{"id":8967,"date":"2021-10-04T18:54:21","date_gmt":"2021-10-04T22:54:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/?p=8967"},"modified":"2021-10-04T19:02:04","modified_gmt":"2021-10-04T23:02:04","slug":"these-artists-would-love-for-you-to-sit-on-their-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/2021\/10\/04\/these-artists-would-love-for-you-to-sit-on-their-work\/","title":{"rendered":"These Artists Would Love for You to Sit on Their Work"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Author: <\/strong>Alina Cohen<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Date: <\/strong>Nov 28, 2018<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Publisher: <\/strong>Artsy<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jillian Mayer, Slumpie 69 – Shark Fin<\/em> . Courtesy of the artist.A zany perversity is rampant in the studios of many young, contemporary creators who are trampling the boundary between furniture and fine art. For artists who want to break rules, this offers tempting propositions: chairs that aren\u2019t meant for sitting, lamps that are less interested in illumination than in aesthetic verve, home goods that don\u2019t work like they should. Rebellious aesthetes are turning old, recognizable forms\u2014the sofa, the shelf\u2014into objects for considerable contemplation. In their studios, provocation and individual expression override comfort and utility.One example among many is on view at the Carnegie International in Pittsburgh, where Jessi Reaves<\/a> welcomes viewers to sit on her art. She\u2019s created a sprawling couch that branches into tongue and tentacle shapes; patchwork fabrics with a metallic sheen give the cushioning an aura of trashy decadence. Around the room, Reaves has placed a variety of sculptures with an equally sexy-messy vibe. Threads hang loose, wire armatures are exposed, and function is an afterthought, though some of the wall-mounted pieces do resemble deconstructed chairs or shelves. While some pieces might be called \u201clamps\u201d because there are lightbulbs inside, these are clearly art objects to look at, not to read by.Reaves is certainly not the only artist who is rethinking the line between furniture and art. She\u2019s one of a handful of young talents\u2014including Lucy Dodd<\/a>, Misha Kahn<\/a>, Jillian Mayer<\/a>, Katie Stout<\/a>, and the Haas Brothers<\/a>\u2014who resists such limiting labels as \u201cdesigner,\u201d \u201cfurniture-maker,\u201d \u201ccraftsperson,\u201d or \u201cartist.\u201d In truth, each of them represents a synthesis of all of these. Stout makes wacky, woman-shaped lamps; Kahn\u2019s pieces often resemble characters just in from the cosmos; and the Haas brothers may be best known for their furry, function-free beasts. These artists\u2019 exhibitions can be immersive and multi-sensory, turning their oeuvres into gesamtkunstwerk<\/em> and their aesthetics into lifestyles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Installation<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Installation view of Lucy Dodd, \u201cMay Flower,\u201d David Lewis, New York, NY, 2018. Courtesy of the artist and David Lewis, New York.Shannon Stratton, chief curator at New York\u2019s Museum of Arts and Design<\/a> (MAD), often refers to these multi-disciplinarians simply as \u201cmakers,\u201d or groups them into the larger visual canon as artists. \u201cI don\u2019t make a distinction,\u201d she said. \u201cSomebody working in clay is an artist. Somebody who\u2019s making more sculptural, conceptual, functional objects\u2014whether furniture or jewelry\u2014is still an artist.\u201dSince around the time of the Enlightenment, Stratton said, Western institutions have stigmatized objects that require intensive labor. Instead, the academy has favored work that conveys \u201cwholly intellectual pursuits.\u201d A class divide has long separated craftspeople from institutionally educated and sanctioned artists. Gender bias also plays a role. \u201cFiber, weaving, and textiles were very feminine pursuits,\u201d Stratton said. Quilt-making, for example, was long dismissed as \u201cwomen\u2019s work.\u201d MAD itself aims to eliminate such hierarchical distinctions between disciplines. Reaves\u2019s couch, which required significant craftsmanship\u2014and plenty of stitching and welding\u2014rebels against such ghettoization. Its rough edges and non-traditional shape shatter ideas about what a couch should look like.It\u2019s too easy to suggest that young \u201cmakers\u201d are part of a nascent art-meets-design trend. Though they\u2019re certainly producing some of today\u2019s most intriguing\u2014and at least nominally functional\u2014objects, their interdisciplinary approach has a long history. By examining this narrative, we reconsider who we\u2019ve valorized and neglected, and what we\u2019ve fetishized or dismissed. Often, the record shows how we\u2019ve reinforced inequity across gender and class. Thankfully, a new generation of gallerists, museums, and collectors are helping to smash such tired prejudice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A brief history of art that\u2019s also kind of furniture<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>Richard Artschwager<\/a><\/strong>Chair<\/a><\/em>, 1987-1990Schellmann Art<\/a>Furniture-making both inspired and financed the artist Richard Artschwager<\/a>\u2019s practice. Artschwager went to school in New York and Paris in the 1940s, finally settling in the former city. He got married, had a child, and temporarily relinquished