Li Edelkoort vindt de vragen die de vertegenwoordigers van “Post Fossil” stellen erg interessant. “Kan de mensheid een meer betekenisvolle manier vinden om te consumeren? Kunnen wij breken met het verleden en de toekomst opnieuw heruitvinden?” In de Post Fossil-stroming, met een zware vertegenwoordiging van designers, ziet ze een echo van de Art Povera, de kunststroming met Italiaanse en Griekse kunstenaars die ook teruggrepen naar basismaterialen, zelfs steenkool. “Een nieuwe generatie gaan deze stroming doen herleven”, voorspelt Edelkoort, die van 1999 tot 2008 directeur was van de Design Academy in Eindhoven. Een vervolg, maar toch weer anders. Ze ziet steeds meer logo’s die een imitatie vormen van natuurlijke groeivormen. Niet naïef, maar filosofische vragen stellend die ingaan op de zin van ons bestaan als mens op aarde. Kortom: “De tijd van extreme veranderingen is aangebroken. We zijn gereed om definitief met de vorige eeuw te breken.” Haar volledige statement in het Engels luidt: “Time has come for extreme change. Society is ready to break away from last century for good. To break with creative conventions, theoretic rules and stigmas that now are questioned, challenged and broken. To break with a materialistic mentality replacing it with the materialisation of modest earth-bound and recomposed matter. In the aftermath of the worst financial crisis in decades, a period of glamorous and streamlined design for design!s sake comes to an end. A new generation of designers retrace their roots, refine their earth and research their history, sometimes going back to the beginning of time. In this process, they form and formulate design around exactly these natural and sustainable materials, favouring timber, hide, pulp, fibre, earth and fire; like contemporary cavemen, they reinvent shelter, redesign tools and manmade machines, and conceptualise archaic rituals for a more modest, contented and contained lifestyle. Like a Fred Flintstone of tomorrow. Bone structures give quality to pre-historic dwellings and millennial designs imitating the organic process of growth. Hand-blown glass and hand-thrown pottery will dominate the table of the future, presenting even slower food with forgotten vegetables and just local and seasonal produce. In general, materials will be matte and humble, however the earth and its hidden riches also invites this generation to employ minerals, alloys and crystals; adding lustre and sometimes even sheen to these fossil-like concepts and constructions. At times these designs will echo the essence of the arte povera movement which is bound to make a revival – soon.
Nature is a dominant ingredient in this movement, although no longer used in a naïve and aspiring ecological language, but as a mature philosophy fit for a newer age. Raising the questions that need to be raised… Can we do with less to become more?
Can design have a soul and therefore be animated?
Can man find a more meaningful way to consume?
Can we break with the past and reinvent the future?” P+ webtip 1: Post Fossil by Li Edelkoort
P+ webtip 2: Aquadyne van Jan Eric Visser