Side Gallery

The presentation was an invitation to discover and compare different time periods, geographic borders, and even different styles. Visual artists Fien Muller and Hannes Van Severen made their debut as the design duo Muller Van Severen in 2011. The duo explore the boundaries between art and design in a contemporary and innovative way and adopt an inventive, imaginative approach to functionality. They are constantly looking for new ways to make furniture more interesting from a sculptural perspective, without losing functionality. They succeed wonderfully in adding a personal, fresh touch to major historical art and design movements. Their oeuvre is characterised by an exciting tension between austerity and extravagance, lightness and heaviness, severity and playfulness, delicacy and sturdiness. Their fascination for materials, their sense of colour and proportions, their affinity with architectural space and their focus on the sculptural form all help create a fascinating universe. They eagerly follow their own path and experiment with new ways of using furniture, averse to fashions and trends, thus designing unique functional landscapes for living, permeated by poetry, imagination and aesthetics.

Suspended from above was a contemporary chandelier by Guillermo Santomá. The piece was designed for the architect’s solo show at the Museo Cerralbo past February 2019. In true Santomà style the piece is constructed from a variety of raw industrial materials, most likely found around his workshop. The lamp expresses the philosophy of Santomà, his desire to transform everyday objects into new innovative concepts and experiment with material limitations and combinations, resulting in an objects that conjures the view into a world of fantasy and fiction.