New York gallery R & Company has curated collectible design work by 55 contemporary artists and designers based throughout the United States.
The exhibition Object USA 2024 is the second instalment in a series of triannual exhibits by the gallery surveying the current state of collectible design practices in the country.
The show touches on topics such as revived craft traditions, material experimentation, political instability, environmental degradation, and cultural re-appropriation.
Designers that represent different generations and backgrounds are on show, including Minjae Kim, Chen Chen and Kai Williams, Roberto Lugo, Katie Stout, and Hugh Hayden.
“In recent years, collectible design has increasingly entered popular consciousness, in part, thanks to the diversity of individuals embracing handmade processes and propelling them in new directions,” R & Company said.
“Objects: USA offers an incisive exploration of the formal innovations and conceptual motivations that shape the distinct and varied landscape of today’s object-making.”
According to the gallery, many of the artists and designers defy easy categorisation and challenge the understood boundaries between art and design.
The show was guest-curated by writers and historians Angelik Vizcarrondo-Laboy and Kellie Riggs, who chose to present works thematically through several “archetypes.”
“After a long period of examining what we believe to be some of the most compelling work being made today, we took on the daunting but exciting task of finding the throughline between 55 unique practices,” Vizcarrondo-Laboy said.
“What emerged were seven archetypes that provide a dynamic way to explore object-making, not only within this group but also in the future.”
The groupings are organised under the headings Truthseekers, Codebreakers, Betatesters, Doomsdayers, Insiders, Keepers and Mediators.
Showcasing talents that uphold and find new purpose for long-established handicrafts, the Truthseekers section includes pieces by Los Angeles wood artist Nik Gelormino and New Mexico-based ceramicist Lonnie Vigil.
The Betatesters grouping presents artists and designers who experiment with these techniques and push the limits of material.
On view as part of this “archetype” is Houston designer Joyce Lin’s Wood Chair concept, which was created using MDF, epoxy, and oil paint. It shows her ongoing exploration of how the lines between what people think of as natural and artificial can be blurred.
The Doomsdayers section touches on how talents are addressing today’s political polarisation and dystopian angst.
The work under this dystopian heading includes Brooklyn-based designer Ryan Decker, who creates graphical works out of materials like fibreglass, resin, and aluminium – like Leaky Bladder – to comment on the rise of technologies like VR and the role video games play in our lives.
The Insiders grouping explores how design can address domestic space and how that impacts the human experience, especially during the lockdowns during the Covid-19 pandemic. Designers in this category included Hugh Hayden who presents “unexpected interventions” into everyday objects such as cribs.
Brooklyn-based Congolese-Belgian designer Kim Mupangilaï’s Bina daybed was grouped under the Codebreakers section. It demonstrates how designers incorporate distinct forms from different cultural sources.
“[Mupangilaï’s] distinct body of furniture is imbued with personal narratives, embracing materials symbolic of her Congolese heritage and childhood in Europe,” R & Company said. “Her elegant, organic forms reveal historical and contemporary complexities of identity and experience as the viewer revels in the details.”
The Keepers section includes one-off designs, sculptures, and installations by artists and designers that utilise these mediums to explore how people establish cultural and interpersonal connections.
The Mediator “archetype” highlights designs used to help people negotiate with their surroundings and heritage – such as those by Chicago-based Norman Teague.
“Norman Teague’s multi-faceted practice [architecture, installation, and object design] is inspired by his Chicago South Side neighbourhood and broader African aesthetics,” R & Company said.
Made using ebony-finished basswood and leather as well as traditional carving and stitching techniques, the Africana Rocking Chair combines references to both his Western and African upbringings but Teague distils them in a contemporary form.
Also exhibited as part of the Mediator section, Las Vegas-based artist Justin Favela re-appropriates the piñata as an important symbol of Latinx identity in both still-life paintings and painted life-size objects such as low-rider bikes.
According to Riggs, the idea was to use these groupings as a way of highlighting the full complexity of American collectible design and offer fresh insights on how conceptual and self-expressive objects fit in the larger cultural conversation; how these designs can be both functional and used to comment on different aspects of contemporary American society.
The photography is by Logan Jackson.
Object USA 2024 is on show from 6 September 2024 to 10 January 2025 in New York City. For more exhibitions, talks and fairs in architecture and design visit Dezeen Events Guide.
