Artist designers to watch:
Vincent Pocsik
Vincent Pocsik is an LA-based artist whose pieces morph the human form into fantastical objects and functional furniture with visible inspirations from folk art and fairy tales.
Pocsik playfully transforms the legs of a chair into the literal shape of limbs. Damned to Love (Four Feet and Two Bodies) is constructed from carved black walnut, resulting in an elegant and imaginative piece of functional art.
The work is currently on display in a group show, A Trail to Chase, at LOY Contemporary Art Gallery in Singapore until 31 May. Pocsik’s free-standing lamp, Charlie is also included in the show, among 27 other multidisciplinary art and design pieces by Viktor Udzenija, Charlotte Kingsnorth, Jialun Cao and more.
Monique Chiari
Melbourne-based Monique Chiari, owner of funky homeware brand Clumsy, recently created a pet-friendly throne as part of PET SHOP exhibition at Craft Victoria – and it was reportedly very popular among the visiting pups indeed.
Cushions are the star products at Clumsy, whether they be constructed from faux fur, made from recycled water bottle fibres or cheekily revealing. Check them out for yourself.
Chris Wolston
Dividing his time between New York and Medellín, Colombia, Chris Wolston is the maker behind the Nalgona chair – a piece of functional art that is more like an old friend waving at you from afar.
Wolston’s iconic creations have already been picked up by celebrities and art institutions alike. You may have seen one inside the Sydney home of Australian beauty entrepreneur Zoë Foster Blake and the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV) also owns one, previously shown as part of Freedom of Movement: Contemporary Art and Design from the NGV Collection in 2022-23.
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Fredrikson Stallard
Patrik Fredrikson and Ian Stallard are the artistic minds behind London-based art and design practice, Fredrikson Stallard. They are known for their dystopian furniture designs, working across sculpture, installation, functional art and collectible design.
A sofa resembling a space rock, Species 1 is constructed from polyurethane, glass fibre and polyester, finished in a rich and atomic shade of red.
The piece is showing at Denver Art Museum in the exhibition, Biophilia: Nature Reimagined, on view until 11 August.
Kwangho Lee
Kwangho Lee is a Korean artist who has enjoyed making by hand from an early age, seeking to ‘give new meaning and function to the most ordinary’.
In 2017, Lee was selected as Designer of the Year by Mercado Arte Design (MADE), an international collective design fair in Brazil.
Lee works with a diverse range of materials, from knotted nylon ropes packed like ramyeon (instant noodles), to working with copper and enamel.
Saelia Aparicio
Spanish artist Saelia Aparicio has a background in sculpture and now works across drawing, installation, film, mural, glass and design. Her works often engage deeply with the female form, while also addressing the topics of femininity and mythology.
The pieces in her functional sculpture series, featuring different figures in a position with their backs bent and hugging their knees, are each given an identity and name. There is Anousha, Flick, Ruki and Tai, previously shown in Los Angeles at Gallery FUMI, as well as Ariel and Lilith, from the series the monsters that care for you, depicting mythological villains.
