#itinerance01 by Manu Blondiau

#itinerance01

Titre Oeuvre, YYYY Material, dimensions

#itinerance01

In October 2017, invited by Art Élysées, Jean-François Declercq (Atelier Jespers) presented a selection of Belgian designers from several different generations. This “off-site” exhibition formed the first part of his new “itinerance” project. Art Élysées contributes to the artistic and cultural dynamism of the city of Paris. Since its creation, the fair has hosted in its pavilions institutional exhibitions and private collections, often never seen before. The event is thus the moment for JeanFrançois Declercq to present the richness of Belgian design creativity from several decades. This is not industrial design on a global scale, but careful, personal creations that border on contemporary art and show the manual and intellectual craftsmanship of several generations of Belgian designers. Some of them, such as Vladimir Slavov (lighting), Ben Storms (furniture), Casimir (furniture) and Gerard Kuijpers (furniture, sculpture) have previously been shown at the Atelier Jespers. The others – Pol Quadens (seating), Damien Gernay (furniture), Studio Krjst (fabrics) and Michaël Verheyden (furniture) – are being presented for the first time in a staging that reveals the singularity of their creations and thus contributes to the recognition of their work.

Index

CASIMIR �� 4 – 7 MAARTEN DE CEULAER........................ 8 – 11 ARNO DECLERCQ �� 12 – 15 FREDERIK DELBART �� 16 – 19 NATHALIE DEWEZ �� 20 – 23 DAMIEN GERNAY �� 24 – 27 KRJST �� 28 – 31 GERARD KUIJPERS �� 32 – 35 POL QUADENS �� 36– 39 VLADIMIR SLAVOV �� 40 – 43 NICOLAS SCHUYBROEK �� 44– 47 BEN STORMS �� 48 – 51 MICHAEL VERHEYDEN �� 52 – 55 CONTACT �� 59

CASIMIR www.casimir.be

Casimir was born in Koersel (Belgium) in 1966. He studied Industrial Design at SHIVKV Genk (Belgium). It was never a conscious choice of his to focus on design. Casimir was just looking for a versatile direction that would include theory and technique as well as creativity. While training as an Industrial Designer, he discovered that designing industrial products was not for him, as an industrial product is an accumulation of compromises and rarely the expression of a personal emotion or the personal vision of the designer... During his studies, he did, however, design a number of items of furniture that expressed his own vision of design. He established himself as a furniture designer and went on to develop this vision into a personal style.

#itinerance01

BRUG (limited edition), solid oak (natural), 210 x 82 x 144 cm

CASIMIR

BRUG (limited edition)

#itinerance01

MAARTEN DE CEULAER www.maartendeceulaer.com

Transforming Antique Benches is an ongoing project which Maarten De Ceulaer developed for Fendi and which was first shown in an installation at Design Miami 2012. The antique benches that Maarten is using, are being transformed into something else, something timeless, just by applying these multicolored cushions on them in a particular way. The pieces are an ode to the anonymous craftsmen that produced them, and they are asking the question whether, in this time of over-consumption and production, it is really necessary to produce yet another bench, chair of sofa, while we can also just transform what we already have.

#itinerance01

Transformed Antique Benches, 240 cm x ± 30 cm x 40 cm (L x W x H)

MAARTEN DE CEULAER

#itinerance01

Transformed Antique Benches, 240 cm x ± 30 cm x 40 cm (L x W x H)

ARNO DECLERCQ www.arnodeclercq.com

A Belgium designer and art dealer born in 1994 who makes bespoke objects for interiors with passion for design, atmosphere, history and craft. Arno grew up in a family with parents who loved to work with beautiful brands, object ect. His father studied at the royal academy of arts fashion department and worked for Bikkembergs and made his own fashion brands but also collected already for more than 20 years tribal art. His mother who worked since the beginning with his father bought in 2010 a shoe shop where she sold brands as Rick Owens, Ann Demeulemeester, Maison Martin Margiela, ... With the interest in beauty he learned from his parents, Arno studied interior design in Gent (Belgium), learning a lot about materials and with lots of knowledge about history and architecture. He designed interiors and opened his own gallery for ethnographic arts and design.

