ANDREA ANASTASIO
SOLO SHOW

February 20th – March 20th, 2015
Galleria Giustini / Stagetti, former Galleria O.
Roma

The one-of-a-kind works designed by Andrea Anastasio for the gallery – tables, carpets and seats – are characterised by the use of materials that are contrasting in its make-up and origin, express the need to symbolically verify the relevance of a constructive process based on the compatibility of jarring juxtapositions. The rigidity and hardness of the stone are, in fact, juxtaposed with the softness and flexibility of the fabric; the spontaneity of geological formations are confronted with the manufactured artefact, the variety of shades and textures found in nature are paired with those industrially produced, as if within these two poles you could articulate the entire horizon of human habitation.
The same approach is used in the processing of the materials. Both the heavy-and- fragile (marble) and those soft (textile) are processed by a combination of traditional craftsmanship and modern technology. The tables, for example, are built by using the ancient gesture of “mending”, which in this case is made with leather laces that are applied to hold together fragments and slabs of marble – like yellow of Siena, the black Belgian, the Levanto red – that were previously modelled with the aid of a computerized water jet cutter machine.
The making of the carpets follow a similar principle. Strips of handwoven velvet jacquard (Colony-Rome) are cut and edged with industrial machine to be then interlaced by hand thus enhancing the compositional texture by contrasting colours, styles and patterns.
Similarly, the idea of enriching the aesthetics and the semantics of a domestic interior is obtained by introducing an innovative and rather subversive chair composed by seemingly unstable and fragile stack of pillows. The “pillow-case” chair is made out of three cushions, upholstered with velvets designed by Raf Simons for Kvadrat, and by silk satin manufactured by Verel de Belval.
It transforms the cushion from an accessorial element of interior decoration into a proper and solid piece of furniture.