his creative ambitions in order to support his burgeoning family, by making furniture and working at a bank.Throughout the 1960s, Artschwager returned to sculpture, taking advantage of his now-significant woodworking skills. For gallery settings, Artschwager installed forms that alluded to the structure of cabinets, chairs, and other furniture. Description of Table<\/em> (1964), for example, is a simple painted plywood cube, with black pigment conveying an empty space beneath a wooden \u201ctable,\u201d and white that suggests a tablecloth on top. Artschwager also used Formica throughout his career, sampling the surface and texture of common countertops. Looking at his work, it\u2019s difficult to tell what belongs in a living room and what should be in a museum. His artwork advocates diminishing the barriers between both.In contrast, the Minimalist<\/a> pioneer Donald Judd<\/a> drew clear boundaries between his furniture and art practice. In the 1970s, he was already famous for his boxy sculptures: wall-mounted like shelves, or arrayed on the floor like unusable tables, benches, or storage units. During the decade, he moved from New York to West Texas with his family. Judd found no good furniture stores nearby, so he decided to make all his own furnishings. Out of necessity, then, he started constructing chairs, desks, and other functional pieces that shared many elements (sleekness, right angles, clean lines) with his artwork.Yet he viewed his two different modes of making as discreet activities. \u201cThe intent of art is different from that of [furniture], which must be functional,\u201d Judd wrote in his 1993 essay \u201cIt\u2019s Hard to Find a Good Lamp.\u201d Yet he also conceded (albeit cryptically): \u201cThe furniture is furniture and is only art in that architecture, ceramics, textiles, and many things are art.\u201d His son, Flavin Judd, recalls that public reception for his father\u2019s chairs and dressers was not initially positive. \u201cThe world is divided up in two lanes,\u201d he told Artsy<\/em>. \u201cPeople like other people to stay in their own lane.\u201d<\/a>Franz West<\/a><\/strong>Two works: Onkel Stuhl (Uncle Chair)<\/a><\/em>, 2003Phillips<\/a>Donald Judd<\/a><\/strong>Untitled<\/a><\/em>, 1980Artemundi<\/a>Judd\u2019s puritanical approach offers a significant contrast to that of Austrian-born Franz West<\/a>. In the 1980s, West was already a renowned sculptor, best known for his \u201cAdaptives\u201d (Passst\u00fccke<\/em>): white mixed-media artworks of varying shapes that viewers were allowed to pick up and touch, like strange toys. They resemble umbrellas, balloons, and distorted hula-hoops, evidencing West\u2019s interest in the quotidian. His subsequent, now-iconic \u201cUncle Chairs\u201d feature colorful, interwoven bands on the back and seat, beckoning viewers to not just play with his work, but sit on it. Functionality was always integral to West\u2019s practice, no matter how the public chose to label specific objects. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t matter what the art looks like but how it\u2019s used,\u201d he once said.Andrea Zittel<\/a>, who lives in Joshua Tree, is something of a Judd heir. Since the 1990s, she\u2019s built cabinets and beds fit for either galleries or homes. Even when her structures lack a specific function\u2014like a raised platform with a wall emerging from it for no other purpose than to hang a fabric square\u2014they still resemble architecture. In 2000, after trying out Brooklyn, she rejected urban concerns to live out in the desert, like Judd. She\u2019s turned her 70-acre site into a comprehensive artwork called A-Z West<\/em>. The compound features her living quarters, studios, cabins, and a variety of amenities for rotating groups of resident artists.And if Zittel is a descendent of Judd, Gaetano Pesce<\/a> may be the paterfamilias of many of today\u2019s most prominent young makers. In his New York studio, he creates soft, gummy bear\u2013shaped armchairs of foam and stretch fabric; tables of cast polyester, or resin and foam, with inward slanting legs; and jagged-edged, multi-colored resin vases. A sense of indulgent whimsy supersedes more serious technical concerns. His creations ask: \u201cWhy can\u2019t furniture be fun?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The new guard of nonconformists<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>Jillian Mayer<\/a><\/strong>Slumpie 3 \u2013 Q Chair<\/a><\/em>, 2016Postmasters Gallery<\/a>Contact for price<\/a>Jillian Mayer<\/a><\/strong>Slumpie 16 \u2013 Knee Holder<\/a><\/em>, 2016Postmasters Gallery<\/a>Contact for priceToday\u2019s young makers have taken up this charge. They\u2019ve all but gutted that old Bauhaus<\/a> directive: \u201cForm follows function.\u201d A DIY aesthetic prevails today, which often either considers function as a kind of afterthought or challenges our idea of functionality altogether.For example, Jillian Mayer<\/a> makes interactive sculptural objects called \u201cSlumpies\u201d\u2014glittering, multi-colored, and lumpen, they resemble couches and chairs tailor-made for people who want to simultaneously sit and use their phones. The works feature various hoops and platforms amenable to anyone typing on a digital device.\u201cI identified a problem (the slouched human body on their phone),\u201d Mayer explained via email. Her sculptures, she said, are a \u201csolutionist gesture\u201d that invites users to indulge their love for both art and digital communication. They can even take pictures of themselves enjoying the work, while resting. It\u2019s easy to see Mies van der Rohe<\/a> turning in his grave.Bright and crudely finished, made from a motley mix of fiberglass, resin, wood, and enamel, the \u201cSlumpies\u201d exemplify what Stratton of the MAD calls \u201csloppy craft.