Photographie John Pomp
French
En présentant pour la première fois à Paris une sélection de designers américains, Triode, www.triodedesign.com met en avant une scène créative dynamique mais peu connue en Europe.
Malgré une histoire relativement courte, elle bénéficie d’un riche héritage laissé par l’activité de designers à la renommée mondiale.
Des épisodes glorieux ont ponctué cette histoire atypique à laquelle sont associés des noms aussi prestigieux que ceux de Russel Wright, Henry Dreyfuss, Normand Bel Geddes sans oublier bien sur Raymond Loewy , Ray & Charles Eames ou Georges Nelson .
Toujours influencés pas la consommation de masse et le souci de procurer des produits pratiques et efficaces, ils ont donné les lettres de noblesse au design Américain en le faisant rentrer par la salle de bains, la cuisine ou le garage.
Alors que l’Europe restait attachée à un certain élitisme et à une tradition sculaire, la production américaine donnait au plis grand nombre des produits directement inspirés des avancées technologiques et des nouveaux matériaux.
Paradoxalement, cette activité industrielle tès intense avec des marques de références telles que Herman Miller ou Knoll limite de nos jours l’expression créative américaine qui peine à trouver sur son territoire de petites structures capables de produire des séries limités. Aussi les designers américains sont tentés de se tourner vers les pôles traditionnels de fabrication européens pour voir leurs productions réalisées et diffusés.
En montrant l’énergie et le talent déployés par cette génération qui participe à la reconnaissance et à l’identité du design américains , Triode poursuit sa volonté de promouvoir des formes de création peu présentes en France.
Triode Show room : 28, rue Jacob 75006 Paris
English
Unlike their fashion brethren, young American furniture and product designers get little respect or attention in their native land, let alone in the sophisticated capitals of Europe. But now, in a surprising turn of events, they are being celebrated in Paris, the apogee of chic.
On Jan. 21, Triode , www.triodedesign.com a Left Bank gallery, opened “Americans in Paris,” a show that features the work of over a dozen budding United States-based talents including Harry Allen, Mathilde Alessandra, Chris Ferebee, KleinReid, Paul Loebach, Jason Miller, Jeff Miller, Moorhead & Moorhead, John Pomp, Josh Owen, Jonah Takagi and Ali Tayar.
“Triode would like to become the ambassador for American design — a bridge between the States and Paris,” said the gallery’s owner, Jacques Barret, a former landscape and lighting designer who was the first to introduce Parisians to the work of the Danish master Finn Juhl and the pioneering Brazilian modernist Sergio Rodrigues.
Barret selected the designers for the show by scouting the International Contemporary Furniture Fair in New York last May and by making frequent visits to the United States and searching the Internet. “I want to show people not known in France,” he said.
The New York-based designer Harry Allen was the only one in the show who came over for the opening, and he created a piece for the event, a lamp made from an assemblage of individually cast resin wishbones. That afternoon, Allen had attended the retrospective exhibition of VIA (the government-backed organization that sponsors French design) at the Centre Pompidou and was impressed at the number of projects that had actually made their way into production. “Very little manufacturing gets done in the U.S.,” he said. “Designers have to do it themselves.”
Richard Wrightman, another American designer who had come to the opening, agreed. “Being a designer and producing your own work is an act of masochism. I have no time to design things now because I’m so busy manufacturing.”
Barret said that the exhibition will be up for two months, but he intends to keep selling the designs throughout the year and will introduce new pieces on a continuing basis. “We want to show the energy and talent of a new generation of American designers.”
John Pomp bio
John Pomp has redefined contemporary design through the art of glass blowing. for the past decade, he has been living and working in new york city, and has established himself as one of the leaders in modern design. his integrity is seen in his use of pure glass and functional, minimalist forms. his organic approach to design reveals itself in the simplicity of his silhouettes and through intentional hints of imperfection. combined with modern color concepts, his work is unmistakably contemporary. smooth, seductive and sexy vase forms like the silhouettes, bulbs, and eggs exemplify his love for glass. schooled in venetian glassblowing style by italian maestros, pomp has taught glassblowing throughout the country and was a faculty member at Tyler school of art (temple university in Philadelphia pa) where he also received his bachelor of fine arts. in 2000, he opened a public access, educational, glassblowing facility in Brooklyn Ny named o ne sixty glass. he was recently awarded best product line for his « silhouette collection » at accent on design section of the New York international gift show. john pomp’s current line of glass includes seductively shaped vases and lighting have been shown in numerous publications including house and garden, Martha Stewart living, wallpaper, vogue, Instyle, one, W, city, real simple, Elle décor, food and wine and on the front page of the house and home section of the New York times as well as the New York times magazine. he created an exclusive line of glass for tiffany & co. and Donna Karan’s New York flagship store and designed glass for an installation at Jcrew’s Rockefeller center store in New York city. his work is available at select stores including aero, Jeffery, barneys New York, shelter in Los Angeles, elements in Chicago, Stanley korshak in Texas, Haus in Arizona, Hollace Cluny in Toronto and Colette in Paris and now Triode Design Showroom in Paris.