Artefact 2021: Design Centre Chelsea Harbour
The Design Centre, Chelsea Harbour launches the first edition of Artefact, a contemporary craft fair showcasing works from galleries, local and, international craftspeople.
Held across eight days, Artefact was a first edition contemporary craft fair held at the home of London design, the Design Centre, Chelsea Harbour. Showcasing collections, designers, artists, and craftspeople represented by fifteen galleries, the fair showcased everything from contemporary glassware to intricate ceramic work, exquisite carvings, and impressive sculptures. See personal highlights from this year's event from just a few galleries and pieces on display below.
Cavaliero Finn
London-based art gallery Cavaliero Finn exhibited the works of twelve artists from their vast portfolio. Showcasing everything from abstract sculpture to tapestry pieces, the gallery showcased the skill and diversity of their collections, providing something for all tastes and mediums.
Personal favourites on display include the 'Floating Bowls', Parian and soluble cobalt small sculptural vessels created by Nicholas Lees, 'Llamas Siluetas' ceramic sculptures crafted by Soledad Christie and 'Balancing Act I' colourful metal sculptures by Cecilia Moore.
Ting Ying Gallery
Ting Ying Studio offered a choice of unique pieces from British ceramic artist Alice Walton, who makes complex and multi-layered porcelain objects; Cork-based textile artist Helen O'Shea, whose work explores the ocean's waste plastics; and China-born Jinya Zhao, whose current collection uses different glass qualities to explore the subtle relationships and tensions between colour, form, and structure.
One of my favourite discoveries was the collection by Babs Haenen. Haenen often works with layers of porcelain slabs which she folds, cuts, and sculpts to create her vessels, often producing complex structures that incorporate multiple designs elements, patterns, and forms to build mesmerising abstract designs to lure the eye.
MADEINBRITALY
London based art gallery MADEINBRITALY showcases contemporary applied arts and collectable design, aiming to revive the connection between Italy and Great Britain. The stand had an impressive range of displays, everything from furniture design to ceramic vessels, textile art and abstract sculpture.
'Sea Urchins', a collection by Colombian born and Italian based artist Martha Pachon Rodriguez attract the eye with their fascinating, feather-like forms, circling to create abstract vessels. Several pieces of Rodriguez's porcelain works exhibited, many taking inspiration from nature, presented in unique and unusual ways. 'Composizione', a collection of glazed earthenware by visual artist Andrea Salvatori provides a modern take on pottery design, using 3D printing to create striking sculptural vessels that incorporate layers and bubbles into their exterior.
jaggedart
Renowned for its curation of contemporary artworks, jaggedart focuses on three-dimensional works made from ceramic, grasses, wood, paper, books, maps, or textiles, all used in innovative ways. Many of the pieces have a natural and organic feel, working together in harmony between collections.
Ceramic Artist Lucas Ferreira impressed visitors with his 'Faded' collection of artworks. The designs consist of hundreds of ceramic segments presented in a gradient of black and grey rows. The change in orientation represents differing views, while the many segments showcase strength in numbers. In elegant contrast, Valéria Nascimento's porcelain designs consist of delicate, hand-made petals assembled on wires to create decorative floral displays.
Vessel Gallery London
Founded in Notting Hill, Vessel Gallery is one to mesmerise visitors with its impressive collections of contemporary art glass sculptures. While the gallery specialises in a range of mediums, the presentation of their glass pieces provided a centrepiece to the fair. Whether it is suspended wall art, vessels or abstract swirling sculptures, there was something for everyone to fall in love with.
'Big Reddish Line' by Karin Mørch is a personal favourite, the simplicity of the design, a swirl of red glass exhibits the beauty of the material and the complexity of its creation. The 'Chemical Elements' collection by renowned multidisciplinary artist Bethan Laura Wood takes its inspiration like many of Wood's pieces, from the world around us. The glass vases depict abstract scenes such as swirls of waves from the sea of flows of lava across a landscape.
Cube Gallery
Based in Marylebone, Cube Gallery had an international reach, working with clients in the US, Europe and the Far East. One of the most fascinating collections of work on display at the gallery's stand was the 'Eye Series' colourful and striking porcelain works by Myung Nam An, a South Korean ceramicist based in Miami, Florida. Myung tells stories using universal symbols, easy for viewers to understand and interpret it in their own ways, ultimately stimulating an active dialogue between the viewer and the piece of art. Myung explores abstract appropriated images from our culture and translates these onto the surface of his artworks.