LONDON.- Gallery FUMI’s new group exhibition Stories and Other Objects features an exciting selection of works by the gallery roster of international artists and designers.
Presenting newly commissioned work along with a selection of key pieces, the exhibition invites visitors to observe the growth of artists who are at the forefront in the use of materials and technologies. Some are using new colours, materials and shapes. Others are moving towards a more figurative aesthetic; whilst others are taking inspiration from their past, or their mistakes.
For Italian craftsman Francesco Perini, nature serves as the main inspiration of his ‘creatures’ - as he likes defining the works that he makes applying his marquetry skills. Living in the Tuscan countryside and observing the surrounding landscape, Perini’s work is a celebration of the simplest natural elements: leaves, trees, water. Now his attention has turned to pebbles and especially rock cairns. The result is a monumental oak dining table with concrete inlays resembling three pebbles balancing on each other and testing the laws of gravity.
Similarly, the work of Rowan Mersh celebrates natural forms and movements by assembling small components. Pithváva Echinothrix Ibrida II, whose soft-like appearance is achieved by combining two different types of seashells, is reminiscent of a flower shape. Inspired by the botanical illustrations of German scientist and artist Ernst Haeckel, the artist has moved towards a more figurative shape, setting a point of departure from the geometrical structures that he had used in his previous work.
The Finnish designer Tuomas Markunpoika is presenting for the first time Juoksenki, a lamp constructed using manually cut steel sheets that are then processed to achieve an unusual surface texture. The designer has extensively been using steel in his practice, creating sculptural pieces made of welded steel rings for his acclaimed Engineering Temporality Series. The new lamp is partly an evolution of the series, as it developed from a common mistake that the designer commits when welding steel. “I often forget to turn on the welding gas” - says Markunpoika - “The gas protects the weld by pushing oxygen away from the welded area, preventing oxidation and porous outcome. I found this as a serendipitous encounter, very beautiful, and I used this mistake as a starting point”.
The London design duo JAMESPLUMB presents Altar Within, three sculptural works from their Steel Monoliths series. The designers’ signature style consists in transforming found objects into aesthetically and conceptually incredible works. The three majestic pieces exhibited, feature a solid steel structure embedded within the frame of antique chairs; a discrete door reveals a hidden plinth.
The latest addition to the Poly series by British designer Max Lamb – first presented in 2006 – is a bench carved into polystyrene, with an unusual glossy aqua finish. A colour never used before in the palette that has characterised the series throughout the years. The bench will be displayed in one of the gallery windows, along with a chandelier by the young upstart designer Jie Wu. Made of coloured resin combined with rare antique rosewood, the chandelier is part of the new collection Una Historia Filosófica De Los Jardines. Ancient Chinese lanterns found in Imperial gardens - symbols of light and peace - were the inspiration behind the work.
The chandelier is an important milestone in the artist's career, whose practice has evolved from making small decorative boxes to side tables, consoles and now a remarkable chandelier.
Among many highlights is a bronze head by Voukenas Petrides. The creative process of the Athens based designers is characterised by constant experimentation creating furniture pieces with sculptural properties. Inspired by Picasso’ sculptures exhibited at the MoMA New York, Petrides started making heads and figures made of plaster, which have lately developed into the duo’s renowned Gypsum seatings. The piece on display is the first bronze version of the plaster heads, an homage to Picasso, and the symbol of the inception of the designers’ current practice.
Sam Orlando Miller focuses on the beauty of mirror and glass, creating freestanding and wall sculptures that are visually illusive. For the artist, evolution often means a look back into the origins, working with new awareness of his previous pieces. Scale Infinite and Cielo Nuovo, two wall pieces in the shades of bronze, are a reinterpretation of Untitled Mirrors that he started making in 2009. Many are the aspects that he has resolved by applying subtle but significant changes; Cielo Nuovo, differently from the original mirrors, has a concave faceted surface which resembles a reflective pool.
Artist Saelia Aparicio, whose work features a symbolic system that represents the blunt aspects of reality, is presenting for the first time a hand made libation bowl made of terracotta. Clay is a new material for the artist, who only started using it in 2020. The inspiration came from looking at how functional objects with anthropomorphic shapes are recurrent in different civilizations, and yet in current contexts they look surreal.
Running across both gallery floors, the exhibition also features notable projects by Josepha Gasch-Muche, Study O Portable, Eelko Moorer, Johannes Nagel, Glithero, Maria Bruun & Anne Dorthe Vester, Shinta Nakajima, Frederick Nystrup-Larsen.
Visitors will be immersed into a world where fine craftsmanship meets conceptual rigour, blending emotions with narrative.
