THE FUTURE PERFECT DEBUTS OVER 130 NEW WORKS FROM ARTISTS AND DESIGNERS AT DESIGN MIAMI 2023

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The Future Perfect is introducing over 130 new works from 18 artists and designers at Design Miami 2023. The Future Perfect’s presentation is designed as a reflection on anticipation and expectation, aspects that are often invisible and unnoticed by the audience. In collaboration with USM Modular Furniture, they have created a 9-foot-tall display case. This case is made up of 124 glass cubes, each 20 inches in size, with darkened back walls, forming an immersive space that partially conceals an internal exhibition area. Inside these cubes are compactly scaled works by artists who have been a long-standing part of the gallery’s roster, including various notable names including Dan John Anderson, Ben & Aja Blanc, Autumn Casey, Bradley Bowers, Chen Chen & Kai Williams, Ian Collings, John Hogan, Cody Hoyt, Mark Pavlovits, Eric Roinestad, Reinaldo Sanguino, Leena Similu, The Perfect Nothing Catalog by Frank Traynor, Chris Wolston, Floris Wubben, Jane Yang-D’Haene, Rahee Yoon, and Karl Zahn.

At the center of the presentation, within the enclosure, viewers will find a floor-to-ceiling mobile-like light installation by Karl Zahn, its four component pieces representing the four seasons, the lights reflecting in an ethereal dance against the bronze mirrors with which the interior space is lined. The installation is Zahn’s most ambitiously scaled work to date, featuring interventions of color—a new development for the artist. Looking out onto the installation is a bench made by ceramicist Cody Hoyt, executed in his signature style, with a striking graphic pattern composed from tiles the artist produces using the nerikomi technique.

Beside the display case, imagined by The Future Perfect as an otherworldly reception area where visitors can pause before proceeding towards the interior exhibition space of the display, will be an arrangement of large-scale pieces by Medellín-based multidisciplinary artist Chris Wolston, including a desk, composed of large bronze leaves outlining those of a palm, with leather leaf pads serving as its top; the first desk-chair iteration of Wolston’s Oro series, upholstered with blue shearling; two terracotta chairs inspired by the tropical flora of Medellín, Colombia. Hanging above the desk will be a new version of his Florian chandelier, with lights embedded in two the bronze cascade of florals, illuminated berries extending beyond its Murano-glass shade. Behind the desk hangs an oversized blue ceramic mural by Dutch artist Floris Wubben, known for his experimental technological approach to creating large-scale ceramic furniture-sculptures.

Within the display case, making her debut at Design Miami/, Miami-based artist Autumn Casey will present four light sculptures inspired by classic Tiffany lamp designs, extending the phantasmagoric potential of the genre towards a moving, earnest humorousness—John and Jackie is a pair of fluorescent flamingoes, whose bodies light up from within; The Garden of Eden is a tortoise, flowers growing from its shell; Woodstock is a globe composed from psychedelically-colored tree leaves, standing upon a glossy black pedestal. Meanwhile, Bradley Bowers will present six sculptural paper lanterns, riffs on his acclaimed Halo series, smaller than the work Bowers typically creates; the artist sculpts each by hand in a dance with the material, which results in expressive examinations of balance and duration, the aging of these works inherent to their ever-evolving nature.

The Future Perfect gallery fixtures, design duo Chen Chen & Kai Willaims will premiere the Moon Pearl Table Light series which borrows from the stratigraphic technique the duo developed for their highly popular Geology Mirrors, wherein stone offcuts are seamlessly embedded into glass; the six lamps, with the lightbulbs housed in ethereal rectangular glass boxes, present a range of material experiments within their contained, deliberately engineered form—from clear glass with graphic black hardware to a variety of sandblasting methods combined with brass covered in a rich turquoise patina. Also debuting a new series is another stalwart of The Future Perfect program, Ben & Aja Blanc, who will present the Penny Bun lamps—a cluster of six lamps that take their form from their sumptuous namesakes (a.k.a Porcini mushrooms), their shades made from milk-white glass, with ceramic stems, the striations between the earth-toned glazes creating a marble-like effect.