#itinerance01

Four legs stool, yakisugi treated iroko wood, 50 cm high, seat 35/35 cm

ARNO DECLERCQ

Bunker, yakisugi treated oak & iroko wood, 50 cm high

#itinerance01

Babel vase, yakisugi treated oak, 2 sizes: 65 & 85 cm (H)

FREDERIK DELBART www.frederikdelbart.be

Frederik Delbart Design Studio is an independent creative office located in Brussels and Hasselt, Belgium, active in product design, strategic design management and consultancy. Inspired by textures and structures, the main purpose of the studio is creating honest and simple objects. By having a critical approach on the way objects are used and look, every step of the “design process” is deeply analysed and regarded with respect for the user, the manufacturer and the editor.

#itinerance01

IDEM stool, solid Oak, 40 x 40 x 40 cm / 40 x 40 x 80 cm / 40 x 40 x 120 cm

FREDERIK DELBART

#itinerance01

IDEM stool

NATHALIE DEWEZ www.nathaliedewez.com

The work of Nathalie Dewez extends from small objects to monumental installations, from the unique piece to the industrial product. With a focus on light, Nathalie is an designer whose materials vary between metal, glass and other long-lasting medium. Whether designing light fixtures, objects, furnishings or large-scale sculptures, she also works as consultant in Lighting for several architecture offices such as 51N4E or Archi2000. Nathalie’s designs reveals his passion for sculptural shapes and superior craftsmanship.

#itinerance01

MOON, Polycarbonat Disk / aluminum, Dia 800/930 mm

NATHALIE DEWEZ

Moon, big flat translucent disk framed by a simple metal ring

#itinerance01

Still lamp, painted aluminium & steel, 240 cm or 150 cm. Height adjustable

DAMIEN GERNAY www.damiengernay.com

Damien Gernay’s work is highly experimental, driven by his desire to challenge boundaries between art and design. To date, his practice spans furniture, lighting, and accessories. His pieces often reflect a reverence for nature and the enigmatic; his larger oeuvre focuses on materiality, texture, and ambiguity. Close to the considerations of a painter or a sculptor, the imponderable plays a decisive role in his practice. The error is accepted and assimilated, making each piece unique with its own history, complexities, and intimate paradoxes. He combine control with spontaneity, mixing the smooth with the rough.

#itinerance01

MER NOIRE, leather, patinated steel 120 x 36 cm (Ø x H)

DAMIEN GERNAY

MER NOIRE

#itinerance01

KRJST www.studiokrjst.com

KRJST Studio’s story started in 2012 launched by Erika Schillebeeckx (KR) and Justine de Moriamé (JST), both graduated in Stylisme at La Cambre (Belgium) where they developed their knowledge for textiles, colors and shapes. KRJST Studio became a world dedicated to plastic research and development based on a quest for spirituality. Through their creative process, they reinvent iconographies from the past, crystallizing their research on protection, symbolism and the Sacred. Their strong identity, close to neo-baroque, incorporates pictural and technical exploration. Painting, drawings, 3D works and results of our alchemic experiments are filling the studio. The translation of the research into clothes and weaving represents the heart of their creative approach. KRJST Studio takes its root in the unexpected symbiosis between fashion and art, mixing works in colors, 3D, technology, textile and craft.

#itinerance01

Sagitta, collaboration N. VROUYR, textile, wool, cotton, 165 x 180 x 1 cm

KRJST

#itinerance01

Recollection III, textile, wool, 110 x 330 x 1 cm

GÉRARD KUIJPERS www.gerardkuijpers.be

For thirty years Gerard Kuijpers, autodidact, has been researching the essential qualities of steel, stone glass and wood. In this way he meets the core of his materials, whereafter he uses the power of their interaction. Glass becomes even more transparent, steel even stronger; while wood obtains more warmth, stone becomes eternal. Moreover, even more fundamental opposites arise: resistance versus movement, severity versus organic, and usability versus poetry, which then merge into the magical harmony of the present. In all their simplicity the works are timeless.

Represented in France by Yves Gastou Gallery. © Tim Van de Velde

#itinerance01

Turning mirror, 60 x 60 x 180 cm

GÃ&#x2030;RARD KUIJPERS

#itinerance01

Turning mirror, Belgian Rouge Griotte Marble, steel, glass, mirror, frame in Wenge

POL QUADENS www.polquadens.com

Pol Quadens has been a designer for 30 years and has approached design from all angles. His first success was the CD holder he created in 1988, which he produced and of which over 100,000 copies were distributed. He then came with the C06 chair, the world lightest and ladies’ shoes without a heel: the “strada”. He is interested in the unique properties of carbon fibre. He has pushed back the limits of Corian since 2007 and has frenetically produced limited series of furniture in pure forms and with soft curves. He stretches, bends, welds his Corian and manages to achieve the identical reflection of his futuristic or rebellious vision, in each of his pieces.

