RESIDENCIES

RESIDENCY #3
METAMORPHOSIS SIGNALS

Designers:

SIGVE KNUTSON
AUDREY LARGE

SIGVE KNUTSON

Sigve Knutson (Norway, 1991) obtained an MA in Contextual Design at Design Academy Eindhoven in 2016. He is now based in Oslo and has had several solo shows in cities like Milan, Athens, Beirut and Copenhagen. His practice is motivated by a fascination for the intuitive and raw rather than the smoothened and planned.

sigveknutson.com

AUDREY LARGE

​​Audrey Large (France, 1994) is a designer based in the Netherlands. After graduating with Cum Laude from the Master Social Design at the Design Academy in Eindhoven in 2017, she joined the post-academic program of the Jan Van Eyck Academie (NL). In a context of exponential digitization, she positions her practice in an interdisciplinary form of design that uses digital cinema and image theory as a field of research to reconsider object design methodologies.

s710959515.onlinehome.fr

RESIDENCY #3
METAMORPHOSIS SIGNALS

TURIN, ITALY
DUPARC CONTEMPORARY SUITES
2022

A year-long project started with a residency in Turin, Italy, and culminated in the production of a collection of works and the publication of a monograph book on each designer.


METAMORPHOSIS SIGNALS

“Nothing lasts like change”
Karl Ludwig Börne

“It is almost banal to say so yet it needs to be stressed continually: all is creation, all is change, all is flux, all is metamorphosis”
Henry Miller

 

Metamorphosis: a change in the form or nature of a material singularity that can be linked to an individual or other subject. Signs of metamorphosis are clues that anticipate or accompany transformations, changes in form and substance that help reshape, reformulate, and redefine that upon which they intervene. We analyze metamorphosis with the idea and the will to develop a potential mapping of the outcomes it produces but also to deepen – and perhaps reveal – some of the substantial reasons that determined it; recognizing the shifts that lead to the alteration of an original identity means participating in the process of change – sometimes imperceptible, in other cases radical – in order to be able to describe, define and perhaps understand it. The wonder and the enigma of metamorphosis concern the evolutionary or involutionary processes linked to the concept of change, but also of transience and even transfiguration, always dealing with what is animated, in movement, not in stasis: in extreme synthesis, metamorphosis concerns everything that exists and inhabits the world of our existence.

 

The residency program is inaugurated with a stay in Turin: a series of visits and meetings will give the opportunity to get in touch with the city, proposing some useful clues for a first definition of its identity profile; which of these can be connected to the concept of metamorphosis? Which signals
reveal most frequently and incisively the theme of change? How can the principles of “metamorphosis” or of “notify the change” be interpreted or represented – even in a symbolic key – by resorting to the art of design? According to which “artifacts” or “interpretative tools”? Using which primitive or advanced technologies?

 

THE EXHIBITIONS

Following the experience of the residency, the project developed by Sigve Knutson has been featured in the solo exhibition at NEVVEN Gallery in Götheborg,  titled “Log Scriber”. Guided by a fascination for the intuitive and the unexpected, Sigve Knutson’s design experiments with different techniques and produces distinctly original results that reflect on the limits of serial production and the opportunities associated with the creation of one-of-a-kind objects. “Log Scriber” presents two distinct bodies of work: a family of standing wooden sculptures and a wall-mounted ‘inhabited structure’ hosting small organic-shaped symbolic artifacts creatures intended as hybrid tools or ritual jewels. The latter work, conceived in the light of the IN Residence’s residency theme Metamorphosis Signals, is intended as manifestation of an inhabited body, a shed-architecture that welcomes precious presences not only to keep and protect them but also to reveal them.


“Design In Metamorphosis” is the double solo exhibition showcasing the creative practice of young designers Audrey Large and Théophile Blandet. Curated by the Barbara Brondi & Marco Rainò, the exhibition finds its prestigious home at the Centre d’Art Contemporain Genève. Audrey Large and Théophile Blandet’s projects embody the essence of a society in constant flux, where material culture is continuously evolving. Their works shape a dynamic and fluid design language that seamlessly merges opposing forces – tangible and intangible, unique and reproducible, artisanal and industrial – often in paradoxical ways. Their visionary objects, born from a design practice rooted in radical experimentation, encapsulate the zeitgeist of alteration, mutation, and change, offering an evocative representation of the transient nature of our world. Audrey Large’s special project, developed as part of the IN Residence residency program and inspired by the theme “Metamorphosis Signals”, adds an extra layer of intrigue and innovation to the exhibition. Through digital manipulation, the designer creates complex entities with lighting functions, resembling shards of light. The works symbolize the dislocation of energy and challenge the authenticity of vision: light and digital data are compared as fluid substances, representing the pervasive presence of the virtual in reality.