\u201d Anne Wilson, a professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, introduced the term in 2007. In an essay included in the 2015 anthology Sloppy Craft<\/em>: Postdisciplinarity and the Crafts<\/em>, Wilson used the designation to convey an \u201cintelligent and formally progressive\u201d aesthetic found in Josh Faught<\/a>\u2019s colorful, loosely crafted, fiber-based work. She argued that such a contemporary style derives, in part, from \u201cthe ubiquity of computer screens\u2026and the availability of seemingly easy perfection that demands its opposite\u2014the wish for a more sensorial experience, materiality and the mark of the hand, privileging foible and imperfection, irregularity and uncertainty.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Installation<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Installation view of Misha Kahn\u2019s work at NOMAD MONACO 2018. Courtesy of Friedman Benda<\/a>.As our lives become increasingly digital, in other words, younger makers are drawn more to roughness and individuality than the streamlined, sleek aesthetic that Judd advocated. Wonkiness is similarly pervading contemporary ceramics: Ruby Neri<\/a>\u2019s vases depict women\u2019s bodies distorted to grotesque proportions, for instance, while Monika Grabuschnigg<\/a>\u2019s light-pink, life-sized totems explore the medium\u2019s biomorphic potentials.For his part, Misha Kahn<\/a> similarly believes that technology has impacted his practice, but in a very different way. \u201cWe\u2019re all looking at Instagram all the time, consuming things. You\u2019re never just looking at one thing,\u201d he told Artsy<\/em> during a recent visit to his Bushwick studio. On a typical day, Kahn might be covered in sawdust, coloring something, and looking at a picture of a baby elephant, all at the same time. His work perfectly articulates this busyness.For a 2017 exhibition at Friedman Benda<\/a>, Kahn created a wooden platform that viewers could traverse. It served as a kind of maze around his various objects, which were submerged in mulch. Bronze Miss Fishy<\/em> chairs featured spindly backs that resembled fish skeletons. An inward-curving cabinet looked more like a macrame totem than like anything you\u2019d use for storage. Indeed, upon first glance, many of Kahn\u2019s pieces look more like aliens than home goods. Washer\/ Dryer\/ Dishwasher (Low Model)<\/em> (2017), made from interwoven wood and grass, resembles a furry, two-legged creature with three eyes. His mirrors are ringed with bright resin and vinyl accents, suggesting balloons or pool toys. Kahn\u2019s list of materials frequently includes found objects\u2014he relishes their textures and embedded histories. \u201cEveryone\u2019s grappling to represent what it feels like to be alive right now,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s hard to make something simple or straightforward and feel like you\u2019ve in any way captured how weird it is right now.\u201d<\/a>Misha Kahn<\/a><\/strong>Group of black cement stools<\/a><\/em>, 2016Friedman Benda<\/a>Kahn\u2019s New York gallerist, Marc Benda, says that boundaries between art and design have been \u201cslowly dissolving\u201d over the past 10 to 15 years, with the wider art world taking \u201cnote of design as a concept.\u201d Benda founded his Friedman Benda gallery in 2007, which now shows work that ranges from Ettore Sottsass<\/a>\u2019s exuberantly colored Memphis<\/a> objects to Chris Schanck<\/a>\u2019s stalactite-studded mirrors and tables. Clients have followed Benda\u2019s lead, and he believes that the contemporary generation of collectors have more fluid interests that take little stock of old hierarchical values assigned to design or art. (Still, Benda maintains a separate gallery\u2014Albertz Benda<\/a>\u2014to display more traditional painting, sculpture, and video work.)Kahn\u2019s friend and former studio mate, Katie Stout<\/a>, offers a human counterpart to his otherworldly creations. She\u2019s best known for colorful ceramic lamps shaped like naked ladies (their raised arms hold up the shades). They often feature uneven indents that look like thumbprints\u2014individuality embodied. \u201cFrom a conceptual level, she\u2019s looking to challenge the norms of domestic space,\u201d says Stout\u2019s Miami gallerist, Nina Johnson<\/a>. By creating objects for the home, Stout makes her work accessible beyond the art world bubble\u2014attracting people who simply want to see how the pieces actually work.Johnson believes that her gallery\u2019s location grants her significant creative freedom. She can exhibit more traditional \u201csculpture\u201d and functional objects that strain categorization in a way that\u2019s more difficult in New York. Her collectors aren\u2019t distinguishing between objects on the basis of whether or not they can sit in them: According to Johnson, they\u2019re more interested in conceptual underpinnings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"The<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Haas Brothers, Spotley Cru<\/em>, 2017. Designed and made by The Haas Brothers and The Haas Sisters. \u00a9 The Haas Brothers. Courtesy of the artists; R & Company, New York; and Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York and Aspen. Photo by Joe Kramm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"The<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Haas Brothers, Spotley Cru<\/em> , 2017. Designed and made by The Haas Brothers and The Haas Sisters. \u00a9 The Haas Brothers. Courtesy of the artists; R & Company, New York; and Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York and Aspen. Photo by Joe Kramm.To illustrate the point, Johnson mentioned an upcoming exhibition at her gallery that was curated by architecture firm Charlap Hyman & Herrero. It will include works that range from a picture by photographer Malick Sidib\u00e9<\/a> to a lamp by the French multimedia phenom Nicola L<\/a>. As Johnson says, \u201cThey\u2019re both really objects that exist to challenge the viewer and create questions.