A poetic connection: Nendo's mammoth retrospective at Design Museum Holon
Sushi and a bonsai plant. These are the metaphorical comparisons Nendo's founder Oki Sato makes of his studio's style of design. Design that can produce 100 pieces a year, and simultaneously work on 400 at the same time. Design that astonishes the rest of the industry, with its ability to maintain an impeccable level of purity and hurl out product after product. 'I place a lot of importance on the freshness of the ideas.' He reveals, in his comparison to sushi, 'I try to work quickly, shaping the fish before the heat of my own body is transferred over to it.'
It comes as no surprise that someone was soon going to suggest the idea of a retrospective for the Japanese inventor, but for such a young brand that formed just over ten years ago, it is still quite a feat. The show follows on from the year survey of the studio's work at Salone del Mobile in 2015, and the mesmerising triumph of this year’s the 'Light and Shadow' marble exhibition with Marsotto Edizioni in Milan. It is quite fitting that what comes next is a question of what is between these opposites, in-between the conveyer belt of products, in-between the personal and professional life of Oki Sato and Nendo design.
Housed in the Ron Arad-designed Design Museum Holon in Tel Aviv that just celebrated its fifth anniversary, ‘The Space in Between’ is pulled together by curator Maria Cristina Didero as an almost scientific investigation of the designer’s processes, imagination, shapes and materials, and how they all intrinsically connect. The exhibition opens with a new site-specific piece that brings together the wares of Glas Italia and Caesarstone, titled 'In the shade'. Located within the rusted steel ribs of the Holon's atrium, the contrasting sheets of material cajole with shade and lighting. This tactically introduces us to a running theme with the show's subtleties. ‘Japanese designers really try to look into light and shadow, rather than colours,’ Sato explains.
Following this is the mighty plethora of designs across two floors of the impressive edifice, kindly categorised by Didero into six divisions of 'Between': 'Textures', 'Objects', 'Relationships', 'Boundaries', 'Senses' and 'Processes.'
The research starts on the lower ground floor with an array of 12 unique Nendo chairs, each piece from a different category. Every seat shows his abstract, slightly fairy-tale like versions of an everyday product, from the ‘Fadeout’ chair that blends wood and glass to the ‘Diamond’ chair that looks more like an atomic structure than a chair.
The upper floor is host to the rest of the 74 designs, each arranged in bright white boxes, allowing the different forms to stand out. Here the show travels from the ‘Processes’ section, which highlights the studio's delicate side in the intricacy of the patchwork glass for Lasvit all the way to the ‘Objects’ section that contains the compact emergency aid kit for natural disasters 'MINIM+AID'.
This epic leap from one panache to another continues, whether its is a USB stick paper clip for Elecom that they created with Italian designer Luca Nichetto, or geometric chocolates for Maison&Objet Paris, their elegance is maintained. 'It is possible to find a balance between industry and poetry,' Sato explains, 'I call it the balance between the right brain and the left brain.'
Witnessing such masterpieces bound together, we are also invited into Sato's personal self, which is imbued in every piece. 'Design is part of my everyday life, like breathing or sleeping,' he tells Didero, 'I think that the day I begin to consider design as work will be my final day as a designer.’ We certainly hope that day never comes.
INFORMATION
'Nendo: The Space in Between' is on view until 29 October at Design Museum Holon, for more information, visit the museums's website.
Photography: Takumi Ota
ADDRESS
Pinhas Eilon St. 8 Holon
5845400
Israel
Wallpaper* Newsletter
Receive our daily digest of inspiration, escapism and design stories from around the world direct to your inbox.
Sujata Burman is a writer and editor based in London, specialising in design and culture. She was Digital Design Editor at Wallpaper* before moving to her current role of Head of Content at London Design Festival and London Design Biennale where she is expanding the content offering of the showcases. Over the past decade, Sujata has written for global design and culture publications, and has been a speaker, moderator and judge for institutions and brands including RIBA, D&AD, Design Museum and Design Miami/. In 2019, she co-authored her first book, An Opinionated Guide to London Architecture, published by Hoxton Mini Press, which was driven by her aim to make the fields of design and architecture accessible to wider audiences.
-
Out of office: what the Wallpaper* editors have been doing this week
A snowy Swiss Alpine sleepover, a design book fest in Milan, and a night with Steve Coogan in London – our editors' out-of-hours adventures this week
By Bill Prince Published
-
Quirky but quotidian, Toyota’s C-HR has brave looks but is a risk-free proposition
Toyota’s oddball C-HR might have concept car looks, but it’s still a rigorously engineered machine for those who like their cars to be solid, safe and reliable
By Jonathan Bell Published
-
APOC’s secret London pop-up is a curiosity shop of weird and wonderful fashion
Offbeat fashion emporium APOC’s London pop-up opens in time for the holiday season, offering the work of more than 70 avant-garde designers – most of which you won’t find elsewhere – in a secret location
By Mary Cleary Published
-
Nendo’s collaborations with Kyoto artisans go on view in New York
‘Nendo sees Kyoto’ is on view at Friedman Benda (until 15 October 2022), showcasing the design studio's collaboration with six artisans specialised in ancient Japanese crafts
By Pei-Ru Keh Last updated
-
Saul Steinberg: behind the scenes at Triennale Design Museum
Triennale Design Museum and publishing house Electa present ‘Saul Steinberg Milano New York’, a new exhibition (until 13 March 2022) that pays homage to the American artist through 350 works. Join us for a behind-the-scenes peek at it's installation
By Rosa Bertoli Last updated
-
Ten years of Muller Van Severen, at Design Museum Ghent
A new exhibition by Belgian design duo Muller Van Severen (until 6 March 2022) features a retrospective of the studio’s ten years as well as a curation of pieces from the Design Museum Ghent collections
By Rosa Bertoli Last updated
-
Noguchi show celebrates his reverence for Greece
Design show ‘Objects of Common Interest: Hard, Soft, and All Lit Up with Nowhere to Go’ opens in collaboration with Wallpaper* Designers of the Year, Objects of Common Interest, at the Noguchi Museum in Queens, New York (until 13 February 2022)
By Tilly Macalister-Smith Last updated
-
17 designers and artists reinterpret Dior's ‘Medallion’ chair
The Dior ‘Medallion’ chair project marks the French maison's most significant presence at Milan’s Salone del Mobile to date
By Nick Vinson - Art Direction Last updated
-
‘Design not for children, but for everyone’: Jewish Museum Berlin’s new play space
Olson Kundig architecture and design practice brings kids’ play space ANOHA Children’s World to life inside a vast former wholesale flower market, at the Jewish Museum Berlin
By Hannah Silver Last updated
-
A landscape of playful animals pops up at Design Museum Holon
Child-centric designer Sarit Shani Hay presents an imaginary natural landscape that references Ron Arad's Design Museum Holon architecture and is inhabited by soft, cushioned sea lions, seals and bears
By Rosa Bertoli Last updated
-
Charlotte Perriand’s life and work explored at London’s Design Museum
London’s Design Museum presents ‘Charlotte Perriand: The Modern Life’, an exhibition turned the spotlight on one of the most iconic creators of the 20th century
By Rosa Bertoli Last updated