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MAKE ME. The Emergence of BUTCH-CRAFT in Contemporary Design

09.08.10 | By
MAKE ME. The Emergence of BUTCH-CRAFT in Contemporary Design

MAKE ME. The Emergence of BUTCH-CRAFT in Contemporary Design is a new exhibition opening September 15 at Moss.

Through the infusion of a cerebral yet virile narrative applied to rough work crafted in wood, iron, steel, marble, rush, paint, boiled leather, clay, baked agricultural waste, plant-life, gypsum drywall, and blood, sweat and tears.

This exhibition introduces new studio work by:
– Peter Marigold
– Oscar Magnus Narud
– Joost Van Bleiswijk
– Kiki Van Eijk
– Marcus Tremonto
– Qubus Design Studio
– Studio Formafantasma
– Aaron Raymer
– Drift (courtesy Carpenters Workshop Gallery, London)
– Christopher Chiappa (courtesy Kate Werble Gallery, New York)
– Simon Hasan (courtesy Johnson Trading Gallery, New York)
– Also featured are iconic Brazilian works (1954 to 2002) by Sergio Rodrigues for LinBrasil and The Mangiarotti Collection debuting historical design (1953 to 1978) by Angelo Mangiarotti for AGAPEcasa

From the press release:

While there is never at any one moment a singular, all pervasive and universal narrative being written in design or art, occasionally there emerges a critical mass, a “tipping point” as author Malcom Gladwell calls it, of influential designers and artists, some established and some perhaps little known outside their professional circles, whose work simultaneously addresses similar issues or reflects similar contemporary-culture realities (perhaps aesthetic, or political, or economic, or sociological in nature), embodying certain across-the-board characteristics which cumulatively have the potential to create a social epidemic, like a virus moving through the population.

MAKE ME. presents a small but diverse body of work by an otherwise un-related collective of artists and designers, which together celebrate a rough-hewn, virile, reductive, anti-academic, craft-driven, “tool-belt and heavy-lifting” aesthetic, paradoxically realized with such sensitivity and finesse, often embodying subtle, complex theoretical, structural, formal, and compositional aspects, and infused with such poetic narrative as to be necessarily characterized as “butch,” a word defined in today’s vernacular as a stereotypical “brute-masculine” approach taken by a stereotypical “sensitive-feminine” personality.

Read more about the exhibition on Moss’ website.

What: MAKE ME. The Emergence of BUTCH-CRAFT in Contemporary Design
When: September 15, 2010 – November 14, 2010
Where: Moss Gallery, 150 Greene Street, New York, NY 10012

Jaime Derringer, Founder + Executive Editor of Design Milk, is a Jersey girl living in SoCal. She dreams about funky, artistic jewelry + having enough free time to enjoy some of her favorite things—running, reading, making music, and drawing.