On the shores of Lake Como, design is the protagonist of a thematic itinerary through nature, historic buildings and places devoted to creativity, leaving young international designers the task of reflecting on the past and reimagining the future.
The sixth edition of Lake Como Design Festival has come to an end, but I am sure that the discussions it triggered and the questions it asked will not dissolve in the wind with the advent of the next “must-attend” appointment in the increasingly busy design agenda. From September 16 to 22, the festival returned to revive the creative scene of Como with a series of events whose fil rouge was Lightness. “[…] Lightness is not superficiality, but gliding over things from above […]”, says the writer Italo Calvino in the essay Lezioni Americane (1988), which inspired the theme of the festival and the projects that made up its rich program. In this sense, the participating designers, artists, galleries, and companies have taught us that lightness does not coincide with vagueness and abandonment to chance, but with accuracy and determination.
In particular, the designers of the Contemporary Design Selection (CDS), for the second consecutive year under the guidance of Brussels-based curator Giovanna Massoni, have been able to interpret this apparently simple theme in an original way. The CDS is a multi-voiced exhibition that, year after year, aims to provide visitors with a diverse and multifaceted image of the current state of the international design scene. This year, as in a widespread kunsthalle, the works of the designers selected through an open call were exhibited in small and fascinating architectures scattered throughout the Chilometro della Conoscenza park, which connects three villas of great historical and artistic value: Villa Olmo – which last year hosted the Back To Nature exhibition -, Villa del Grumello – setting of the Lightness in Progress exhibition – and Villa Sucota, home of the Ratti Foundation.
Between greenhouses, chapels and lemon groves, Giovanna Massoni created a journey through different design approaches that spoke for themselves but at the same time were part of a broader vision. On display were a series of objects in dialogue with traditional craftsmanship and technology, in search of a fertile connection between past and present. Eliminating the superfluous and updating production techniques and materials in the name of sustainability and progress: this was the goal of 30+ selected artists, including studios, collectives, and independent designers divided into thematic clusters.
The first one, which interpreted the theme from a more literal point of view, focused on lightweight, the subtraction of materials and processes which also translates into a lower environmental impact, such as the Vivo chair by Sardinian designer Marino Secco. The other clusters, on the other hand, delved into the concept of lightness through more figurative but still concrete angles: agile, foldable, transportable objects, and thanks to these characteristics, also extremely user-friendly; but also, spaces of light, natural or constructed places that become stages of epiphanies, emotions, and sensations. Among the designers on display, some “friends” of the festival, such as Jonathan Bocca, with his recycled paper sculpture-objects, and Biancodichina, a contemporary porcelain studio that created an ethereal and delicate work, permeable to light. But also many new names: from Anton Burdakov, with his small-scale ceramic architectures, Alice Pilastre + Mathilde Tinturier + Andy Farrow who created mobiles made of natural materials, ceramic and metal, and Atelier Pampa, who played with the transitory nature of wax, to ENEI, a design duo from Argentina, Paulina Herrera Letelier, a Chilean designer who studied the architecture of lighthouses and the projection of their light beams, and curaa studio, a Milanese collective that celebrates the lightness with which it would be possible to inhabit our places, both natural and artificial.
The frame for this varied parterre was a series of exhibitions, events and curated talks that enlivened the city of Como for over a week, underlining, as Giovanna Massoni states, that design is a narrative practice, a means of telling stories that draw from the past and boldly project themselves into the future. Written stories, as in the exhibition Lightness on Paper, in collaboration with the publishing house Lithos, a reflection on the heavy and impetuous act of engraving in stone, wood and metal that through ancient and precious techniques gives life to works of sublime delicacy, both in concept and in medium – paper -, or impalpable and elusive as in 8 Days of Lightness by the creative couple formed by the Latvian artists Bai Bai and Erlands, who put in place a continuous eight-day performance triggered by the relationship between Erlands’ body and Bai Bai’s collectible design glass pieces.
LINK
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