Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec Take Over MCA Chicago
Beginning October 20, the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago will play host to an exhibition of work by French designers Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec. Their first major solo show stateside in nearly ten years, “Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec: Bivouac” is organized by the Centre Pompidou-Metz and traces the brothers’ design career over fifteen years of collaboration and evolution.
“Bivouac” will provide the viewer with an immersive viewing experience of the Bouroullec’s diverse body of work, from prototypes and one-offs to finished objects and mass-produced editions. Since they began collaborating in the late 1990s, the Bouroullecs have married the conceptual, flexible, and elegant, becoming known for sleek objects and designs for the home and office – such as furniture and storage systems – that defy conventional wisdom while maintaining function and comfort.
“One of the most exciting things about the show, aside from the fact that visitors will be able to see a wide range of Bouroullec products in one location, are site-specific and in some cases interactive installations,” says Michael Darling, Chief Curator of the MCA Chicago. “We will feature the Textile Field [commissioned] for the Victoria and Albert Museum where museum-goers can lounge, the first-ever floating installation of the Styrofoam Cloud Modules in the MCA’s atrium, and opportunities to relax and sit in various Bouroullec chairs or sofas throughout the exhibition.”
Also included are the brothers’ experiments in what they call “micro architecture”: items larger than furniture, but smaller than architecture, including their pressed-felt Clouds, which, when slotted together, create faceted walls or room-like enclosures. The award-winning Algues are a series of molded plastic branches that can be snapped together to make translucent, organic screens that, says Darling, “shape the spaces leading viewers on a circuitous path through the Bouroullecs’ career.”
“Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec: Bivouac” runs through January 20, 2013.
