African visual culture, although vast and diverse much like its continent and people, is characterised by a dramatically expressive narrative.
Territorio is a collection of functional pieces based on a visual research which explores traditional African sculpture, objects, architecture and costumes. The collection is a composition of a series of formal elements such as thicknesses, proportions, mass, stature and synthetic geometries gathered in the research.
Set | Greta Cevenini
Photo | Pietro Cocco
"Territorio" is a fascinating project conceived by the design studio CARA \ DAVIDE and intends to create a territorial and generational reflection on African culture in relation to our contemporary culture. The collection, consisting of three aesthetically harmonious objects, is the result of an in-depth visual and historical research, mainly referring to sub-Saharan Africa. With an interdisciplinary approach between art and architecture, the designer-artists, in a sort of journey through Africa, collected and catalogued numerous photographs of objects of use, masks, architectures and decorations in order to extrapolate some significant characteristics: thicknesses, proportions, irregular surfaces and synthetic geometries. This careful analysis of a diversity of objects belonging to very distant populations highlights similarities and compose a common code that is an expression of how one lives with nature.
Production in Africa is strongly characterised by the relationship that the producers establish with the environment that surrounds them, with the procurement of the material, with the tools for processing and with the choice of colours and finishes. The artefact is not only the exclusive work of the creator-artisan but becomes a synthesis of a union of forces between nature with its materials and the ingenuity and technique of man.
The objects of African cultures celebrate the harmony between man and the territory in which he lives, whereas our industrial dimension is dominant, anthropocentric and often not respectful of the environment. The search for balance between man and nature becomes a predominant aspect in the design of objects in the collection of designers CARA \ DAVIDE.
Interpreting contemporaneity and contextualising this careful analysis, the city becomes the place in which to establish harmony between creator and territory. The materials used for the objects in the collection replace logs of wood, animal skins or red soil with mass-produced, semi-finished pieces, standard plastic components, plywood panels or industrial production waste. The rhythm of the objects of the "Territorio" collection is dictated by the rhythm of industrial production with standards of radii, curves and thickness defined by the manufacturers. The three objects of “Territorio”, with essential and pure lines, celebrate the harmony and balance between the design studio CARA \ DAVIDE and the productive environment in which we live.
Text by Giuliana Montrasio
