Expanding mind: design

Kleureyck

Pigment Walk

Van Eyck formulated virtuoso, ground-breaking solutions to all kinds of technical and design questions. How do you let the viewer feel what material things are made of? How do you give colours depth? Which pigments do you use for which shades? How do you direct the viewer’s gaze?

Today, many designers and artists are still considering such issues. This is evident from the more than 100 contemporary works from different design disciplines that curators Siegrid Demyttenaere and Sofie Lachaert have brought together in this Pigment Walk. The selection also includes some 20 pieces from Design Museum Gent’s own collection.

This part of the Kleureyck exhibition is conceived as a walk through Van Eyck’s colour universe. The starting point for the selection is 13 details from the Adoration of the Mystic Lamb (the Ghent Altarpiece). In each case the focus is on a particular colour. Every detail is accompanied by a group of contemporary works in which the same colour recurs. At the same time, these works intersect with other aspects of the Adoration of the Mystic Lamb, such as symbolism, craftmanship, display of materials, and transparency.

1

Design x colour

met Atelier NL, María Boto en Siegrid Demyttenaere

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2

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Design x anthropology

Catherine Willems and Charles Heller talk with Tine Destrooper about their artistic practices and the connection between design and anthropology.

3

Design x public space

a dialogue between Annelys de Vet & Elly Van Eeghem, moderated by Leo Van Broeck

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4

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Design x digital network

What is the role of the designer and how is it changing in a time when design and manufacturing become increasingly more digitized? This question is key to understanding the work of design studio Unfold.

The studio, founded in 2002 by Claire Warnier and Dries Verbruggen after they graduated from the Design Academy Eindhoven, develops projects that investigate new ways of creating, manufacturing, financing and distributing in a changing context. A context in which we see a merging of aspects of the pre-industrial craft economy with high tech industrial production methods and digital communication networks. A context that has the potential to shift power, from industrial producers and those regulating infrastructure to the individual designer and the consumer.

5

Design x domesticity

Design Dialogues: Design & Domesticity by Joseph Grima & Hilde Bouchez, moderated by Evelien Bracke

On the occasion of the exhibition Home Stories and the semi-permanent presentation Het wilde ding, which are currently on display in Design Museum Gent, Joseph Grima and Hilde Bouchez are invited to join in a dialogue on the theme of design and domesticity. What makes something a tame or wild object? What does domestication mean? How do interiors and utensils shape our way of life? Did the corona crisis change our living rooms? And how can everyday objects and interiors generate a more responsible consciousness?

for the talk

Joseph Grima (UK)
Joseph Grima is an architect, editor, curator and researcher based in Italy. Together with Tamar Shafrir, he founded Space Caviar in 2013, an architecture and research practice that operates at the intersection of design, architecture, technology, politics and the public sphere. Vitra Design Museum commissioned the office to design the scenography for Home Stories, an exhibition that tells the history and future of private living through 20 visionary interiors. Previously, Grima was director of Storefront for Art and Architecture in New York, editor-in-chief of Domus magazine and a prominent (guest) curator of the Biennale Interieur in Kortrijk, Istanbul Design Biennial and the Triennale di Milano, among others. Finally, he was appointed artistic director of Design Academy Eindhoven in 2017.
Throughout his career, Grima has conducted extensive research into the evolution and future of the home. He argues that all kinds of forces such as the economy, climate, geopolitics or technological evolutions continuously influence our understanding of housing. What we called ‘home’ yesterday may no longer exist today.

Hilde Bouchez (BE)
Hilde Bouchez is a researcher who studies the role and significance of design in society. She is head of the Design Department of KASK & Conservatorium, where she also teaches design theory and design history. Bouchez was previously editor-in-chief of BEople and A Magazine, and has published in international magazines and journals. As (co)curator, she has put together various exhibitions, including Maarten Van Severen & Co. Het wilde ding in collaboration with Marij De Brabandere for Design Museum Gent. The arrangement of Het wilde ding is inspired by Bouchez's book with the same name, and constitutes a dialogue between the oeuvre of the famous Belgian designer and objects by kindred spirits.
In her book A Wild Thing. Essays on things, nearness and love, published by APE, Bouchez attempts to name and describe the phenomenological qualities of everyday objects. Regardless of form, function, concept or trend, utilitarian objects can have an intangible aura. Such animated objects are the result of a design process in which the unity between man, thing and cosmos is central. Besides outlining the history and recent developments of design, her essays provide a methodology for both designer and consumer to deal with everyday objects in a conscious and poetic way.

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