Category: Interview

Swiss Grand Award for Design 2021 – Sarah Owens

As a part of the Federal Design Commission, it was a pleasure to have an extended conversation about her life and work in the context of her distinction with the Swiss Grand Award for Design 2021. As author Jonas Berthod remarked for the occasion,

Her consideration for the full spectrum of knowledge reflects her desire to share and connect with the wider community, addressing issues of representation and visibility outside the university. These activities perhaps define the core of Sarah Owens’s biography: a passion for knowledge that is anti-hierarchical, celebrates plurality and focuses on inclusion, but also a career-long engagement to sharing and collectively building that knowledge.

During the prize ceremony of the Swiss Grand Award for Design 2021, I was honored to give Sarah’s laudatio and present the award.

Reading the laudatio for Sarah Owens. Photo by Diana Pfammatter.

Scratching the Surface

Screen Shot 2019-11-21 at 3.02.23 PM

I had a great time talking to Jarrett Fuller in the latest episode of his Scratching the Surface podcast, which has just been released. We discussed career paths, our shared love of graphic design, criticism and education, how we made the 4th Istanbul Design Biennial, and ended talking about how design can evolve and change as a discipline. You can listen to the whole episode here! 

The Politics of Design

papanek
Cover of Victor Papanek: The Politics of Design, the accompanying publication to the Vitra Design Museum’s most recent exhibition. 

I contributed to the catalogue of the Vitra Design Museum’s most recent exhibition, Victor Papanek: The Politics of Design, with not one but two pieces. One, an interview with Critical Making and Disobedient Electronics author Garnet Hertz, and another, an essay co-written with Jan Boelen on how the spirit of Papanek lives on in the work of several contemporary designers. The publication is impressive and gathers the voices of many luminaries and experts on Papanek and his significance. I’m happy to be among such incredible authors! You can find out more about the book in the e-shop here.

Swiss Grand Award for Design 2018

_DSC9042An impression of the atelier of Cécile Feilchenfeldt in Paris. Photo Marc Asekhame.

In May we presented the results of the latest volume developed for the Swiss Grand Award for Design series. The 2018 laureates of this award, given annually by the Swiss Confederation and the Federal Office of Culture, are Cécile Feilchenfeldt, Rosmarie Tissi and Felco. Once more I had the pleasure to interview all these wonderful practitioners and help make the book that celebrates their professional achievements. This year, the photos were by Marc Asekhame, and the graphic design by Krispin Hée.

DIY design in SRF2

diydesign
Excerpt from a production diagram for Jesse Howard’s OS Waterboiler. Photo Jesse Howard

The latest edition of the Swiss national radio’s Kontext program was dedicated to DIY design. Starting from an exhibition dedicated to the topic, currently on display at Zurich’s Schaudepot, the program talked to several curators, designers and critics to better understand the phenomenon and its implications. I was happy to contribute to the program, offering my insights on the subject and discussing the excellent work of Thomas Lommée, Jesse Howard and Gaspard Tiné-Bères, among others. The full program (in German) can be accessed here.

The Italian Avant-Garde, 1968-1976


The Italian Avant-Garde, page detail. Photo by Fabrizia Vecchione for Domus.

When Catharine Rossi first asked me to moderate a conversation between Joseph Grima and Alessandro Mendini for an upcoming publication she was co-editing on the Italian avant-garde of the late 1960s and early 1970s, I have to say I panicked. But a few nights of research led to an absolutely fabulous conversation, in which I merely watched as history happened before my eyes. This meeting of giants has been transcribed as the first chapter of Sternberg Press’ new volume EP Vol.1: The Italian Avant-Garde, 1968-1976, edited by Alex Coles and Catharine Rossi, and designed by Experimental Jetset. The book features a series of essays, interviews and explorations of several aspects of this complex, multilayered impulse that was immensely influential. I am humbled and honored to have been a part of it. Read Alice Rawsthorn’s review of the book here.

Souto de Moura: a commentary and interview


Braga Municipal Stadium, Souto de Moura Arquitectos. Photo: Luis Ferreira Alves

More on the Souto the Moura front: my commentary on the Portuguese Pritzker, as well as an exclusive interview, are now up on The Architect’s Newspaper. It was a pleasure writing a bit more about this Portuguese architect, whose work I like so much. It was great to interview him, too. A small excerpt here,

Your work is full of quotations of work you admire: the Corbusier-type window in your House in Maia, the Xenakis-imposed rhythm in the House in Barrocal, and Mies in the Burgo Office tower, this last one an homage…

The Burgo Tower is not an homage. I quote, because those who cannot write quote. What I don’t want is to start from scratch, which is a waste of time and a sign of little intelligence. If there is a set of circumstances to which architects have answered in a way I admire, I would like to use it, because this is part of the continuity that architecture needs. Architecture is a continuous story. I’m not going to invent a brick angle if Mies already did it in the Dominion Center, but what I can do is to re-think or re-draw it. But I always start from a concrete thing. To start from scratch leads to two things: either it’s stupid, or it leads to an excessive creativity that architecture doesn’t need.

And the full commentary and interview at The Architect’s Newspaper site & April 20th print edition.