Milan and all the Fun of the Fair

Words by Leanne Amodeo Leanne is a content director, media consultant and educator.

There was a time a few years back when it seemed the Milan Furniture Fair’s credibility was waning. Visitors were disgruntled with the annual trade fair’s organisation, insulted by the overinflated prices they had to pay for accommodation and generally frustrated by the northern Italian city’s lack of adequate infrastructure. Then came the scathing yet reasonable opinion piece by Dezeen’s influential founder and editor-in-chief Marcus Fairs on his experience of the 2013 offering. He drew attention to the lack of curation across the main Fiera Milano exhibition complex and satellite events in adjacent districts and highlighted the difficulties in navigating the Fair in its entirety, both on foot and online. Coupled with the rise of the London Design Festival and the shift in attention this attracted, the event looked to be in trouble.

But the tide has turned. Cosmit, the company that owns the Milan Furniture Fair, seemingly listened to the backlash and responded – or perhaps they couldn’t put the fact off any longer that the event (established in 1961) was well and truly overdue for a refresh. A snappy rebrand from the old Salone Internationale del Mobile title to Salone del Mobile Milano ensued (although it’s likely most will continue to call it Milan Furniture Fair), signalling renewed cohesion across all venues. The event finally got its own website and the city also underwent a series of infrastructural upgrades, all of which make the Fair more user-friendly. Even Fairs’ 2016 round-up was much, much more favourable.

Previous Page: Anna Varendorff, Brass Vase, 2018; Jon Goulder, Basket, 2018; Anna Varendorff, Sculptures of Infinite Arrangements, 2018: Henry Wilson, Thoronet Dishes, 2018; Jon Goulder x Spence and Lyda, Innate Credenza, 2018. Photo courtesy of Emma Elizabeth. Above: Jon Goulder x Spence and Lyda, Innate Console, 2018; Ross Gardam, Ora desk lamp & Noon mirror, 2018; Fred Ganim, Coat wall hange, 2018. Photo courtesy of Emma Elizabeth. Right: Nicholas Fuller, Voyage Partitions, 2017; Jonathon Zawada, Ouroboros chair, 2018. Photo courtesy of Emma Elizabeth.

So what does it all mean for designers? Regardless of the inflated hotel prices, one thing has remained constant and that’s the quality of design on display. From the big brands such as Tom Dixon and Moooi, to the newest names popping-up in Ventura Centrale, the Salone del Mobile Milano showcases the industry’s very best. Ask any designer today to name the most significant event on the design calendar and chances are they’ll say Milan. From an Australian perspective, the 2018 offering (held from 17 until 22 April) was a watershed moment, thanks in no small part to Emma Elizabeth.

The Sydney-based designer and stylist is a powerhouse of creativity and major advocate for design via online hub Local Design, which she curates with James Coffey. Elizabeth is also the curator of Local Milan and presented its third iteration within an abandoned palazzo, resplendent in its patchy bright coloured walls and worn parquet flooring, in the 5Vie district for this year’s Fair. Local Milan no. 3 showcased the work of 26 Australian designers who define Australia’s design scene today. This impressive body of furniture, lighting and product, was full of nuance and intelligence, beauty and formality and the global exposure it gave these designers is not easily matched.

The fact the exhibition itself was so incredibly photogenic was not lost on the world’s established media outlets or savvy Instagrammers either; an important point not to be underestimated, as Elizabeth is well aware. ‘Internationally it’s hard for the market to put a face to a name and a name

“This impressive body of furniture, lighting and product, was full of nuance and intelligence, beauty and formality and the global exposure it gave these designers is not easily matched.”

to a design and exhibitions like this help create stronger connection,’ she explains. ‘We’re at a disadvantage due to distance, but we have strength in our aesthetic. People from around the world look to Australia for food, lifestyle, travel, nature and fashion and design goes hand in hand with these.’

Local Milan no. 3 certainly punctuates the ongoing conversation about an Australian design identity and being seen on a world stage is not only good for the collective, it’s excellent for individual designers as well. South Australia was well represented in Elizabeth’s exhibition, with seasoned Milan exhibitors Jon Goulder (in collaboration with Spence & Lyda) and Daniel Emma (who also exhibited as part of Wallpaper Handmade) featured alongside emerging designer Nicholas Fuller.

Exhibiting at the Milan Furniture Fair is not without its logistical challenges. It takes time and effort, not to mention money, to produce the designs and get them and their designers there and back. Daniel Emma’s Emma Aiston concedes it gets easier with each exhibition as one knows what to expect and can therefore better prepare. The pay-off is being a visible part of a global design community – there’s nothing quite like experiencing a new product in the flesh as opposed to seeing it through a filtered social media post – and the opportunity to network in person.

