Ron Arad

Ron Arad’s work rotates around the mutual identification of art and design. The order between the two is usually considered to be unmanageable. This is due to the fact that when design becomes art, it is no longer design and when art becomes a product it no longer considered to be art. This conception is fixed in the idea of art as a magnificent expression removed from reality and protected., along with the notion that design instead belongs to the real world. This implies that design has a function.

However one may notice that in Ron Arad’s work, this does not apply. Here, art can be recognized in his objects. In accordance to his work, design original ways of expression, just as art must exceed the usual limits of constrained art work.

Ron Arad’s most beloved technology is welding, here he found a way where forms could be welded and manipulated reaching a compromise between design and artistic creation. His objects that can be described as sculptural lay between abstraction and figuration.

Bookworm ribbon bookshelf

Ron Arad manages to set out from the nature of what materials are available and his style redevelops the actual substance of these materials by removing them from much of their weight, and transforming them into different materials. Such experimentation gave rise to best sellers including the bookworm ribbon bookshelf produced by Kartell.

From the past twenty years of the twentieth century to the present day, Ron Arad played the role as a complement to the contemporary design production. In this manner, Ron Arad managed to find himself a spot on the International design scene while remaining an individualist. 

With the help and support of high level art collectors, Arad explored the difficult ground between art, architecture and design. From the time during which he experienced his vocational training to his later experimental days, managed to transform him from an outsider of the international design to one of its leading figures. It is this situation of being in between art and design that sets Ron Arad’s work apart, allowing him to become a central figure in the world of design.

After finishing his studies, Arad founded One Off, having Dennis Groves as his partner. This was the actual first studio and workshop were Arad tested his artisan and sculptor and was able to create pieces of his own which would then sell. The first set of objects that he produced were made out of a system of steel joints known as the Kee Klamps. He accumulated them and manipulated them in various shapes such as beds and shelves meeting the different requests of his clients.

Rover Chair

At Covent Garden in 1981, Arad created the original series of weird objects, and he was able to by experimenting with bent and welded sheets of steel. The first very official product, that was created under this collaboration was the 1981 Rover Chair. This chair was made by recycling the seat of demolished Rover 2002 cars and mounting them on Kee Klamps tubular structures. The aim behind this project was to combine unusual materials to be able to experiment with original and exaggerated shapes.

‘I did not know how to cut or weld metal, but I learnt. What I wanted was to break the will of a material to create something which had never existed before’.

Well Tempered chair

Arad was able to do so by thinning down a very fine sheet of tempered steel and he then curved back and folded like a ribbon. The Well Tempered chair which was produced for Vitra in 1986,  was the result of this work. This chair is described as light, comfortable and industrial looking with steel sheets and still it had a handmade feel.

These objects are honest sculptures with perfectly polished forms. Having a monumental size.

Big Easy chair

This tendency that inclines to artistic motions is a unique feature of Ron Arad’s work and affords an explanatory key to his whole fabrication. The Big Easy Chair reminds me of one of Jackson’s Pollock’s paintings. Since the style in which its designed, resembles that of the dripping system Pollock used. For Arad this system however becomes a way of expressing his desire for spontaneous self-verification through creation. Another resemblance that came to my mind as soon as I noticed this chair was the way in which Mendini also used another artist; this time Kandinsky as inspiration for the Kandissa Family.

One may also denote that Ron Arad, owes his success to his association with Italian companies that represents the Italian Design System. The designer has now became a professional who is capable of working with manufacturing companies and with sophisticated clients and collectors. 

Plastic was a major contribution to the success of the studio’s work which had become Arad’s prime material. Again, I feel that as Panton used plastic for his experimentation, the same can be said about this designer.

Soft Misfits

Furthermore, Ron Arad can be scene seen to drift towards the forms that he was most popular for. This can be scene in his obsession with the archetype, which is already situated in many of his welded chairs. This archetype later attained an anthropomorphic form with the Big E and the soft misfits.

 

After spring-before summer

A ribbon, consisting of a single sheet of either polished stainless steel or blackened carbon steel, is folded on itself to form a chaise longue. This is the way in which this product is developed. This is a very refined object and it is manufactured in only five copies, thus aimed at a public of Design Art collectors. One of the features that sets this product apart from the rest of Arad’s work is it its capacity to provoke as much interest in his objects as people have in artworks.

It can be said also that his roots that go back to the Jewish personality of this designer have also an importance in shaping his ideas.

Arad’s tendency to continuously revitalize the same forms and models by characterizing them with new materials, in order to make them diverse ,makes his work evocative of the DE constructivism of Daniel Libeskind, who used to dismember objects and reassembles them, offering a design alternative to design conventions.

Bibliography:

Minimum Design, 24 ORE Cultura. Ron Arad