London shoe designer Tracey Neuls and Danish artist Nina Saunders have collaborated to create an installation using fabrics by British textile brand Sanderson at Neuls' London shop.
Called Most Curious, the installation features a sculpture by Saunders with upholstery bursting out of a chair frame and spilling onto the floor.
Two shoe designs by Neuls are also on show, featuring cast rubber soles covered in Sanderson fabrics.
Above: Squirrel & Dove
The exhibition celebrates the textile company's 150th anniversary.
More about Tracey Neuls on Dezeen: Shop&Show (February 2009)
Here's some more information from Tracey Neuls:
Tracey Neuls, Nina Saunders, Sanderson
In February 2010 in time for London Fashion Week, footwear designer Tracey Neuls will open her shop TN29 at 29 Marylebone Lane for a 3-way collaboration involving acclaimed contemporary artist Nina Saunders, and revered British textiles company, Sanderson on the eve of the latter’s 150th anniversary.
Above: Eglantine
The collaboration will be anchored by a large-scale sculpture from Nina Saunders and a dedicated collection of shoes from Tracey, both employing reissued vintage Sanderson textiles. Nina’s sculpture, a characteristi- cally morphed, melting item of furniture, upholstered in Sanderson, sets the scene for this sensual and play- ful subversion of the expected. Tracey’s shoes take this further. Cast rubber soles are deftly inserted with Sanderson textile meaning the shoes have pattern top to bottom - a trailblazing approach in footwear, yet the cut and feel remain uncompromised – exquisite!
The Spring Summer 2010 collection is Tracey Neuls’ most recent foray into an ongoing preoccupation with textile, surface and sculptural form. Her vision is one that goes beyond the shoe, and her shop’s eclectic displays reflect her openness. This chimes nicely with Sanderson who have throughout their history forged links with dynamic designers and artists, encouraging a stream of innovation to mingle with the timeless- ness of their product.
As Tracey says, “a collaboration that combines three completely different disciplines and generates contra- dictions like classic/ avant-garde, or heritage/ timeless is exactly what 29 Marylebone Lane is about”.
The project represents a coming together of shared mind-sets, combining artistic innovation with a healthy respect for traditional craftsmanship. February brings an enmeshing of design, art, and decoration - foot- wear, furniture, and interiors. There are untold stories sewn into the fabric here. We invite you to come and experience them for yourselves.
SANDERSON
In 2010, Sanderson will celebrate its 150th anniversary, a momentous occasion for the oldest surviving English brand in its field. The Sanderson story spans many eras of changing tastes and styles and the designs have moved with the times, always reflecting contemporary style and new technologies.
Whether through several important technical innovations, its production of textiles and wallpapers by influential designers, or its provision of Britain’s first ‘infinite’ range of colours in household paints, Sanderson has had a significant impact on the decorator trade since its foundation by Arthur Sanderson in 1860. Moving with the times, it has survived when many other great firms failed, and over the years acquired a massive collection of wallpapers and textiles representing the history of its milieu, from the Arts & Crafts style, jazzy Moderne, fifties’ Festival designs and Pop patterns, to decidedly contemporary art and decor. The company has experienced both success and struggle across its fifteen decades, and is proud to remain today a prosperous British business with an international reputation for lasting quality and timeless style.
TRACEY NEULS
Tracey Neuls has over the last 9 years established herself as a vital force in contemporary design. Since graduating from Cordwainers', she has built a reputation for innovative yet idiosyncratic shoe making. With a string of awards under her belt (including New Generation, Design Week Benchmark, and Royal Society of Arts), she continues season upon season to present mould-breaking collections - unique yet always distinctively Tracey Neuls. Tracey is the author of TN_29, signature Tracey Neuls, and now Homage collections. Like Eileen Gray last century (to whom she has been compared), her work shuns mainstream fads, opting for a more timeless approach. Each shoe bears the mark of a questioning mind and instinctive feel for form and material. She describes herself as sponge-like - attracted to the small things in life. Fugitive moments that have inspired, forms and textures she has moulded or admired, re-surface in her collections. If you like playing detective, the details worked into her designs - maps imprinted into the sole, the upper pulled down over a heel, a fastening that mimics a stationery clasp - are clues to be discovered.
NINA SAUNDERS
Nina Saunders was born in Odense, Denmark in 1958 and trained at Central St Martin's, London. The artist creates a series of sculptures which are both funny and quirky, yet at the same time quiet and contemplative, from a range of medium including concrete, leather, textiles and bronze. Recent exhibitions include Nature or Nurture, Galleri Specta, Copenhagen, Art Futures, Contemporary Art Society, London, Here for Now, the apartment, Athens and domestic (f)utility and Autumn Leaves at the New Art Centre. She is included in many public collections around the world including the Arts Council Collection; the Modern Museum, Stockholm, Sweden; Esbjerg Kunstmuseum, Denmark and the Saatchi Collection, London. She lives and works in London.
Nina has utilized Sanderson and Morris & Co. fabrics within a number of her previous works including Making Love to Flowers 1997, Smothered 1999, Never 1999, So and So 2003 (all Sanderson), Autumn Flowers at the Pallant House Art Gallery, Chichester, 2008 (Morris & Co.) and Refuge – an artwork incorporating Sanderson fabric to be displayed as part of the Very Sanderson: 150 Years of English Decoration at the Fashion & Textile Museum London from 19 March – 13 June 2010.