For Fuller, who debuted Leggero floor lamp, 2017, as well as exhibiting his award-winning Voyage partitions, 2017, the event was an eye opener. Although aware of its scale, the magnitude of it all didn’t quite hit until he was there in person. Indeed, Salone del Mobile Milano’s website clocked 2018’s attendance across six days at around 435,000 and with over 1800 exhibitors, it’s little wonder Fuller found it difficult to see everything. However, he appreciates all that being part of a well-received exhibition like Local Design no. 3 means professionally. ‘Exhibiting in Milan has been a turning point in my career and I’m excited to use the experience to further my practice,’ he says. ‘I received some good feedback from fellow designers and the general public and I made some great connections too.’

Most of this year’s attendees are most likely to use words like amazing, busy, incredible, crazy, chaotic, intense and overwhelming and all in the same sentence, to describe the event. Reports also suggest the number of outstanding installations and exhibitions were numerous, from Swarovski’s Crystal Palace to Studiopepe’s 1970s themed ‘secret members club’ Club Unseen to a showing of vegan furniture by designer Erez Nevi Pana. Hay’s take-over of the Palazzo Clerici in the Brera district with Sonos and WeWork impressed many, including ceramicist Damon Moon, as did New York design studio Apparatus’ showroom in the popular 5Vie district.

Moon exhibited a few doors down from Apparatus, along with furniture designer and fellow Adelaidean Andrew Carvolth. The Milan Project featured their ceramic and timber objects that sit somewhere between art and design and which elegantly explore ideas of craftsmanship, materiality and manufacture in the process. It was the first time at the Fair for both designers and like Fuller, Moon agrees that it was beneficial, especially in opening up possibilities that simply don’t exist in Australia.

‘The world goes to Milan, so you get to meet people from everywhere and they’re in the hundreds of thousands and they’re all looking at design,’ he explains. Some of Moon’s designs were kept back post-exhibition for a photo shoot with an Italian magazine; an opportunity that may not have happened if he’d exhibited in Australia. That’s not to say Moon sees more value in exhibiting internationally than he does locally. ‘I think ideally it’s possible to strike a balance between exhibiting overseas and in Australia and that the two should support each other,’ he says. ‘Although I do think going to Milan as an Australian designer means you are taken more seriously in Australia because you’re seen to be engaging on a global scale.’

Another South Australian first-time exhibitor at the 2018 Fair is furniture designer Andrew Eden, a former design assistant to Khai Liew. He exhibited in the sixth iteration of Din-Design In within the Lambrate Design District and relished the melting pot of designers and industry experts, commentators and supporters defining the event. Best of all, he was able to interact with the big names. ‘I made a special effort to see the exhibitions by Vitra, Hay, Louis Vuitton, U-Joint, Kvadrat and Nendo,’ he says. ‘They were mind-blowing.’ Like so many first-time exhibitors, Eden hopes to return.

The Milan Furniture Fair is the perfect place to launch a new product. Moon’s right, it does give both the designer and their practice added credibility and generates the type of positive hype that comes with such endorsement. And just like the showing of any fashion designer’s new collection, the Fair sets trends for the coming year, paving the way for conversations and responses to timely design themes and topics. Planning has already begun for next year and the long process of designing and prototyping new pieces is underway. The 2018 event set a high benchmark for the exhibition of Australian design and part of the fun is seeing how this will be topped next time around.

Top right: Damon Moon, Gold Skittle, 2018. Photographer: Andre Castellucci. Right: Andrew Carvolth, Mila Tall Boy, 2018; Damon Moon, Skittle, 2018. Photographer: Andre Castellucci. Far right: Daniel Emma, Bling Bling Dynasty, 2018. Photo courtesy of the artist.

JAMFACTORY ICON CLARE BELFRAGE: A MEASURE OF TIME

Launched in 2013, JamFactory’s annual icon series celebrates the achievements of South Australia’s most outstanding and influential artists working in crafts based media.

Launched in 2013, JamFactory’s annual Icon exhibition celebrates the achievements of one of South Australia’s most outstanding and influential craft and design practitioners. The 2018 iteration presents the work of Clare Belfrage. With an international career spanning three decades, the awarded artist is best known for her detailed glass sculptures that marry organic blown forms with intricate line work.

JamFactory’s Senior Curator, Margaret Hancock Davis, recently caught up with Belfrage at her home studio set to a backdrop of stunning red and blue gums; a constant reminder for the artist about the fluid beauty of nature.

MHD: Over the years you have become internationally known for challenging and pushing the conventions of drawing on glass with stringers (that is fine rods or hollow tubes of glass colour). How does your use of stringers differ from other approaches?

CB: I’ve been working with this drawing technique of fusing thin lines of glass onto a form during the hot glass process for many years now. It’s not a widely used technique and I initially used it to draw little pictures or scenes. As my work has evolved, I’ve moved away from a narrative style and instead focussed on pattern, using repetition and details from the natural world to create a sense of rhythm across a form. I’ve got pretty obsessed with varying line qualities – opacity, transparency, flatness, depth, colour, tonal variation – all different sensibilities useful for different ideas.

MHD: I’m always fascinated by the processes in the hot shop and the change of rhythms whist making. Can you describe how it feels to work on the molten surface and the attention drawing on glass with stringers requires?

