Australian design goes to Miami
Miami Design bills itself as ‘the global authority for collectible design’ bringing together ‘the most influential players’ through their fairs and online marketplace. This year fairs were also held in Los Angeles, Basel and Paris. Gallery displays and design talks by and from ‘visionary creatives, curators, and brands’ reward visitors.
This year, Sydney based Gallery Sally Dan-Cuthbert made its debut in Design Miami with a presentation under Glen Adamson’s curatorial theme ‘Blue Sky’. ‘On the centenary of the Surrealist manifesto, the gallery followed a Blue Sky approach to dreaming an exciting realm of artistic and presentation possibilities to bring a selection of remarkable Australian designers to the US from the other side of the world’, states the Gallery Sally Dan-Cuthbert website. ‘The artists are selected for their practice, working with either traditional or new and innovative techniques of making and storytelling to bring focus to the rich tapestry that characterises Australian design today.’
The presentation includes a curated collection of inter-generational Australian artists and designers, including First Nation, that explores Australia through traditional and innovative techniques.
Featured works by the following artists were shown: Marion Borgelt, Olive Gill-Hille, Kyoko Hashimoto, Guy Keulemans, David Tate, Charles Trevelyan, Rive Roshan, Damien Wright and Bonhula Yunupingu.
Design Miami took place in Miami Beach, USA, 4 – 8 December 2024. A selection of the work featured is shown below.
David Tate, Eganu, 2023–2024, emu eggs, emu feathers, cotton, plywood, USD 95,000 ‘Eganu encapsulates the memory of Tate’s Australian childhood – the resilient, robust wildflowers and the emu not only survive but flourish with splendour and beauty.’
Kyoko Hashimoto and Guy Keulemans, Bioregional Rings (Sydney Basin), 2021, collection of 12 rings, USD 10,000. Coal, yellowblock sandstone, Hawkesbury sandstone, oyster shell, coral, beach stone, sea sponge, fishing line, sand, ash, neodymium magnet, glue and sterling silver. Image courtesy Grant Hancock
David Tate, Skip, 13, 2021, American black walnut. ‘Skip captures the idea of the Australian outback. Inspired by the legs and tail of the endemic Kangaroo, and the seat of a tractor. Skip combines craftsmanship with humour.’
Damien Wright, 2:22pm 2/2/22 Mono-block, 2022, 10,000 year old ancient river red gum, polypropylene, USD 35,000. ‘When timber is buried for so long it is starved of oxygen and saturated with iron and silica; the oxidised material that results is part timber and part fossil. Often buried deep down for millions of years, organic materials, plants and trees can transform further into organic compounds, including crude oil. Oil, a fossil fuel, is a key ingredient in the polypropylene used to manufacture the ubiquitous, long-lasting plastic chair that Wright has dismembered and embedded in the block of wood.
‘Mono block conceptualises “metamorphosis”. A polypropylene plastic chair held in 10,000-year-old ancient redgum. The wood is no longer timber nor a fossil – if undisturbed for 50 million years, it becomes oil, the material required to make polypropylene. The future, both holding and consuming the past.
‘If this keeps breaking down, it turns into the oil that’s needed to make these plastic chairs’, commented Sally Dan-Cuthbert. ‘It’s a piece of sculpture, but it’s functional. This is the second piece the artist has made. The first was acquired by the National Gallery of Australia.’
Damien Wright and Bonhula Yunupingu, Dhanparr Garak light 1, 2024, 10,000 year old ancient river red gum, gadayka (Darwin stringybark), copper wire, LED light, tung oil finish, USD 25,000. ‘Drawing reference from larrakitj (traditional funeral poles) Dhanparr Garak is a sculptural lighting feature that connects the earth and sky, dark and light, death and survival, nature and navigation. Through a First Nations lens, themes of death and survival, light and dark are indivisible, whilst the colonial canon positions these as oppositional. Dhanparr Garak projects light out the top and the bottom of the larrakitj suggesting two polarities, at the same time projected light omits in a circular pattern – like the Milky Way – connecting past, present and future.’
Damien Wright wrote: ‘The day after the Voice referendum was defeated Bonhula went hunting djingilma (mud crab) and mardi (crayfish) he called me with a bucket full of food and an idea. To build a larrikatj (funeral pole) as a light. Carve stars into it so that light can connect earth and the forever. Life goes on. This is Dhanparr Garak.’
Rive Roshan, Radiance Bench, Dark Ruby, 2023, textured coloured reflective glass, timber substrate. ‘The innovative use of rippled glass echoes the undulating patterns of desert terrain, as sunlight reflects on waves of sand shifted by the wind. Rive Roshan’s Radiance Bench serves as both a functional work and a meditative reflection on the fluid and ephemeral nature of Australia's arid regions, encouraging viewers to contemplate the transient beauty of the desert landscape and burning red sunsets.’
Olive Gill-Hille, Form 2, 2024, ethically sourced, ebonised and carved West Australian jarrah, USD 10,000. ‘Gill-Hille has responded to the rivers and ocean of the local Western Australia coastline, and observations of the weathering of rock, limestone, wood and the components which contribute to a vast and striking landscape – an awareness of time that erodes and transfigures.’
Images courtesy Gallery Sally Dan-Cuthbert, see https://gallerysallydancuthbert.com