The follow-on and consequence of the Piedmontese exhibition is a number of self-productions, editions offered directly by the designers themselves and, to a lesser degree, by galleries. The latter notably included the fledgling Camp Design Gallery which stood out with works by Analogia Project, Veronica Todisco and David Lindberg, designers chosen by Beatrice Bianco and Valentina Lucio, the gallery’s founders, for their experimental and signature design.
The Festival centred on two key areas: the relationship between nature and artifice and that of relational design in the Me/We section. The Nature/Artifice pairing highlighted just how much the new directions of self-produced research owe to science, especially when nature is investigated more as a master of creative processes than a repertoire of forms. Vivid examples in this section featured glass techniques by Laura Couto Rosado, who used applied physics to grow synthetic crystals in real time as if they were pliable forms, and objects by Tijmen Smeulders which find a very intimistic raison d’être in a mono-material content and light refraction, as in the aluminium Mirror sculpture that is almost a reflecting and distorting mask, inviting us to rethink our own perceived reflection.
6–8 November 2015
Operæ 2015. 6. Festival del design indipendente
Turin