Young French interior designers and craftspeople are being spotlighted at the Villa Albertine’s historic Payne Whitney Mansion, in an exhibit functioning as the centerpiece of the fourth annual “Oui Design! Festival.”
On display is a diversity of decorative and functional pieces, styles and materials — from the textile weaving by Lily Alcarez and Léa Berlier, and the lacquer technique of Nicolas Pinon, to the ceramic designs by Céline Salomon and the chair design from Atelier Monier.
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The pieces range from fresh to compelling to curious in character. But all couldn’t have been displayed in a better manner, on the second floor of the stunning 1909 Renaissance-style landmark mansion on Fifth Avenue designed by Stanford White, and set upon scenography consisting of a large, circular minimalist counter and pedestals created by Harry Nuriev of Crosby Studios.
Oui Design! is supported by the Fondation Bettencourt Schueller and Manufactures Nationales, and held in conjunction with the NYCxDesign, the weeklong celebration of architecture, fashion, technology and interior design. Oui Design! provides open studios, panel discussions, artists-in-residence programs, and immersive encounters across the city, along with the exhibit.
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“Among New Yorkers, there is a curiousness about let’s say, ‘French savoir faire,’ or know how,” said Diane Josse, the cultural attaché at Villa Albertine, the cultural arm of the French Embassy in the U.S. “Oui Design! brings artists and craftsmen selected by a French and American jury panel to come to New York for a week to present their work, and organizes meetings for them with interior decorators, agencies and galleries to understand what Americans have a taste for, what might work for them here, and how to extend their businesses in the U.S. Several of the designers in the show have already done renovation work in mansions or have staged exhibits in the U.S. Several are now exhibiting here for the first time.”
Frantz Wehrle, a traditional French craftsman, who paints hotels, residences, offices and even castle interiors, and designs decorative pieces, displayed his painted wood icosahedron decorative piece. “I’m honored to have been selected by the Foundation Bettencourt and Villa Albertine,” said Wehrle. “I’m also happy because I’m seeing a new generation of designers and interior decorators who have interest in faux finishes and other ideas which maybe shakes me up out of some of my old habits.”
Romi Texier and Valentin Vie-Bienet of the design team Xolo Cuintle are first-time exhibitors in the U.S. with an unconventional approach to sculpture and installation. They displayed decorative ornamental pieces in concrete, one depicting a cross section of a flower; the other, a hybrid plant.
“We work on pieces that dialogue with each other,” said Texier. “It’s quite unusual to sculpt the way we do. You create a mold, pour the liquid concrete in, and then it solidifies. Concrete is a material we see as very present in everyday life. I feel it encapsulates many stories, and we use it in an organic way. We often inlay ceramic pieces within the concrete. We also work in wood, but we are identified more through our use of concrete.”
Sophia Taillet, participating in Oui Designs! artists-in-residence program and exhibiting for the first time in the U.S., works in metal and glass. She is displaying three of her aluminum “spinning mirrors” that can be freely pushed to revolve smoothly on flat, round bases.
“The idea was to bring movements into the objects as they interact with the environment,” she said. “The installation I made in collaboration with a dancer. In the end, it was kind of like a conversation between me and the dancer. I also worked with a specific craftsman. It’s a very industrial technique used for airplanes.”
The spinning mirrors, she said, are “quite light actually. I try to find a new way to perceive function and not just imagine a simple mirror.”
Among those viewing the show was Sasha Viksom, an interior designer and product designer. “Oui Design! really brings the French sensibility to New York. There is so much crossover to New Yorkers who are incredibly smart shoppers, intellectual, and have a deep sense of the arts and craftsmanship. So bringing this to New York is probably one of the most exciting moments of this NYCxDesign week, and we’re being introduced to young, emerging talent, which is really hard to find, and finding it in such a beautiful space.”
Others exhibiting at Oui Design! are Juliette Tellier, a trans-disciplinary designer working between industrial design, anthropology and craftsmanship. She has realized projects across a variety of domains, from exhibition scenography to object design, including experimental archaeology. For the show, she displayed a candle-shaped thermal paper machine reimagined to produce lotto tickets. Artist/designer Yassine Ben Abdallah, who displayed a porcelain vase, has a background in social sciences and merges design, social science and sculpture to highlight neglected narratives, often using materials like sugar, machetes as well as porcelain.