#itinerance04 by Manu Blondiau

#itinerance04

13 — 15 April, 2018

NEO ARCHAISM

For its first participation in miart, the Atelier Jespers has organised its fourth external project, #itinerance04, conceived around the idea of time and the history of forms, with eight contemporary European designers: Francesco Balzano, Pierre Bonnefille, Destroyers/Builders, KRJST Studio, Gerard Kuijpers, Rooms Design, Maarten Stuer and Conrad Willems. With the materials, forms and techniques, these artists produce objects that remind one of a certain archaism and elegance of lines while also remaining timeless. Previously a collector, currently a visionary, Jean-François Declercq discovers talents which he then displays at the Atelier Jespers in Brussels, a space dedicated to exhibitions of historic design and contemporary creation. Jean-François Declercq’s questionings about design find their source in his past as a collector of historic pieces. Naturally curious, he conscientiously expanded his collection over twenty-five years with all eras of design before deciding to focalise on contemporary design. Thanks to his experience and critical eye, Jean-François Declercq has managed to succeed in a space infused with history (the former home and workshop of the sculptor Oscar Jespers) to create a synthesis of all eras by offering an aesthetic and critically demanding vision.

In his selection for miart youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll find items as diverse as a tapestry, a stool and the sculpture/ model of a building. All these objects recreate a link with the objects that preceded them, whether through the purity of their forms, the archetypal figures represented or the ancient techniques employed, as if the future belonged to the past. Or perhaps it is rather that the past is already the future.

Index

FRANCESCO BALZANO �� 4–7 PIERRE BONNEFILLE ��8–11 DESTROYERS/BUILDERS �� 12–15 KRJST STUDIO ��16–19 GERARD KUIJPERS �� 20–23 ROOMS DESIGN �� 24–27 MAARTEN STUER �� 28–31 CONRAD WILLEMS �� 32–35 CONTACT �� 36 NOTES �� 40

FRANCESCO BALZANO www.francescobalzano.com www.Kolkhoze.fr

FRANCESCO BALZANO is a french designer based in Paris. His research work is a permanent tribute to the beauty of timeless things. The simplicity is used as an ultimate sophistication, mixing noble materials, purity of lines and essential functions of everyday lifestyle.

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GIORGIO CHAIR — Artist proof (Edition of 12), 2017, Sanded and skated aluminium, 45 x 46 x 90 cm Handcrafted in France by Ateliers SaintJacques within the Fondation de Coubertin

FRANCESCO BALZANO

GIORGIO CHAIR

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PIERRE BONNEFILLE www.pierrebonnefille.com

Pierre Bonnefille is a French artist, painter, designer and ‘Maître d’art’ (Art Master) of a singular and poetic approach. Pierre Bonnefille is a chromatic alchemist. He draws inspiration from his journeys and distils the colors he encounters into the infinite richness of his work. The material, colours and light are inseparable in Pierre Bonnefille’s work. The artist creates his own materials and textures, made from mineral powder, limestone, lava, marble, earth, from natural pigments and metallic powders. A veritable explorer, Pierre Bonnefille draws his inspiration from the colours of nature and his architectural references in Venice, Pompei and even Kyoto.

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CARBON PAINTING 2 â&#x20AC;&#x201D; 2017, original mixed media, carbon powder on metallic mesh, 180 x 180 cm

PIERRE BONNEFILLE

Carbon Painting 2

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DESTROYERS/BUILDERS www.destroyersbuilders.com

Portrait: ÂŠ Linde Freya Tangelder

Destroyers/Builders is a Brussels based design studio, founded by Linde Freya. With a focus on materiality the studio strives for sensory relevance in detail and bigger scale. Linde Freya highlights the field between industrial and human methods, and translates this into primary form language. Studio Destroyers/Builders makes objects and interior projects with a conscious material use and aims to bring daily objects closer to our senses. Product and material designer Linde Freya Tangelder (1987), based in Brussels, has been raised with Brazilian-Dutch background. After her work experiences at the Campana Brothers in Sao Paulo and Studio Unfold in Antwerp, she started Studio Destroyers/Builders in 2014 together with her work/life partner Jo Groven, landscape architect.

