Presence of the immaterial – form and expression
“Design … is an expression of the capability of the human mind to step beyond,” wrote the design theorist George Nelson in 1957, referring to the manifold possibilities that reside in human thinking, and which, ideally, find their way into products. Thus interpreted, design is a process of thinking whereby the onlooker creates the form of a product just as much as the person who created it. The French architect, Jean Nouvel, is constantly on the search for new forms to give expression to his designs, sounding the limits and possibilities of innovative materials and technologies in his work as an architect and designer. With the SKiN sofa, a design with a strongly avant-garde appearance, he now intends to give shape to something that is “essential” – a new kind of comfort is to be achieved through leaving things out. The sofa concept emerged while planning for the Musée du Quai Branly in Paris and the solutions, developed especially for the architecture of that museum, have now been transferred in an interdisciplinary approach to a piece of furniture. The SKiN sofa consists of a supporting structure in tubular pretensioned steel that holds another structure, the cover in double leather. A distinctive feature is that this upholstery is supported only by self-modelling geometric incisions. The SKiN sofa thus looks as if modelled from one piece, and the seat area in particular seems to be floating. SKiN is surprisingly comfortable and the leather feels soft and delicate. Its form is recreated through the senses and in the imagination of the beholder – a presence that is disclosed as a tactical experience of the immaterial.
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