Californian ceramicist Eric Roinestad will present five new pieces— two new bust sculptures from his Hooligans series and a vessel with adorned with an owl figurine will serve as additions to the artist’s established bodies of work, while a sleek vase in an antique Greek style with a cameo portrait showcases a new development in the artists iconographic sculptural language. Fellow Los Angeles-based ceramic artist Leena Similu will show six new versions of her signature clay vessels and head sculptures, inspired by the stories and secrets handed down to her by her Cameroonian ancestry. These new iterations of the artist’s explorations of motherhood and lineage, see a bold approach to integrating West African craft traditions in its variance of mediums and materials, with wood and horse-hair and joining her clay figurines, some of which themselves present complicated in construction with the addition of large dangling earrings.

Brooklyn-based, Korean-born ceramicist Jane Yang-D’Haene — following a series of successful solo exhibitions over the past year, including Remembrance at The Future Perfect’s Goldwyn House — has created a new series of works rooted in the tradition of the Korean moon jar, of which nine pieces will be featured in this showcase. Marked with a deep sense of rawness, the works serve as reflections on the artist’s relationship with her body after a recent cycle of going through illness, treatment and recovery, and how this has shaped the process of making—the vessels are marked with scars which are then mended with more layers of porcelain and glazed, tracing their journey of becoming with poignant beauty. Another gallery mainstay, ceramic artist Reinaldo Sanguino, has created a variety of meditation stools and benches, boxes, vessels and bowls in his signature intuitive, collagistic style, rich with texture and color—reds, yellows, pastels and rich jewel tones blur together, producing visual effects such as the colorful halo of a neon light, or patches of snakeskin.

The booth will also feature nine sculptures by master glass artist John Hogan, which showcase Hogan’s subtle alchemy in manipulating light through his material, creating vast articulations of its optical qualities, by playing with angle, color, and density; each piece changes throughout the day, along with the lighting of the space in which it is placed. Approaching similar themes, turning them toward the philosophical, stone sculptor Ian Collings has created fourteen new pieces for the fair, continuing his ongoing investigation of his signature medium as a repository of primordial historical consciousness, in the process giving shape to the typically formless concept of transformation. The booth will also feature ten sculptures by Korean artist Rahee Yoon. Designed to be viewed in the round, they simultaneously possess the luminescent lightness of a hologram and the heft of a monolith, owing to a combination of the blurry, soft-focus way in which the designer deploys color, and the rigid, straight-cut blocks into which the material is cut.

The exhibit by The Future Perfect is designed as a reflection on the themes of anticipation and expectation, elements often unseen and unnoticed by viewers. In collaboration with USM Modular Furniture, they’ve constructed a 9-foot-tall display case made up of 124 glass cubes, each 20 inches in size, with darkened back walls. This structure forms an enveloping space, partially hiding an internal exhibition area. Within these cubes, visitors will find smaller-scale works by artists who have had a long-standing association with the gallery.

ABOUT THE FUTURE PERFECT

Founded by David Alhadeff in 2003, The Future Perfect is one of the world’s foremost contemporary design galleries, distinguished by its range of vision and strong curatorial focus, which showcases studio-created works alongside one-of-a-kind and limited edition pieces. In its nearly 20-year history, the gallery has introduced highly collectible works by seminal design talents such as Lindsey Adelman, Jason Miller, and Piet Hein Eek. Acting as both a catalyst and an industry authority, The Future Perfect has forged relationships with some of the world’s most influential artists, designers, and craftspeople. The Future Perfect’s prestigious gallery program is tailored to each of its unique locations in North America, with a townhouse in the heart of Manhattan’s West Village, a residential complex in San Francisco’s luxurious Pacific Heights, and a newly renovated residence in Los Angeles: the Goldwyn House. The Future Perfect’s site-specific collections adhere to Alhadeff’s original vision: the coalescence of playfulness, craftsmanship, and innovation. Shifting the borders between gallerist and merchant, curator and designer, Alhadeff and The Future Perfect continue to forge new pathways for artists and collectors alike, and expand to expand their ardent community of creators and design enthusiasts.

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