\u201dIn New York, another boundary-pushing gallery, R & Company<\/a>, represents Stout, as well as the Haas Brothers<\/a> (twins Nikolai and Simon). The brothers\u2019 oeuvre coalesces into a fantastical zoo: porcelain vases whose spiky round bottoms resemble sea creatures; sheepskin \u201cbeasts\u201d with cast-bronze legs; and furry benches that evoke hirsute dogs (with a few too many feet). Not all of their works have a specific function. You could sit on one of their beasts, if you wanted, but it would make for an uncomfortable chair.\u201cThe only time we get pigeonholed is when we interact with the market,\u201d Nikolai told me recently. Fairs such as Art Basel and Design Miami\/ are particularly strict about who can exhibit in which venue. Last winter, carved stone chairs by Max Lamb<\/a> were the rare exception to Art Basel\u2019s stringent \u201cno furniture\u201d rule.Yet the issue isn\u2019t just the market, but the way that humans are wired to think. \u201cWe are pattern recognizers. We thrive on categories,\u201d Simon said. The brothers aim to expand viewers\u2019 perceptions, pushing audiences to think beyond classifications that are not just aesthetic, but social, too. They want to create a deeper understanding of what it means to be \u201cnon-binary\u201d in all facets of contemporary life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"The<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Haas Brothers, Uma Worm-an<\/em>, 2018. \u00a9 The Haas Brothers. Courtesy of the artists; R & Company, New York; and Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York and Aspen. Photo by Joe Kramm.Miami\u2019s Bass Museum of Art<\/a> has even incorporated such a boundary eruption into its mission. This month, during Art Basel in Miami Beach, the museum will mount an exhibition by the Haas Brothers\u2014the first that the duo has ever held in a traditional art space. Says the museum\u2019s executive director Silvia Cubi\u00f1\u00e1: \u201cThere\u2019s risk in redefining what contemporary art is in 2018.\u201d For today\u2019s creators, that risk is half the fun.In his 1993 essay, Judd wrote: \u201cIf a chair or a building is not functional, if it appears to be only art, it is ridiculous.\u201d Contemporary makers, it seems, have no problem with that, and they\u2019re happily making objects that are appropriate for our absurd times. Their creations are going beyond outlandishness just for the sake of it, though. Ultimately, they\u2019re turning ridiculous into the meaningful and the sublime. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Comments: <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are many artists that have been bending the rules of this ancient craft of furniture making. There is a divide between people who think furniture has to be functional over form and the opposite. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think there can be an agreement between these two sides. Furniture should and has to be functional but we see and live with our furniture every day, so it should evoke a sense of emotion. Furniture can be just as provocative and thoughtful as a piece of art you hang on the wall. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

All of the artists in this article could use a service that directly connects them to their followers by being able to print pieces. This would allow a wider range of people to own a piece of their art, as well as making interior spaces less boring and more sensory. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Author: Alina Cohen Date: Nov 28, 2018 Publisher: Artsy Jillian Mayer, Slumpie 69 – Shark Fin . Courtesy of the artist.A zany perversity is rampant in the studios of many young, contemporary creators who are trampling the boundary between furniture and fine art. For artists who want to break rules, this offers tempting propositions: chairs that aren\u2019t […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":53,"featured_media":8969,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-8967","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arts"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8967","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/53"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8967"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8967\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8975,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8967\/revisions\/8975"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8969"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8967"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8967"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8967"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}