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BIGGER PLATE 01 — Limited edition of 10 pieces Meranti wood “aubergine”, pigment and varnish, 13 x 60 x 60 cm

DESTROYERS/BUILDERS

BIGGER PLATE 01

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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.

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ORION 1 & 2 â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Woven fabric in wool, rubber, acrylic, linen and raffia, 165 x 800 cm

KRJST

ORION 1 & 2

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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. Portrait: ÂŠ Tim van de Velde ÂŠ Stijn Van Hulle

GERARD KUIJPERS www.gerardkuijpers.be

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THE BLACK SHRINE â&#x20AC;&#x201D; 2016 Steel & belgian black marble (noir de Mazy) 170 x 54 (W) x (D) 48 cm

GÃ&#x2030;RARD KUIJPERS

THE BLACK SHRINE

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ROOMS DESIGN www.rooms.ge/en www.Kolkhoze.fr Portrait: © guramkapanadze

Rooms is the Tbilisi-based Interior and product design studio founded by Nata Janberidze and Keti Toloraia. Distinguished by a strong graphic presence, the studio’s work spans hospitality and retail design, residential projects as well as furniture, lighting and accessories. Both Nata and Keti were born in Tbilisi, Georgia in the spring of 1981. The duo met and formed a friendship whilst studying Interior Design at Tbilisi Academy of Arts. Rooms, considered the first Georgian product design studio, was founded in 2007. While Rooms’ work feels global in its purview, the studio’s vision is grounded in the founders experience of soviet childhood during great political change as well as Georgia’s rich cultural mix of a Asian and European influences.

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SCULPTURAL CHAIR â&#x20AC;&#x201D; 2017, numbered edition Aged oak, 50 x 50 x 84 cm

ROOMS DESIGN

SCULPTURAL CHAIR

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MAARTEN STUER www.maartenstuer.net www.Kolkhoze.fr

Graduate of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp, where he specialized in graphic arts, drawing and lithography, Maarten Stuer moved to Barcelona in the 1990s, where he learned to work with clay. In 1995 he moved to the Gers, France, where he still lives. A lover of nature and landscapes, he turned to clay to develop his art. In his hands, the clay is not so dense, not so heavy, not so lifeless… It becomes aerated and pierced, coils up and takes air, space, life and movement, apparently sensitive to weather conditions, to time passing and to the looks that it receives. Through his different series his works increase in scale. However, the shapes that emerge from a made-to-measure kiln remain inspired by the natural world, seeds, shells, waves, coiled fibres: a powerful, subtle world that combines archaism and spirituality.

STUUL â&#x20AC;&#x201D; 2017, edition of 30 Stoneware with kaolin engobe, 48 x 37 x 38 cm Artist monogram at the base

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MAARTEN STUER

ASTRE LUNE 1 â&#x20AC;&#x201D; 2016, unique piece Stoneware with kaolin engobe, 51 x 18 cm Artist monogram at the base

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DISQUE 2 â&#x20AC;&#x201D; 2016, unique piece Stoneware with kaolin engobe, 73 x 72 x 14 cm Artist monogram at the base

CONRAD WILLEMS www.conradwillems.com

Portrait: ÂŠ Cedric Verhelst

My art practice shifts between sculpting, drawing and performance. Their origin is found in my interest in construction, deconstruction and architecture, often tracing back to the basic shapes of wooden toy building sets. Body movement functions as an intermediate between my two and three-dimensional works. My sculptures are constructed rather than sculpted in the classical sense of the word. I work with freestanding pieces that are stacked on top of each other, remaining unfixed to each other. These modular installations are often constructed for a live audience. The building process thus becomes a performance, the resulting construction an installation work.

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CONSTRUCTION IV — 2017 500 beige Borrèze sandstone building blocks 275 x 120 x 110 cm (sculpture) Black paper and white ink 110 x 75 cm (drawing)

CONRAD WILLEMS

CONSTRUCTION IV

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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 Erfprinslaan 149, Avenue du Prince Héritier Brussel 1200 Bruxelles, Belgium Jean-Francois Declercq +32 475 64 95 81 Elsa Sarfati +33 6 10 84 27 48 jf@itinerance-project.com www.itinerance-project.com

with the support of:

notes