Foreign Dialogues

Alicja Strzyzynska was born in Poland where she completed her Masters of Arts Degree in Product Design and Visual Communication at Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts. After graduation, she worked in Tokyo and then in Amsterdam, where she established her own studio.

The sculptures in this exhibit are an effort to engage in a conversation between the spirit of fine art and the purpose of design to create intimate art pieces. Alica is searching for the experience of intimacy – a metaphysical exchange between human and objects. Her ideas for these sculptures came to mind after deciding to reconnect with her roots and her grandfather who is also a sculptor artist. Combining her two learnt practices of scultpure and design was what inspired Alicja to experiment with the principles underlying the functionality of sculpture and the meaning of furniture.

Anna Jožová has been studying in the Glass Studio under the guidance of Rony Plesl at the UMPRUM in Prague since 2017. She focuses mainly on experimental techniques in glass and porcelain, combining different, seemingly disparate materials to create new unique objects. Alicja has presented work at several prestigious exhibitions such as the Salone del Mobile 2022; Venice Design Biennial 2021; and London Design Fair 2017. In 2018 she designed and created a trophy for the Global Champions Prague Playoffs and her work is included in the permanent exhibition at the Moravian Gallery in Brno. In 2019, she completed an internship at Otago Polytechnic (New Zealand), which significantly influenced the direction of her work.

Caro Pattle’s experimental object-based practice explores handcraft processes through a lens of contemporary materiality. She draws from a range of craft disciplines to create works that joyfully muddle organic/synthetic, past/present and functional/non-functional binaries. Pattle’s practice spans large-scale public art installation through to objects for interiors and is underpinned by ongoing research into material culture, animism, and domestic worlds. Embedded across all of her output is a sense of pleasure and play.

Pattle graduated from a Bachelor of Textiles at RMIT in 2019 with a previous Bachelor of Fine Arts completed in 2009. The recipient of several travel grants and industry prizes, she was named the Australian Textile Graduate of the Year by the Design Institute of Australia for 2020, was shortlisted for the Design Files Awards 2021 and received a Vivid Design Prize award in 2022.
In 2022, Pattle’s work was presented at the inaugural Melbourne Design Fair and selected for the group exhibitions: Improper Structures, By/Product, Welcome, Cheers, A Gentle Unwinding, and It’s Not Just Blue. In 2023 Pattle completed a large commissioned work for Melbourne Now in a co-curation between the NGV and Craft.

Elliot Bastianon is a designer and artist based in Canberra, Australia. He has a diverse material palette and attempts to extrapolate the most from everyday things around him; often combining materials in ways that he hopes will direct his practice down a path not often taken. His studio is a triangulation of commercial furniture, research-driven projects and sculpture. Bastianon is currently undertaking a PhD in Visual Arts at the Australian National University. His research is focused on how the presence of mineral growth can provide readings on the Anthropocene, conflicting time scales and the power imbalance between human activity and environmental forces.

Georgia Weitenberg is a Newcastle-based furniture designer with technical training at the University of Tasmania Furniture School in Launceston. This backdrop of industry and craft has come to inform her evolving practice which balances invention with tradition. Georgia’s humanistic approach to design imbues her work with a warmth and familiarity that combined with her unique exploration of form and function, instils each piece with its own inherent narrative and the poetics of daily life.

Jiří Krejčiřík is a multidisciplinary designer based in Prague. His practice embraces a broad spectrum of disciplines and methods it transcends the barriers between art and design, from product design through furniture, lighting, glass, interior and spatial design. Whether designing for a client or developing his own self–initiated projects or gallery objects, he always apply the same thorough attention to context, process and detail. As a result, his entire portfolio is characterised by a coherent visual language threading the historical and the cultural through a contemporary lens with an unexpected edge. Embracing a tradition of craftsmanship, each product is meticulously hand-crafted locally, in the Czech Republic.

Joana Schneider creates spacious installations and sculptural environments that present a sustainable contact with organic materials while shedding light on local creativity and industry. Schneider’s material-based approach pays tribute to labour- intensive techniques and makes the Dutch craftsmen central means throughout her oeuvre. Her intuitive working process is inspired by traditional working practices such as netmaking in the fi sheries sector.

Schneider’s playful use of exceptional materials merges with her love for the textile craft. Techniques such as embroidery, passementerie and tapestry making became her speciality whereby combining these with traditional net making techniques such as pluis netting and dolly knotting. Her spacious, sometimes uncanny installations appeal to the viewers’ senses in many respects: visually, tactically and through its natural smell. Her work has been shown internationally in exhibitions and fairs such as the PULSE Art Week Miami, Enter Art Fair Copenhagen, Masterly Milano, Sainte Anne Gallery Paris and Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam.

