simples

Vista da exposição, © Susana Pomba

A minha recensão da exposição É Proibido Proibir do MUDE está desde hoje online no site Artecapital.

Le Corbusier (Charles-Edouard Jeanneret) (1887-1965) Still-Life of the Pavillon de L’Esprit Nouveau, 1924

This morning I visited the Art Deco, 1925 exhibition at the Calouste Gulbenkian Museum in Lisbon. This world-class, exquisite show would surely please Calouste Gulbenkian, the Armenian-born billionaire to which Portuguese science and culture (and myself, as a FCG/FLAD grant holder) owe so much. His famous motto, “only the best”, made the museum and foundation that bear his name two of the world’s most respected and sophisticated institutions.

Curated by Chantal Bizot and Dany Sautot and masterfully designed by Mariano Piçarra and Ricardo Viegas (graphics), the exhibition is a true arts décoratifs treasure trove. From carpets to glass, jewellery to books, it presents a wide range of (mostly applied) artworks that mirrored the prevailing message of 1925′s International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts: the triumph of the ensemble as an expression of industrial and artistic progress.

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Konstantin Grcic’s 360ºC chair for Magis is a product that defies classification. It’s a chair that doesn’t look like anything we have around us these days. It’s a bit like stool, but it has a sort of a small back. It looks hard, but it’s actually much softer to the touch than one would thing. As with other of Grcic’s creations, it doesn’t look pretty, luxurious or particularly comfortable.

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Metropolis magazine, September 2009

The printed version of Metropolis magazine has shrunk as of last September. The result of a publishing crisis-induced redesign (in corner-cutting times, every inch counts), the magazine’s new size did not resolve its two other most pressing ills: an unclear international ambition and an art direction that doesn’t seem to know its place.

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I first wrote a 600-word review of Speed Limits for icon magazine in late May of 2009. It ended up being edited down to just over 450 words, losing in my view some of the details that I liked best. In late June I sent my original piece (with a few changes) to the frieze Writer’s Prize, a yearly award for art criticism. I had previously asked the editors of frieze (who don’t usually accept design exhibition reviews) if Speed Limits would be eligible, as it had as starting point Marinetti’s manifesto. They agreed, and I sent it. In late August I got news from Jennifer Higgie, who said I had been selected, among over 300 entries, as one of the jury’ 8 commended writers.

Both texts are now available here, the first under icon, the second under unpublished.