Kinship

Kinship 

Design exhibition and collaboration between designer Birgitte Due Madsen, architect Anne Dorthe Vester and curator Henriette Noermark during 3daysofdesign 2023.

From June 2 – July 29, Alice Folker Gallery forms the framework for a design exhibition which shows the importance of strong collaboration, good craftsmanship and clear communication.

The exhibition, which is part of 3daysofdesign, investigates the quality of the curator and the presentation of a given design, and it focuses on the need for interdisciplinary process and communication. Designer Birgitte Due Madsen, architect Anne Dorthe Vester and curator Henriette Noermark have come together with the goal of creating a well-defined common mass, where all parties’ contributions to the exhibition are equally important.

While the dialogue is based on selected existing works by Birgitte Due Madsen (Lucid Chair, 2023, Neon Cast, 2023 and Breton Cubes, 2022) and Anne Dorthe Vester (Kilen, 2022 and Vitrine, 2023), it will result in a series of joint works signed by all three, with a clear kinship to the two designers’ existing portfolio. In the exhibition, these new works will be presented side by side with the objects that form the basis of the collaboration and the basis of the series’ existence.

The new series is a collection of handmade furniture consisting of terrazzo bases in combination with seats of lightweight slat structures in Douglas fir from Dinesen. The lightness of the seats becomes clear in the encounter with the heavy terrazzo modules, and the final design of the slatted structure appears at first glance and by its nature fragile, but is strong and durable.

Visual artist Sonja Ferlov Mancoba made use of the South African term ubuntu, which means “I am because we are” and signed several of her works EWS, the initials of her husband Ernest Mancoba, her son Wonga and herself. In Kinship, presence, dedication and inclusion become as important factors as the final object. The exhibition aesthetically and transparently highlights the often overlooked, unspoken or downright invisible collaborations that all designers, architects and curators take part in, and which raise the level of individual and serial works alike.

The exhibition was created in collaboration with Max Kejser Mortensen from Byggeselskabet C. F. Hansen. In the work with terrazzo, traditional and CO2-heavy materials are replaced with, among other things, crushed surplus glass from Holmegaard, recycled tiles and crushed concrete.

The Kinship exhibition is kindly supported by:

Nationalbankens Jubilæumsfond, Statens Værksteder, Dinesen, Byggeselskabet C. F. Hansen