Side Gallery

In the October of 2020 in the midst of the Corona Virus chaos which separated people, isolating them, enclosing them and filling them with fear Guillermo Santomà proposed the program Pista De Baile (Dance floor). Santomà colonized the iconic warehouse Espacio Matadero in Madrid, a vast space of industrial severity supported by functional columns. The designer introduced an architectural layer to the space, a space where the people could interact…or dance.

Side Gallery and Sabine Marcelis in collaboration with the Fundació Mies van der Rohe held the exhibition “No Fear of Glass” in December 2019. The site-specific intervention took the title from ‘Fear of glass’, the book about the Barcelona Pavilion by Josep Quetglas, the proposal aimed to explore the contrast between the request made to Mies van der Rohe to “not use too much glass” with the creative proposal of Sabine Marcelis herself, where glass was the key element of the exhibition, pushing the material’s limits to the end.

The Brazilian Geraldo de Barros (1923-1998) attended the Ulm University of Applied Sciences in the early 1950s. Based on his impressions, after returning to Brazil in 1954, the artist co-founded the so-called university laboratory for the manufacture of furniture. For this reason, alongside the anniversary year of the Bauhaus, Opelvillen Museum in collaboration with Side Gallery, presented the first retrospective in Europe of this multidisciplinary artist and entrepreneur who founded the intellectual collective UNILABOR.

Turn me on…NOW was an exhibition presented by Side Gallery in Barcelona. The spring/summer show was dedicated to unveiling the diversity of contemporary lighting. Being the only design gallery in the city the exciting show brought together a selection of young artists and designers born after the year 1980 displaying a wide variety of material techniques and conceptual ideas. The group show boasted works by Sabine Marcelis, Guillermo Santomà, James Shaw and Martin Rusak among others.

The Fundació Joan Miró in collaboration with the Lina Bo Bardi foundation hosted the exhibition Linda Bo Bardi Dibuja (Lina Bo Bardi drawings), in the spring on 2019. The show explored the deep connection the Brazilian architect had with drawing.

Barcelona based Gulliermo Santomà took Madrid by storm as he broke up the Baroque Museum Cerralbo with his elaborate contemporary designs. Conceptualizing his work with the ideal to construct from the deconstructed, Santomà shakes and deforms objects and materials turning them into sculptured design pieces, encompassing design, architecture performance and scenography. The radical language of Guillermo’s contemporary design colonized the classical museum provoking a new and interactive narrative with the museum’s permanent collection.

The Fundación Juan March held the first retrospective in Spain on the fascinating figure of Lina Bo Bardi (Rome, 1914 - São Paulo, 1992), whose work is represented by Side Gallery in Barcelona. The legendary designer moved to Brazil from Italy in 1946. Bo Bard’s move was typical of the time as a wave of European architects and artists moved to Latin America fleeing the horrors of the second world war and contributing to the modernist movement that dominated the second half of the 20th Century.

Bringing together two of the greatest architects of all times, Side Gallery navigated through time creating a dialogue between two masters of modern architecture. LE CORBUSIER & OSCAR NIEMEYER Influences and counter influences on modern design (1929-1965) opened in the fall of 2018 at Side Gallery, Barcelona.

“UNILABOR”, shown at Side Gallery Barcelona, displayed furniture manufactured by the intellectual working collective co-founded by Gerlaldo de Barros a multidisciplinary artist and entrepreneur.  In 1954 painter, photographer and designer Geraldo de Barros, together with Joao Baptista, a Dominican Priest, founded the Unilabor community. From 1954 to 1961 Unilabor was one of the stand marks in furniture design in São Paulo, renowned for its social characteristic and considered one of the most important projects in the history of modern Brazilian design.

Barcelona based Gulliermo Santomà presented a collection of elaborate contemporary design at Side Gallery’s Palau de Casavells, to open the 2018 summer exhibition. Conceptualising his work with an ideal to construct from the deconstructed Santomà shakes and deforms objects and materials turning them into sculptured design pieces, encompassing design, architecture performance and scenography. The radical language of Guillermo’s contemporary design provoked an interactive narrative with the ancient Maisa in the Catalunya countryside.

“Claytime!” was a show dedicated to revealing some of the most relevant contemporary ceramic artists who rethink the traditional handcraft, producing exciting and new applications. The gallery selected a group of international ceramists, including Aneta Regel, Bente Skjøttgaard, Claudi Casanovas amongst others.

Side Gallery's exhibition Martin Eisler & Carlo Hauner: Forma Brasil presented some of the pair’s most relevant and unique works created between 1950 and 1960, by Forma Brasil, the company the two co-founded, bringing a fresh perspective to the Brazilian modern design scene. The exhibition made a much-needed overview of the trajectory of these two great creators.

A collection of work by Sabine Marcelis was exhibited at Side Gallery’s Barcelona gallery in the early Summer of 2017. Works including the artist's cast resin Candy Cubes alongside new a collection of lighting was on show. The new lighting collection illustrated Sabine Marcelis’ ongoing experimentation with the manipulation of light, and also light as manipulator. The RAY series utilised coloured glass extrusions with neon tubes weaving in and out; Reminiscent of sun rays breaking through clouds.

In the spring of 2017 Side Gallery presented its second show on modern Brazilian Design. As a sequel to the Gallery’s 2016 exhibition, Brazilian Design part II brought together a collection of sought after works by some of Brazil’s most important 20th century designers, including Lina Bo Bardi, Joaquim Tenreiro, Martin Eisler and Carlo Hauner and Branco e Preto.

In the winter of 2016/2017 Side Gallery presented their first retrospective, focused on the works of the Finnish designer Ilmari Tapiovaara. The designer captured the essence of Finnish identity through a series of furniture and lighting pieces created from the 1930s up until the 1990s. The gallery presented works manufactured by Asko, Laukaan Puu and Artek, among others.

In the Autumn of 2016, Side Gallery presented an exhibition focused entirely on Brazilian twentieth century modernist design. Pieces by Lina Bo Bardi, Branco e Preto, Jose Zanine Caldas, Joaquim Tenreiro, Sergio Rodrigues and Oscar Niemeyer were presented for the very first time in Spain, introducing Brazilian modern design to an European audience.

In the Autumn of 2016, Side Gallery proposed an innovative curation of Design Dialogues as a navigation through time, connecting XX century design with an interesting collection of contemporary works. Pieces by Dutch design duo, Oos&Oos, alongside mobile sculptures by Laurent Lo were combined with works from the previous century by Angelo Mangriarotti and Mathieu Mategot.

In the Spring of 2016 Side Gallery in Barcelona proudly presented the first solo exhibition by Spanish designer Guillermo Santomá. The exhibition took place at the gallery's first location at Enrique Granados in the heart of the city. The exhibition featured a range of glass pieces by the multifaceted architectural designer.

In the heart of Barcelona Side Gallery presented their second gallery show. The exhibition presented a display of XX Century European furniture. Important works from Nordic masters such as Hans Agne Jakobsson and Axel Einar Hjorth, were placed thoughtful among pieces by Charlotte Perriand and Gio Ponti.

Side Gallery was established in Barcelona and founded in October 2015. The exhibition UNO was the gallery’s inaugural exhibition. The show mixed a combination of international design of the twentieth century, as well as contemporary design, focusing on historical design from Latin America and Italy, concentrating on the work of designers Lina Bo Bardi and Gio Ponti. For the contemporary side, the gallery showed a young Sabine Marcelis, who focused primarily on material development on a series of mirrors titled "Seeing Glass".