THE ULTIMATE ART FURNITURE SERIES BY BOYM PARTNERS (1986)
Created for Moss Gallery in New York in 2006, Boym Partners’ Ultimate Art Furniture series transforms works of art into furniture. Taking reproductions of Old Master paintings from Laurene Leon Boym’s family collection, the painted canvases are cut, folded, and literally shapeshifted into chairs, tables, and small benches.
It is very common for designers to question how design can become closer to art. Some, such as Gaetano Pesce, have even gone as far as to say the two are the same, or at least inextricably tied together. Within this decades long discussion, rather than elevating furniture into art, Boym Partners quite literally turn art into furniture. The first to fully flip this dynamic, the resulting forms appear to be delicate and evoke the language of paintings while existing as entirely functional objects. Chairs in the series, for example, can support an individual with ease.
It is very common for designers to question how design can become closer to art. Some, such as Gaetano Pesce, have even gone as far as to say the two are the same, or at least inextricably tied together. Within this decades long discussion, rather than elevating furniture into art, Boym Partners quite literally turn art into furniture. The first to fully flip this dynamic, the resulting forms appear to be delicate and evoke the language of paintings while existing as entirely functional objects. Chairs in the series, for example, can support an individual with ease.
SELECTED OBJECTS
Venus and Mars Chair and Mirror
A reproduction of Paolo Veronese’s Mars and Venus United by Love (c. 1570s) is divided between a chair and wall mirror. The painting depicts Cupid binding together Venus, goddess of love, and Mars, god of war. The Boyms extends this act of joining into the objects themselves, fragmenting one image across two functional pieces. The chair and mirror exist as an inseperable pair.
Santiago Table
A reproduction of XXX is turned into a low table. Part of Constantin and Laurene Boym’s personal collection, this piece was exhibited at the V&A Museum in London in 2009.
Museum Chair
A tall back chair featuring 5 paintings that tell a story of the painted figure from birth to death. The original name for the piece was called ‘Biography’ for this reason and the hypothetical life was meant to exist without total explanation. An incredibly rare and special piece from the personal collection of the artiststs.IN CONCLUSION:
Ultimate Art Furniture turns the hierarchy between art and design inside out. Rather than asking when furniture becomes art, similar to their contemporaries, the Boyms begin with art and asks how it can become functional - turning the painted canvas into a design object. The blurring of boundaries between art and design is accomplished nonetheless, however the keen sensitivity to begin where most people end is something only the Boyms would think to do.
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