“The single word, its guttural monosyllabic pronunciation, that’s what I was passionate about,” Ruscha has said of his early work. “Loud words, like slam, smash, honk.” The comic-book quality of these words reflects the Pop artists’ fascination with popular culture.
As one of the inspirational figures of Italy’s ricostruzione (the country’s post-war rebuilding), Sottsass penetrated a wide range of arenas with his work, including fashion stores, computers, furniture, industrial design, glass, ceramics, painting and photography.
The initial idea for the Vegetal chair in 2004 was to create a piece of furniture that appeared as if it had grown naturally, like a plant. For inspiration, its designers, the French brothers Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec, looked to historic furniture that integrated a sense of organic growth: English garden chairs constructed in boughs of cast iron; ... See more