Mostra Gerrit Rietveld – The Revolution of Space

From May 17 through September 16 2012 the Vitra Design Museum will be holding an important retrospective of the work of Gerrit Rietveld, one of the most important 20th century Dutch designers.

After an apprenticeship to a cabinet-maker he joined the neoplastic De Stijl movement founded by Theo van Doesburg and Piet Mondrian. One of his most famous works is the red and blue chair designed in 1918 with obvious references to Mondrian?s art.

Rietveld concentrated primarily on experimentation with various materials, such as plywood and aluminium, used to create furniture which was to become legendary, such as the abovementioned red and blue chair or the Zig-Zag Chair (1932).

Rietveld began working on architecture in 1945, designing the Dutch pavilion for the Biennale in Venice in 1954.
The exhibition also offered an important opportunity to compare Rietveld?s work with that of his contemporaries Piet Mondrian, Theo van Doesburg, Le Corbusier and Marcel Breuer.

(Agnese Bifulco)

Title: Gerrit Rietveld – The Revolution of Space
Dates: May 17 – September 16 2012
Location: Vitra Design Museum, Weil am Rhein, Germany
Illustrations: Thomas Dix, Maarten van Houten, Hans Wilschut/Centraal Museum Utrecht, VG Bild-Kunst - courtesy of Vitra Design Museum

www.design-museum.de

Captions

01
Exterior view of the Rietveld-Schröder-House. Design: Gerrit Rietveld & Truus Schröder, 1924, ©VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2012 Photo: Hans Wilschut/Centraal Museum Utrecht

02
Gerrit Rietveld with a model of the “core house”, 1941, ©VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2012

03
Coloured collotype of the interior of the Rietveld-Schröder-House with the girl’s sleeping area. Drawing: Gerrit Rietveld, 1951, ©VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2012

04
Red-Blue Chair. Design: Gerrit Rietveld, 1918/1923 ©VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2012, Photo: Thomas Dix

05
Zig-Zag Chair. Design: Gerrit Rietveld, ca. 1932, ©VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2012, Photo: Thomas Dix

06
Smoke Rietveld REDBLUE from the series „Where There’s Smoke“, created for Moss, New York. Design: Maarten Baas, 2004, Photo: Maarten van Houten

07
Aluminium Armchair. Design: Gerrit Rietveld, 1942, ©VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2012, Photo: Thomas Dix