Melbourne based designer and artist Jordan Fleming works with metal, plaster, pigment and timber to create sculptural and experimental furniture and lighting pieces characterised by humour and vivacious, wonky asymmetry. Fleming’s work expresses a personal exploration with materials through her use of sculpting plaster and pigments to create pieces that possess an emotional impact; conjuring feelings as if they’re living in the space, rather than solely serving a programmatic function. Having a background in cabinet making and interior design, Fleming established her own furniture design practice in 2018. Fleming’s works have been exhibited in Melbourne Design Week (2020, 2021, 2022), At The Above Gallery (2021) and Australian Design Centre Workshopped19 (2018). Additionally, her work has been profi led in design magazine Artichoke, architecture and design blog Yellowtrace, and Frankie magazine as the winner of their 2018 Good Stuff design awards.

Gallée is a designer based in Rotterdam, Netherlands. From early childhood he was exposed to creative practices, and after briefly studying anthropology, he graduated from Design Academy Eindhoven in 2015. He spent the following years learning different manufacturing techniques, as a craftsman in art and design production. In 2017 he started his own studio in Rotterdam; his work explores traditional and folkloric elements to enter modern materiality, while always considering today’s advanced manufacturing processes to create a contemporary fusion.

Marta Figueiredo is a Portuguese architect and multidisciplinary artist based in Melbourne (Naarm/Birrarung-ga). In 2016, she founded her design practice which unites innovative technology and craft to produce playfulness, joy, and sensory experimentation. With her works she wants to challenge beliefs about standardisation, sustainability, and prompt discussions about new ways design can speak to a broader sensory experience.

With this approach, she’s pushing into a new kind of artistic expression in design that aims to instigate a richer, more layered interaction between individual and object – one that has the potential to be different for each person, depending on the particularities of their mind and body. Marta is motivated by a desire to challenge the notion of design and find alternatives to irresponsible mass production and the concept of the “average individual” as a consumer. Marta has received various awards (High Commendation Clarence Prize for Excellence in Furniture Design 2021, Fringe Furniture Experimental Design Award 2018) and nominations for several others ( Finalist Australian Furniture Design Award (AFDA) 2020) . Her works have been included in a number of shows both in Australia and abroad, including Shanghai, Paris, the Brussels Collectible Fair, and Milan Design Week and collections (Metaphores – Hermès Holding Textiles).

Misseu is a Melbourne based design studio exploring the intersection between art and design. Through lighting, furniture and homewares they question the conventional notions of design, dismantle people’s perceptions and reframe with intention to evoke further thought. By utilising traditional manufacturing techniques and custom methods of production each of their pieces are unique in nature, with no two ever being the same. They believe great design transcends time, an ethos they try to realize in everything they create.

Tadeáš Podracký is an experimental designer who is seeking authenticity in our immediate surroundings. Through material research, questioning craft heritage, and strong hands-on making, Podracky proposes a new methodology, a reformulated approach to design, based on exploring expression, destruction, and accenting individuality. Whether it is an object or space, he is always looking for a way to break down the established principles of “good” design; in order to bring new possibilities and emphasize the multi-layered identities of the contemporary individual. Tadeáš Podracký went through the design and fi ne art academic training. He received a MA in Contextual Design from the Design Academy Eindhoven and MA at the Academy of Art Architecture and Design in Prague; completed study internships in the Fine Art studio at the School of Visual Arts (New York) and in the Monumental Sculpture studio at the Academy of Fine Arts (Prague). His work has been exhibited worldwide in main institutions and fairs such as Design Miami, FOG San Francisco, Maison et Objet Paris, Mudac museum Lausanne, Het Nieuwe Instituut, Designblok Prague, Salone del Mobile Milano, London design festival, Dutch Design Week, Venice Design Biennial.

REM Atelier is a collaborative art and design project that started in 2015. The objects and installations created by artist Remty Elenga and designer Remco van Halderen are oftentimes an investigation into functionality and decor. The name REM atelier represents the first shared letters of their names and, more symbolically, the melting together of their practice. Their first shared studio space in Rotterdam, which marked the beginning of their collaboration, did not only serve as a space to work. As host to several big scale interactive installations it was transformed into a work of art itself, exploring spatial boundaries and meanings. Investigation into everyday objects, playfulness and spatial awareness characterise the work of REM Atelier. The works never merely serve to decorate a space. Rather they create an alternate space, subjecting the surroundings to the artwork.