Ron Arad
Ron Arad has made his mark on architecture, furniture, and sculpture with his experimental design style. The Israeli-born designer, artist, and architect launched his career in 1981 with the readymade ‘Rover’ chair, a now-iconic example of postmodernist design combining a found car seat with a structural tubing frame. He was also Head of Design Products Department at the Royal College of Art from 1997 to 2009. Here, on this directory of Arad, you will be treated to peak underneath the designer’s famous cap, gaining insight into his mind and thought process, from this early works like ‘Rover’ to his newest exhibitions, books, events and installations.
The sweeping Corten steel walls of Ron Arad’s Design Museum Holon were adorned with speakers – emitting sounds controlled by the visitors themselves – for the landmark summer exhibition ’The Sound of Architecture’ in 2017. Photography: Shay Ben Efraim
Photographed for the July 2016 issue of Wallpaper*, Ron Arad and his installation Thought of Train of Thought under construction in Friesland, the Netherlands, where boat builders have been enlisted to craft it. Photography: Ester Grass Vergara
The internal framework of the aluminium structure, which was unveiled at St Pancras station, London, on 7 July 2016. Photography: Ester Grass Vergara
Arad launched his career in 1981 with the ‘Rover’ chair and is now considered among his most iconic designs. It was a fusion of two readymades – a Rover car seat with a structural tubing frame – sourced from a scrapyard in Chalk Farm, London
Pressed Flower Petrol Blue, 2013, by Ron Arad. The artist’s crushed Fiats may read like cartoon cars that have met a nasty fate, yet their surprisingly perfect forms are the result of rigorous experimentation into the way automobiles behave under compression, which began with toy cars in his studio
Arad’s in-progress ToHA will grace its namesake, Totzeret Haaretz Street, in the heart of Tel Aviv near the bohemian paradise of Carmel Market. Nicknamed the ‘Iceberg’, its two office towers clock in at 28 floors and 63 floors, together offering 160,000 sq m of floor space. Set to complete in 2018, the complex will remain light on its feet, supported by slim core ‘legs’ enmeshed within densely planted landscape
Spanish Made, 1990, by Ron Arad. Courtesy of Friedman Benda and Ron Arad. Photography: Dan Kukla
Prototype for Eight by One, 1991, by Ron Arad. Courtesy of Friedman Benda and Ron Arad. Photography: Dan Kukla
