Jim DINE Jules OLITSKI Sonia DELAUNAY Benjamin SHINE Simon PHEULPIN Wang KEPING Gianfranco MEGGIATO Francois CALVAT Huyn Ae KANG Fu WENJUN Alexander CALDER
SIMONE PHEULPIN
Simone Pheulpin's iconic "Decadé" wall installation of 10 cotton sculptures on wooden panels, an incredible 9 x 13 ft chef-d’œuvre, created for Biennal International de la Tapisserie a Lausanne in 1987.
Her works are the result of an instinctive expression that uses both the suppleness and firmness of an untreated, natural material, a simple nonbleached cotton. Simon’s sculptures are made of fabric strips and pins only. From her fabric strips and thousands of pins, a veritable vocabulary of forms and shapes with an organic allure, a supernatural world where surprising rocks and the seabed take form, sprung from her spirit and guided by her hands.
“For Simone Pheulpin, a fundamentally atypical textile sculptor, folding is a language, her language. Her strips of raw cotton, tirelessly stacked, twisted and connected, produce sculptures that reflect Simone Pheulpin’s intense, deep, astonished perspective on nature and convey her view of the world with infinite poetry. Simone Pheulpin (1941) had numerous exhibitions and awards, but the year of 2018 brought her international fame and glory. After being awarded The Loewe Foundation Award, having had exhibition in Design Museum in London, her piece was recently acquired by the Art Museum of Chicago.
Some of her organic sculptures, made of stacked and twisted raw cotton, resemble sea shells; others transport the spectator to the inside of a wet-and-sun-dried book, while others bring to mind odd vegetal shapes —that evolution should make the effort to bring into existence in the natural environment.
BENJAMIN SHINE
Benjamin Shine is a multidisciplinary British artist who has gained recognition in the fashion industry for his creations made from lengths of tulle — a practice which he describes as “painting with fabric”.
Award-winning artist and designer, Benjamin Shine has established a multi-disciplined creative approach dedicated to challenging perceptions through original constructional ideas and craftsmanship. Following his studies in fashion design at Central St Martins in London, Benjamin has spent over a decade exploring the potential of materials to express ideas through his artworks, public sculptures, fashion, furniture, and product designs.
Benjamin is most known for his tulle works, which centre on ideas of impermanence, energy and the fleeting moment – each made by pleating and manipulating the delicate material into form with an iron and often generated from a single uncut length of tulle. Benjamin's Tulle Flows are a continuos single length of flowing tulle, each conveying clarity out of chaos, hence the depiction of faces in states of peaceful meditation. Benjamin's work has attracted a range of clients encompassing fashion labels, product and interior manufacturers, international Arts and Design institutions such as The Crafts Council, UK and The New York Museum of Arts and Design. Global brands include Givenchy, Barclays Wealth, MTV, Eurostar, Deutsche Bank, Coca-Cola and Google His 2013 fashion collaboration with Givenchy saw him develop his signature tulle technique alongside Givenchy’s Creative Director, Riccardo Tisci, creating a limited edition series, which blurred the lines between art, sportswear and Haute Couture. Most recently, Benjamin was invited to collaborate with John Galliano for Maison Margiela. The resulting work of couture was shown at Paris fashion week 2017 and received worldwide recognition. Benjamin has become one of the most wanted artists in NY after his famous installation “Seeing Through The Material” at Bergdorf Goodman, 5th Avenue, New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York has already acquired Benjamin's works.
On the left: Awakening, 2016 Tulle on canvas 57 1/10 × 57 1/10 × 2 in; 145 × 145 × 5 cm On the right: Transcendence, 2016 Tulle on canvas 65 × 49 1/5 × 2 in; 165 × 125 × 5 cm
Benjamin Shine for John Galliano for Maison Margiela at Paris fashion week 2017
In July 2017, Shine was commissioned by Bergdorf Goodman to create “Seeing Through the Material”, an exhibition of five faces for the store’s windows — each using up to 15 metres of tulle. The sculptures took between 50 and 100 hours to construct, layering and manipulating the fabric to form an image. They acted as a backdrop to designs by Valentino, Fendi and Christian Louboutin.
