This exhibition by leading designer Tord Boontje overturns the conventional expectations of what lace might be. In this collection of work showing at Marsden Woo Gallery, Boontje employs traditional craft skills while substituting unorthodox materials, changing the references and subverting our preconceived notions of value.
TORD BOONTJE: The Lace Maker, 24th June-31st July 2010
MARSDEN WOO GALLERY
17-18 Great Sutton Street, London EC1V 0DN (020 7336 6396)
“With lace,” Boontje points out, “all the value is invested in the labour and so it seemed a good idea to start working with cheap materials … But also, by changing the material you can change the references.”
Works in the exhibition include a dramatic black sofa that emerges from a large three-dimensional web-like structure of bound and knotted Aramide and Dynema fibres. The sofa is one example of what he has been able to create by employing traditional craft skills, while substituting unorthodox materials. Others are a curtain composed in a random pattern of tangled flora and a selection of exuberant lighting designs, all constructed from natural raffia.
Some of the more delicate works are items of jewellery, such as necklaces and a hairpiece, and a selection of test samples made in a variety of natural materials, including grass. The exhibition includes a short video about the process of making a raffia lace dress, offering further insights into his approach, which he describes as “spontaneous – not organized and symmetrical.”
Installation shots courtesy of Marsden Woo Gallery (© Phil Sayer).
Tags Clerkenwell | Marsden Woo Gallery | The Lace Maker | Tord Boontje
