Sydney-based designer Trent Jansen takes a research-led, anthropological approach to his work that often involves delving into the history of materials, movements and mythologies, and also includes cross-cultural collaboration.
His most recent work, which is being exhibited as part of Local Milan at the Milan Furniture Fair in April 2019, is the Shaker Family Home. This piece is simultaneously a single work, and also a collection of works, with each part folding away into the structure of the main piece.
The work is inspired by the Shaker tradition, not only referring to the stylistic and aesthetic traits of Shaker-style furniture, but also reflecting on this community, their culture and traditions. In the text that accompanies the work, Jansen describes the Shaker history from the early 19th Century in New England, USA. He says that the community sees “labour of all kinds as an act of prayer” and describes their austere way of life and community-led culture, where all members are celibate, so you become a Shaker, rather than being born a Shaker.
“The Shaker Family Home is an homage to this way of life: Furniture design and making as an act of prayer; the fragility of faith; and the complexity of family in a community where no children are born,” writes Jansen.
The work is comprised of a series of parts, including a table, chest, mirror and other parts, each of which can be folded away into the cabinet. For Jansen, this is symbolic of the family structure of the Shaker communities, where “disparate individuals who lived and worked together as families, refer to each other as sister, brother, mother and father, despite the absence of blood relation.” Each piece is part of the whole, despite being able to be independent.
The creation of this piece was a collaborative effort between designer–researcher Jansen and joiner–maker Chris Nicholson. In a work whose making and exquisite finish is vital to the narrative of the piece, it is fitting that Jansen has not only worked with a master craftsperson to create the piece, but has also chosen to give equal credit to Nicholson as co-creator of the work.
Jansen is one of the most productive designers working in Australia today. In the last 12 months alone, he has had exhibitions at Australian Design Centre and National Gallery of Victoria, as well as works shown in Basel, Switzerland and Miami, USA. In Milan this year, he is not only showing Shaker Family Home, but also is showing as part of DesignByThem‘s exhibition and is showing Broached Monsters at Spazio Rossana Orlandi.
He is also doing vital cross-cultural work with Indigenous artists through projects such as In Cahoots: artists collaborate across Country, which exhibited the results of a project which saw Jansen working for six weeks over 18 months with Indigenous artists at Mangkaja Arts in Fitzroy Crossing, a remote Kimberley region of Western Australia.
With Shaker Family Home, Jansen shows his passion for history, research and design, as well as the benefits of collaboration, this time with a furniture maker of incredible skill. The resulting work is thought-provoking and engages on every level – aesthetic, theoretical and functional.
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