Organic Futures: PAD London

8 - 13 October 2024

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Organic Futures | Catalogue

In the near future, our interiors may be grown instead of built, with unconventional materials and techniques shaping our surroundings into circular ecosystems that intertwine natural and industrial environments. ‘What if tiny insects would be our architects?’ asks gallery artist and material researcher, Ori Orisun Merhav. At PAD24, the Gallery’s presentation is anchored by this question of material futures and highlights the resinous matter of insects in contemporary design and sculpture. We will exhibit specially commissioned artworks from new gallery artist Ori Orisun Merhav and renowned French designer Marlène Huissoud, their works co-manufactured by bugs as part of the sculptors’ ethical practices.

Alongside these arthropodic collaborations, the gallery will present new sculptural art and design pieces in natural materials that herald an authentic vision of hope for the future of design and material culture, in which we live in greater respect to and knowledge of our environments. The design duo Full Grown have cultivated their orchard of grown Willow chairs over nearly 20 years. Best described as botanical craftsmen, they employ ancient techniques to grow their tree-chairs, manipulating a bough’s directions of growth through custom frames and grafting together new furniture forms in the live tree. In another re-considering of the design process, Gareth Neal works with mahogany veneers, a material byproduct of musical instruments. His Khaya Chest of Draws, is the newest addition to this series, celebrating the imperfection and irregularities of industrial waste towards a vivid and unique furniture piece.

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Continuing with wood as a material laden with the capacity for meaning, Nic Webb studies the specific characteristics of each piece of timber he sources and allows this to inform the direction of his sculpture, in a process Nic calls ‘co-design’. We exhibit Eleanor Lakelin, who also celebrates wood as a living, breathing substance with its own history of growth and struggle, centuries beyond our own. We bring seminal wooden vessels from Ernst Gamperl, the first winner of the Loewe Prize in 2017. The artist has revolutionised the practice of woodturning by developing entirely new modes of working that push the vessel to its technical limits. Similarly, innovative material science lies at the heart of Marc Fish’s practice. We are exhibiting Marc’s new Kasumi Uchi console table, made of laminated oak veneers and finished with a weathering effect and multiple layers of wood wax oil.

Also making in wood is sculptor Christopher Kurtz, continuing his exploration of the waveform. The new wavelet console and shelves are exemplary of how Kurtz sees sculpture and furniture as deeply intertwined. Akin to Christopher’s exploration of rippling forms, Katrien Doms wields fire and scorching heat to sculpt softwoods into undulating wall hangings. Japan based artist Mayumi Onagi has created quiet and poised sculptural forms using Urushi, a natural lacquer made from the sap of the Urushi tree. Kenji Honma, also works with Urushi lacquer balancing age-old Japanese techniques with contemporary self-taught methods. His works are comprised of the split and hollowed body of the Urushi tree, and the inside of these are treated with a traditional lacquer-work technique “nashiji-nuri”, in which the lacquer is combined with tin or stone powder to create a captivating mirror like effect.

Working with softer materials, Teresa Hastings has created a monumental hand-dyed and woven tapestry, composed of five interweaving parts. The work is a three-dimensional textured expanse of wool and hammered iron which has been twisted, knotted, woven and fringed with plant fibres, all of which have been hand processed in her studio. Splitting her time between her studios in London and the Indian Himalayas, Teresa’s tapestry is borne out of an architectural approach to fibre and material. The artist aims to continue developing her work with minimal impact on the climate, acknowledging how her practice is bound by specific weather systems, mindful of the rising temperatures and increasing floods due to climate change. Alida Kuzemczak Sayer using repeatedly marked and torn layers of Japanese Mulberry paper, explores the sculptural possibilities of language and mark-making. In doing so, she channels the seemingly unruly and proliferating aspect of language into soft and rhythmic sculptures.

Mami Kato, best known for her sculptural works in rice straw, uses the material to highlight the ability of raw materials to provide energy and sustain life. Her work Ume is richly tactile and highly concentrated in form, meticulously composed and quietly brimming with what Glenn Adamson has referred to as ‘constant flow’. Similarly, Luke Fuller’s practice brims with an earthly vitality. His ceramic furniture forms are born from throwing clay down onto wooden formers, reminiscent of action painting from the abstract impressionist movement. Each piece is built by piling handfuls of clay on top of one another through perfectly inelastic collisions. Finally, we are exhibiting a collection of urns and mirrors from metal artist Adi Toch. Their surface is born from a unique process. After carefully shaping and finishing her metal objects in the studio she relinquishes control and surrenders them to the unpredictable forces of the subterranean elements, burying the objects in the earth for prolonged periods.
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