Rinaldo Bellucci, inspired by the machines in the factory. After listening and recording the music, he transferred the music into a reel of punch cards, which produces the pattern on the two reams of woven fabric (from my limited knowledge of weaving, its the front and back!). These punch cards were then transferred into pianola music, bringing the process full cycle, from music, to textiles, back to music again.

This exhibition is an absolute dream for me, and I'm sure if HoD went on a trip to the exhibition we would all be going wild with inspiration for our own work. The whole time I was thinking 'this is so history of design', especially after our first exhibition Reimagining Objects in response to our object essays. As much as I believe our practice as design historians is about research, its also about being able to express that research, through writing as well as through objects, curation, making and collaboration. One thing I would absolutely love to see is Starling's process, his sketchbooks, writings and note throughout his process of making these works. I will definitely be looking out for more exhibitions like this!

If you're around the Midlands, go and see this before it's finished! At the Nottingham Contemporary until the 26th June.

London Craft Week: Wang Dongling Calligraphy Performance

This post was written for the Design China blog, which you can see here.

On the 6^th May, The British Museum welcomed the world-renowned calligrapher Professor Wang Dongling for his first public performance in London for this year’s London Craft Week. Taking centre stage in the Great Court, four rolls of paper were laid and taped onto the marble floor at the entrance of the museum, where a crowd gathered in wait of a performance by ‘China’s greatest living calligrapher’.

            Wang took a slender brush in his hand, a sixty-centimetre-long bamboo handle with a short drop of hair, and dipped it into a red bucket. He wore an all-black outfit with bright red socks, matching the bucket of ink. Beginning in the top right hand corner, Wang starts to paint; he holds the brush but the very end of the handle, his body in a constantly hunched position, knees slightly bent. After a few characters, written vertically on the page, Wang walked back up towards the bucket to re-ink his brush. The pace is efficient, confident, perhaps less sentimental and more calculated than I imagined the process to look like. The ‘mad cursive’ script is difficult to decipher – the characters become abstract lines and gestures, pulling out the traces of the body from the painting.

            We were lucky to witness such a large piece. In contrast to his wild, heavy works with enormous brushes, finished in one swooping round of black, this piece felt bird-like, fluttering and dainty with its small characters on a vast page. This piece took time. A meditative hour was created in the hot and noisy atrium, with Wang solely concentrated on the calligraphy as we looked on in awe. He didn’t even stop for water. The lines fade in and out of focus as the ink dries on the brush, forming an undulating surface from the paper. The occasional swift flick of the brush for elongated characters surprised the audience, bringing his movement back into focus.

            As he came to the end of his performance by signing the piece in the bottom left corner, a round of applause echoed through the hall. He went to the microphone – he smiled and told us that the script is the Heart Sutra, and that the piece is meant to be seen as both calligraphy and abstract painting. While the piece lay out in the bright light to dry, we walked around it in reverence to what he had just seen; Not only had we observed the product of a master maker, but also the dance of his craft.

London Craft Week: Contemporary Chinese Craft

This post was written for the Design China blog, which you can see here.

As part of this year’s London Craft Week, the China Design Centre hosted two exhibitions displaying an array of work by both established, and up-and-coming Chinese practitioners. The gallery space is hosting one of them; ‘Jingdezhen Ceramics – The Next Generation’ brought together by The Pottery Workshop. The Pottery Workshop was established in Hong Kong in 1985, but have since expanded to four other locations. Jingdezhen, has its biggest facility, and has become a hub for a community of craftspeople in the renowned ‘Porcelain Capital’. This exhibition displayed some of the finest and most innovative works from Jingdezhen’s Pottery Workshop, from illustrative sculpture pieces, to minimal contemporary art objects. 

            Several large works are included in the show. Caroline Cheng, the director of The Pottery Workshop, displays a piece from her series ‘Prosperity’, an outstretched silhouette of a bell-sleeved robe made of a swarm of minute, blue ceramic butterflies, with a single white butterfly. Cheng describes her work as a metaphor for China, as a gathering of unique personalities and cultures coming together to create; both the detail and the whole are significant. The ceramic garment hangs to the side of the room, overseeing contemporaries in the exhibition.             
At the opposite side of the room, the furniture by July Zhou and J Design present witty interpretations of Chinese contemporary ceramics. Two chairs consist of a dark mahogany frame, holding the unusual bowl-shaped ceramic seat, decorated with bamboo painted in the traditional colours of blue and white, but with added flecks of red. A traditional icon of Chinese calligraphy translated onto ceramics is cleverly transformed into something unexpected. Displayed aside is a chair and table set in the style of Ming furniture, only wood is replaced by transparent lucite, bringing to the forefront historical references in a contemporary setting. What might have been decorative wooden panels in the back and seat of the chair, and the centre of the table, is replaced with dark blue ceramic tiles with decorative white illustrations. 

            Smaller ceramic objects dotted the room with a variety of styles, techniques and approaches to the material. Colourful splatters of ceramic fold into organic, cowrie-shell forms in Bian Xiao Dong’s ‘Cocoons’, in a delicious combination of pink, lilac, mint and acid yellow. In a similar vein, Lu Jin’s collection of vessels create a row of pomegranate shapes, with gently hammered surfaces and golden crowns. Some objects were more illustrative; Perched on a shelf are Li Zhen Ming’s pandemonium of miniature parrots, with fluffy white feathers and pink features, in different nesting positions. The most narrative in the exhibition is the collaborative work of Ouyang Liang and Guo Zhen Zhen, a crowd of ceramic characters collectively called the ‘Monkey King’. Several androgynous figures look as thought they are swaying to a distant tune. 

            However, among my personal favourite selection for the show was an assortment of brushes by Yang Dong Mu. Although an unusual addition to a ceramics show, it highlighted the interdisciplinary function of the Jingdezhen Pottery Workshop, which supports an array of craftsmen as well as ceramicists. Framed in the corner of the room, the brushes and their accessories were also examples of contemporary reimaginings of traditional Chinese craft, using natural forms in bamboo to guide the shapes of the brush handles and rests. The exhibition overall, demonstrated the vast understandings of Chinese craft within one of the China’s dynamic arts communities, combining new and old, nature and machine, into work that is refreshing and distinct.