DESIGN DE PRODUTO BRASILEIRO: DESTE LADO DO ESPELHO BRAZILIAN PRODUCT DESIGN: FROM THIS SIDE OF THE MIRROR
when a curatorial choice becomes more easily personal, based on own experiences, and risk becoming less representative than intended. Thus, it is imperative to accept this is not an all-encompassing sample of Brazilian design, but rather a curatorial choice of a few objects to represent the proposed topics around which this dialogue will develop. This is just the start of a conversation between designers from Brazil and Poland. An exchange is expected, more experiences to be added – may this dialogue be prolific! PRODUCT DESIGN THROUGH FILTERED MIRRORS Five threads were set as filters to the products exhibited here – unequal, not necessarily the most representative, arbitrary, difficult to offset, fruits of this casual encounter. Indeed an additional challenge proposed by the exhibition. FURNITURE Furniture was supposed to be the easiest choice. With a strong internal market, and the tradition of Modern architecture demanding high quality and well-designed furniture dating to the first half of the twentieth century, Brazilian designers have added recently a good number of international awards, corroborating a well-established sector of design industry in the country. The choice, however, was geared to a radical experiment that traverses several borders not usually crossed. Blind co-designers were the right choice for this exhibition. A disruptive innovation of the process. GLASS Glass is not a material to be regularly found in many portfolios of Brazilian designers – with the exception of commercial packaging. It is however a strong industrial sector, set to the proportions of the country, and also traditionally familiar to recycling. How innovative could design be when it comes to recycling glass and turning it into useful objects that may also share formal statements? PORCELAIN Porcelain is an industry where Brazil cannot be paired with the tradition of European manufacturers - dating back to the sixteenth century. Nonetheless, there are examples of elaborate graphic interventions and even some formal boldness can be noticed on Brazilian porcelain industries. But what else can design devise out of this material aside from tea and coffee mugs, plates, and the entire traditional dinnerware? TRADITION Tradition allies with design in the elaboration and translation of the vernacular culture into other segments of products. Appropriation, meta-language, exaltation of popular culture? These cross-social references can aggrandize design, as much as carnival does in popularizing elite culture. Different from crafts-based design, what we recognize here as tradition-led design embeds and reframe elements of grassroots culture, turned into a refreshing and lavish blend –
DESIGN DE PRODUTO BRASILEIRO: DESTE LADO DO ESPELHO BRAZILIAN PRODUCT DESIGN: FROM THIS SIDE OF THE MIRROR
similar to what graphic design so frequently does incorporating vernacular graphics and typography. INNOVATION Innovation - oriented design experiments can be technology-driven even while focusing on low-tech. Contemporary Brazilian design is increasingly paying more attention to sustainability, and as a corollary, materials research is strongly focused on the natural, sustainable, available and recycled. The choice has fallen over a eco-driven, labour-intensive, high social impact project, to typify this innovative enterprise of Brazilian contemporary design. Gabriel Patrocínio