Last year, Sotheby’s in Paris sold a hippopotamus bathtub, bidet and toilet set by François-Xavier Lalanne for 2.1 million euros.
François-Xavier Lalanne (1929 – 2008) was a French artist known for his large animal sculptures that also open out to form desks, cupboards, dressers, bars and other functional items. As well as the Hippopotamus Family, there’s also Lalanne’s Duck dresser which also sold for a similar sum this year, and his Rhinoceros desk and sheep drinks cabinet ‘Grand Mouflon de Pauline’, two of many Lalanne pieces that sold at a 2019 Sotheby’s auction for quadruple the expected prices.
By guest contributor and graduate of architecture Nikita Bhopti
If we were to leave an object behind for our loved ones, what would it look like? What is its significance? Does it tell us anything about what happened in that time, or carry a certain meaning about what is to come? Curated by Marsha Golemac for NGV Melbourne Design Week, Future Inheritance invited 20 multidisciplinary artists to ‘consider how, and why, objects carry meaning’. With each artist asked to ‘leave behind’ one object for the next generation, the exhibit is a collective archive of our past and present, with several objects carrying a beacon of hope for future generations.
Worship Me by Nicholas Smith, ‘Future Inheritance’ exhibition, NGV Melbourne Design Week. Image: Supplied.
Sitting on individual white plinths, the objects are arranged like soldiers on either side of the gallery space – both confronting and present. A ceramic vessel sits to the front left of the exhibition, greeting you as you arrive. Titled ‘Worship Me’, artist Nicholas Smith engrains the intersection of his Catholic upbringing and queer identity into this object. Through hand-building this vessel, Smith sculpts in devotional images ranging from medieval to 17th century western paintings, depicting iterations of the Man of Sorrows. Focusing on the ‘homoerotic undertones of this genre’, the tension of queer identity in the catholic realm is brought to the forefront. Smith’s ‘repetitious act of rubbing fingers’ against the vessel’s surface, the bulging forms of the vessel itself and the skin-like finish, complete with what reads like bruising, carries a sense of the grappling emotions experienced between the catholic and queer community.
In a remote part of Bali’s northern coast, The Tiing is a new building with an old soul, constructed using traditional materials and techniques from the region. Designed by Australian designer Nic Brunsdon in collaboration with local studio Manguning, this 14-room resort is only reached after 2.5 hours travelling on smaller roads through the jungle.
The Tiing designed by Nic Brunsdon and Manguning. Photo: Ben Hosking.
Most striking are its bamboo-formed concrete walls, which feature vertical ridges made by the bamboo forma, into which the concrete has been poured on site. Bamboo is plentiful in the area and concrete is the most common building material in the region.
Australian designer Marc Hendrick started Slowdown Studio in Los Angeles in 2015, working closely with designers all over the world to produce an eclectic and creative collection of throw rugs. Each rug is created in collaboration with a different artist and is jacquard woven using American-grown cotton. Australian design brand Koskela has a long relationship with Slowdown Studio and is now offering a range of their throw rugs through its Sydney store and online.
July throw features two tigers and was designed by London illustrator James Daw who works with paper collage.
July, Slowdown Studio available from Koskela. Image supplied.Read more →
As part of the London Design Biennale, Andrew Scott and Hangrui Zhang have created the London Orchestra From Waste Materials, a project that creates instruments from discarded materials and plays new music composed for them.
London Orchestra From Waste Materials by Andrew Scott and Hangrui Zhang. Photo: supplied
The project provides a way of using the huge amounts of waste created in a city as big as London to create joy through music and a sense of community during the city’s lockdown.
A new apartment in Rome by architects La Macchina Studio has a quasi-theatrical flavour, with bright colours, geometries, graphics and other surprising insertions that add up to a collage-effect interior.
Retroscena apartment by La Macchina Studio in Rome. Photo: Paolo Fusco
Called Retroscena, this apartment is located in a 1950s building in the historic Appio Latino district of Rome. The architects were able to retain the pre-existing Venetian Terrazzo flooring of the apartment with the help of local craftsmen. Other materials added to the flooring, including black and Botticino marble in the living room, a pinkish binder with pozzolan powder in the corridor and brick red microcement in the bedroom, create a collage effect.
By guest contributor and graduate of architecture Nikita Bhopti
Dutch-American artist Lara Schnitger explores female power and representation through the ages in a new textile installation ‘The House of Heroines’ at the NGV Triennial in Melbourne. Through the use of illustrations, text, fabric and sculptural forms, Lara fills the gallery with a myriad of messages in a powerful culmination of her past works. The resulting exhibition is a welcoming space scattered with moments of joy, humour, familiarity and power.
Installation view of Lara Schnitger’s work ‘House of Heroines’ 2020 on display in NGV Triennial 2020 from 19 December 2020 – 18 April 2021 at NGV International, Melbourne. Photo: Tom Ross
With an early love for clothing, Dutch-American artist Lara Schnitger is a self-taught sewer who learned how to make her own clothes as a child, inspired by various stretching, weaving, colour, patterns and techniques. Textiles has always been a place where women come together, whether through knitting groups, quilting groups or weaving communities, instead of creating in solitude. At the NGV’s Triennial, the House of Heroines stands as a fabric temple – a safe space for women that references both contemporary and ancient women’s movements and representations found in architecture and our built environment.
Melbourne designer Ross Didier has created a versatile modular furniture system called Puffalo whose name refers to a combination of a puffer jacket and a li-lo.
Designed and manufactured in Melbourne using solid timber frames, steel springs and Green Star-rated foam, plus duck feather for the cushion, this system can be dressed up using any upholstery option. “Any upholstery fabrics can be specified but wools and leathers have a beautiful natural stretch that organically moulds around Puffalo’s voluptuous forms and reveals the skilled upholstery detailing,” says Didier.
An undulating facade of slim white bricks conceals a complex interior for both visual and performing arts at Phoenix Central Park, Judith Nielson’s latest contribution to Sydney’s cultural infrastructure. The architecture is collaborative, with Durback Block Jaggers designing the performance space and John Wardle Architects the visual arts gallery – two separate buildings linked by a courtyard and shared architectural skin.
Phoenix Exterior by Durbach Block Jaggers and John Wardle. Photo: Trevor Mein
The striking exterior of the building was a collaboration between both architecture studios; the architectural statement says that the design was created “working together, iteratively, with conversation and debate, both rigorous and polite, with irreverence, humour and respect.” The result is outstanding.
Designed by Krisna Cheung Architects, this backyard project involves the creation of a double-story studio garage at the back of a Melbourne house, created as a stand-alone building that functions as a garage with single room studio above.
Colour Shingles by Krisna Cheung Architects. Photo: Peter Bennetts
Built next door to Krisna Cheung’s earlier similar project Studio Garage, this example took the same form, but added another level of design detail through the use of coloured perspex shingles in pale blue, green and white.