CB: I don’t think of the atmosphere in the hot shop as being frantic but it definitely is intense. When I’m drawing with glass stringers it’s a particular phase in the making and the rhythm really changes at this stage. Building up the pattern, line by line, like stitch by stitch, you fall into the process – the surface, the pattern – feeling the relationship between each mark made. I always have a plan but part of that plan is to let go of tightness, to soften, to breathe. It is a completely different physical and mental process compared with when we’re actually blowing and shaping the form. It takes a long time, is highly repetitive and I like the way I kind of lose time. Then, when we’re creating the form, it all speeds up again!

MHD: The intricate working of the surface with fine details seems to refer in many ways to what you describe as your close observation to nature, a skill developed as a child on family camping trips. What observations from nature excite you?

CB: I’m not sure if it is a skill, possibly more a natural way of seeing. It is the rhythms in the natural world particularly of fine detail that I’m drawn to. This can be seen in a leaf, a rock, a grass tree or a particular view, a stretch of sand or water. It is the potent combination of intimacy and power, drama and delicacy. It is wonder and it is the myriad expressions of time; fast and slow, fleeting and frozen. I describe it as the big feeling that ‘small’ can give.

MHD: Time can be measured in nature through accumulative processes such as laying down of sediment or growth in plants and inversely it can be measured through subtraction and removal, such as weathering and erosion. In your artwork we see both of these processes at play, the gathering and layering of glass in the hot shop, to the slow removal of the surface through pumice abrasion in the cold shop, creating a smoothed unfamiliar finish to glass. Are these parallels to the natural world something you are consciously considering while making?

CB: When creating my artworks I am definitely thinking of the building up of pattern, line by line, one small element applied at a time, slowly creating a tempo. It is clearly different to the accumulative process in nature yet somehow reminiscent and I think the flow of making is captured within the final object.

Taking the shine off the glass is a reductive process and I do this with most of my work. I sandblast the forms – erosion sped up – with an abrasive compound and then polish by hand or using a glass lathe with pumice paste to bring a subtle sheen to the surface. I think this certainly creates a more tactile surface and draws the audience into the layers more than if the shiny reflective surface of glass was left. It is a softer surface and holds a greater sense of age and wear.

MHD: You describe a shift in your perception about the Australian landscape from a literal view to a more illusionary experience. How did this shift affect your work?

CB: I think there have been a few significant shifts in my work. In the late nineties and early noughties, I really made a change from working with simple forms that I decorated, to an idea driven approach. I focussed on the aspects of the natural world that I was drawn to and developed patterns and forms that were inspired by particular plants, a scene, or the experience in a place. The pattern often came first. The forms became more sculptural and asymmetric. I was keen to move the blown form out of its natural desire to be round and create artwork where the form and pattern were completely integral to each other. Another shift was working more consciously in layers. Sometimes this was laying down a particular pattern behind the line drawings on the surface, especially in the last ten years. This has worked to express my interest in different experiences of time within a landscape and to create a sense of place that’s sometimes real, sometimes imagined.

There has probably been a broad shift in the perception of the Australian landscape and I think there are a number of reasons for this shift; not least the artwork of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists fundamental to the cultural landscape. I have been deeply moved by a number of artists’ practices, particularly the work of Dorothy Napangardi and Kathleen Petyarre. They have made a difference to my experience in the landscape.

MHD: Coming from a large family, one of 8 siblings, there was always activity nearby. You mention your mother’s hands constantly moving, knitting, cooking or mending clothes. Was your love of making in some way instilled by your mother’s unrelenting creative activity?

CB: Rhythm has been a strong theme of mine for many years now. The rhythms I’ve observed in the natural world and more recently, I’ve been reflecting on the rhythms that surrounded me growing up. My mother was a very good knitter along with many other craft practices and I agree her hands were always on the go. She tried to teach me sewing and knitting but I was pretty hopeless at craft when I was little. I wasn’t patient at all. I did learn music though, probably my first passion. There was always lots of music going on in my house too.

JamFactory Icon 2018, Clare Belfrage:A Measure of Time premiered in Adelaide as part of the South Australian Living Artists (SALA) Festival and will tour to 10 venues nationally. The exhibition tour has been assisted by the Australian Government’s Contemporary Touring Initiative, a program of the Australia Council for the Arts. The exhibition presents a body of new art works created specifically for this touring exhibition.

Belfrage was the 2018 SALA (South Australia Living Artist) Festival Featured Artist and is the subject of the SALA publication written by local writers and artists Emeritus Professor Kay Lawrence and Sera Waters and published by Wakefield press.

Previous page: from left Clare Belfrage, Holding Time, Dark Grey, 2014, Quiet Shifting, Oceana and Yellow, 2018, Shedding, Dark Grey, 2018, In Deep, Blue and Grey, 2018, Quiet Shifting, Pigeon Grey, 2003. Photographer: Pippy Mount.

Right: Clare Belfrage, Quiet Shifting, 2018. Photographer: Pippy Mount.