Verona, stainless steel, 220 x 65 x 45 (H x W x L)

#itinerance01

POL QUADENS

#itinerance01

Verona

VLADIMIR SLAVOV www.dimatelier.com

Driven by the passion for art, design, and craftsmanship Vladimir Slavov creates unique, limited edition, and custom made lighting fixtures. The simple and elegant, yet functional and expressive designs by Vladimir are meticulously hand crafted in his workshop in Antwerp, Belgium, under the brand DIM atelier. The minimalistic designs with fine outlines, and the exceptional attention to detail and finish are the main distinguishing characteristics of his exclusive lighting objects. Before devoting himself fully to DIM atelier in the summer of 2013, Vladimir worked on sculptures and light and kinetic installations. He has been featured in numerous exhibitions and art festivals across Belgium.

#itinerance01

Line 02, solid brushed brass, 11.5 x 11.5 x 176 cm (L x W x H)

VLADIMIR SLAVOV

Line 02

#itinerance01

NICOLAS SCHUYBROEK www.ns-architects.com

The Belgian architect Nicolas Schuybroek began his career in Montreal, working for Intégral Jean Beaudoin. He then returned to Belgium and joined the office of Vincent Van Duysen in Antwerp as project director, handling high-end architecture projects in Belgium and beyond. In 2011, Nicolas Schuybroek started his own practice based in Brussels, with a well defined purpose: create and produce architecture, interiors and objects characterized by an acute sense of detail, craftsmanship and intuition, while retaining a feeling of warmth. The search for timeless minimalism and apparent simplicity are central in his work, as well as the love of unassuming, tactile and raw materials.

#itinerance01

HH Bowl, Iranian travertine marble, Egyptian sandstone and perforated bronze

NICOLAS SCHUYBROEK

HH Bowl

#itinerance01

BEN STORMS www.benstorms.be

Ben Storms is a Belgian designer who thinks in terms of matter. He tends to assemble form, material and technique in a way that is both innovative and compelling. By probing its boundaries to and beyond the limits, he creates a rather surprising language of form.

#itinerance01

InVein, marble, steel, leather, mirror made of polished stainless steel, 100 x 200 x 73 cm (W x L x H)

BEN STORMS

InVein

#itinerance01

MICHAEL VERHEYDEN www.michaelverheyden.be

Michaël Verheyden has elevated the simplicity of clean shapes to new heights. A master of leather, Verheyden’s furniture and objects favour the meeting between noble materials and a pure, sculptural aesthetic. His elegant handcrafted pieces have an inherent quiet poetry to them that only grows more beautiful with age.

#itinerance01

Busk vase, marble, 24 x 29 cm (D x H)

MICHAEL VERHEYDEN

#itinerance01

Shelf chair&table, set in brushed solid oak, 80 x 80 x 60 cm, 50 x 40 x 50 cm (W x H x D)

Over twenty years ago, a passion for design filled the world of Jean-François Declercq. In September 2015, he decided to transform his home into a centre for the arts dedicated to cultural exchanges and exhibitions. The 400 m² Atelier Jespers renews this mission: showing art. The modernist setting of the building hosts artistic projects of all varieties – design, visual arts, sound – with the humble ambition of creating a dialogue between Victor Bourgeois’s architecture and new art forms. Allowing himself complete freedom, Jean-François Declercq opens his doors to various forms of expression, provided they are in line with his own minimalist and conceptual choices: “I like things simple and beautiful!”.

CONTACT 149, Avenue du Prince Héritier 1200 Bruxelles, Belgique Jean-Francois Declercq +32 475 64 95 81 Elsa Sarfati +33 6 10 84 27 48 jf@itinerance-project.com www.itinerance-project.com Exposition hors les murs réalisée grâce au soutien de:

& Roel Rijssenbeek Printed with the support of

More info on www.visit.brussels/design

notes

Titre Oeuvre, YYYY Material, dimensions

Printed YYYY with the Titre Oeuvre, Material, dimensions

NAME ARTIST

support of visit.brussels