Studio Job: Reformulating Relationship Between Functionality and Hyper Aesthetics
This Belgian design studio has emerged as one of the maximum exponents of avant-garde art and design.
Founded in 2000 by Job Smeets and Nynke Tynagel, Studio Job has become synonymous with avant-garde, innovation and style. Since 2009 it has operated its own curatorial space in Antwerp, Belgium, and which is just one more of its multiple activities that has allowed it to distance itself from the general trend and exude brilliance.
Smeets reflects on the project, saying: “Unlike many others, we probably did not emerge from Modernism. Studio Job’s contribution is that we have rediscovered a lost road. Consciously and carefully we are positioning the decorative arts in the 21st century. Is that design? Whatever. Is that art? Whatever, seriously.”
Although its work could be related with movements of rupture, such as Bauhaus, Arts and Crafts or Art Nouveau, the studio’s aims are not to reclaim old forgotten forms. In reality Studio Job is renewing the way in which art, decoration and design are related: they fuse diverse creative solutions such as old skills with high-tech tools, creating aesthetic caprices, extrovert beauty that inspires and amazes for its brilliance.
The founders of the studio have the support of a group of specialists in diverse fields of work. Pooling their skills has enabled them to create pieces that do not require usefulness in order to survive: sculptured objects that radically transform the spaces they occupy, animating them and altering perceptions that seek to decipher them.
Recently, both Smeets and Nynke have opted to abandon functionality and dedicate themselves to create “something resembling art,” broadening their spectrum of creation to free forms and ideas. The recipients of awards on multiple occasions and with a long list of international exhibitions to their names, the studio is constantly redefining itself.
It is impossible to minimize the work of Studio Job, and futile to try to categorize their creations. All that is left is to take delight in them while appreciating the work of the group that is currently the most revolutionary, committed and outstanding in the world of material aesthetics.
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