Sakura TRP 22001 by Maarten Vrolijk, Courtesy of Galerie SCENE OUVERTE
Maria Cristina Didero curates the 16th edition of Design Miami/Basel, titled “The Golden Age,” and featuring a dynamic selection of works from the past and present, by top international galleries and designers.
The sixteenth edition of Design Miami/Basel opens to the public on June 14th. Featuring over 50 exhibitor presentations, the show will be presented in a hybrid physical and digital format, offering an array of digital programming, bespoke content and opportunities to shop the show floor directly online.
The theme of this year’s event is The Golden Age, and has been curated by Maria Cristina Didero. The fair brings a focus on the past alongside leading contemporary designers and makers today. Didero says, “Even during the hardest of struggles, as a society we should always focus and strive to be better. We must remember that challenges have always driven humanity forward. Human beings have come up with answers to the world’s most pressing questions, often during moments in which
the very roots of our life are being tested by external forces, over which it seems we have no control. In June we will question these ideas – exploring how the perseverance, flexibility, resilience and adaptability of humanity has led us to innovation and hope. We must continue this now more than ever”.
Along with the 30+ international galleries including Friedman Benda, who will bring the first solo presentation of Misha Kahn, Galerie Eric Philippe, and Galerie SCENE OUVERTE, the Curio platform welcomes an in-depth selection of galleries and designers presenting “surprising cabinets of curiosity that infuse the fair’s exhibition program with inventive snapshots of today’s design landscape.” Special installations that are a part of Curio include Galerie MICA x LAB, which
presents a space for relaxation and contemplation built around the chaise lounge of Pierre Charrié and Un/Tamed by Faina, which offers a platform for modern Ukrainian design. Here, Faina founder and designer, Victoria Yakusha, will show a selection of benches and textile pieces that are made using her signature material, ‘ztista’ – a fully sustainable blend of materials that are conceived to one day return to nature. In collaboration with Rademakers Gallery, Kiki van Eijk will present “Altar of Imagination,’ a work “celebrating the flexibility, resilience and adaptability of humanity,” and WKND Lab, from Seoul, South Korea, will present furniture created using traditional Korean materials and crafts to uncover how they might be more sustainable than those used in contemporary design practices.
Maria Cristina Didero has also initiated a new exhibition concept for Design/Miami called Podium, a curated selling exhibition of museum-quality works under the theme of The Golden Age:Rooted in the Past. With over 30 pieces that date over nearly a century, the platform seeks “to explore a large range of presentations of amazing pieces from different contexts, times and geographies. Podium becomes a platform to reflect on how these pieces can ignite discussions around today’s design scene”, states Didero.
A new program of Special Satellite Projects will also be happening this week, including an installation titled Material Culture, by Irish furniture designer and craftsman, Joseph Walsh, Pulse Topology, a new artwork by Rafael
Lozano-Hemmer, to be exhibited with Superblue.
As always, the fair will feature daily talks and roundtables with leading designers, creatives and thought leaders.
The Golden Age. Design/Miami Basel, June 14-19, 2022
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