Proximity exhibition at Nationale Gallery
On view December 2, 2021–January 2, 2022
Nationale welcomes Proximity, the first collaborative exhibition with Form&Seek Collective and the gallery. The Form&Seek Design Studio focuses on newly developed processes and contemporary craft techniques that prioritize creating unique products and experiences. Featuring work from artists Irina Flore, Ákos Huber, Karen Lee, Laura Papp, and Bilge Nur Saltik, these designers bring together form, function, play and materiality within the gallery space. Proximity seeks to decode the relationship and meaning between these larger themes and how they manifest themselves in the objects on view. The works seem to be asking if inanimate objects can present with emotive qualities - if so, how can those objects embody human characteristics like empathy, sensitivity, and warmth?
Presented here are pieces that contort their form and veer from compositional expectations. In bringing their ideas to life, the five artists push the boundaries of their own craft and methodology, bending it to their will. Huber demonstrates to us the Chair of the Moment—a cantilevered chair whose pillars feel stern and sturdy, like concrete pillars, but is at once inviting, its canvas seat natural and familiar. Similarly, Flore’s 3D printed Extraordinary Objects may appear foreign at first but remain relative in their utility. Their function demands first an understanding of their construction and their relationship to the user before they can be put into practice. Papp utilizes a single piece of material for her twisted case pieces, shaping the fabric into a dynamic sculpture that doubles also as storage. Lee’s Pleasure Vessels rely on an understanding of the relationship between her disparate mediums - glass and wood - and have the viewer engage and build their own relationship within that context. From sketching to execution, Saltik presents with her Frosting Collection a re-examining of design technology that is simplified, creating a final object that is as clean-cut in its execution as it is in its purpose.
Proximity asks for a union between end-user and creator, through which the works on display facilitate symbiosis between the material and its purpose. In observing these pieces and dissecting them from idea to execution, we as viewers imbue them with our own anthropomorphic traits. In this way, the objects truly come alive.
Curatorial Team:
Bilge Nur Saltik, Irina Flore
In Collaboration with
