Landscale

The young Lausanne designer Adrien Rovero takes over the ground floor of the mudac with Land­scale, an exhib­i­tion tailored to fit the museum’s spaces, part land­scape, part a play on the concept of scale and part land itself.
Adrien Rovero opened his studio in 2006. He is an indus­trial designer known partic­u­larly for his furnish­ings, light­ing and sceno­graphy. He combines an exper­i­mental flair frequently presen­ted – and bought – by insti­tu­tions such as the Pomp­idou Centre, the Grand-Hornu and the mudac, with commis­sions for estab­lished brands includ­ing Hermès, Kreo, Pfister and the Manu­fac­ture de Sèvres, altern­at­ing limited edition runs with larger-scale produc­tion.

In just a few years Adrien Rovero has built up an inter­na­tional follow­ing for his ingeni­ous, often humor­ous, but restrained designs, and his effect­ive and subtle sceno­graphy. Draw­ing inspir­a­tion from everything from muscle cars to the texture of sweets, his work involves assem­bling, twist­ing and discon­nect­ing shapes, mater­i­als, refer­ences and expect­a­tions. His unique­ness lies in his vast range, his use of mater­i­als (Partic­ules, a stool made of compressed wood chips) and scale (Cabane perchée, a human-sized bird house), his abil­ity to trans­late from two to three dimen­sions, and a solid connec­tion to the needs of every­day life: respect for the envir­on­ment, with the Saving Grace lamps designed for low-energy light­bulbs, and multi­func­tion­al­ity with Flip, a sofa that turns into a table.

Land­scale offers visit­ors the chance to immerse them­selves in the design­er’s universe through a sceno­graphy that uses trans­lu­cent screens to elim­in­ate all the usual points of refer­ence, present­ing modules as autonom­ous islands within the exhib­i­tion space. The exhib­i­tion plays on the concept of scale: the objects on display may be small-scale models, enlarged versions, or even the produc­tion objects them­selves, but at first sight it is not obvi­ous which. The spec­tat­or’s perspect­ive is distor­ted – larger than life or Lilli­pu­tian. It reflects Rover­o’s modus operandi, using distor­tion of scale to inspire thought and creativ­ity.

Two of Adrien Rover­o’s projects will be on public display for the first time: the Oper­cule collec­tion commis­sioned by the Cristaller­ies de Saint Louis, and the Rock cable car, part of the Moun­tain Climbers project.

The 160-page bilin­gual (fr/en) exhib­i­tion cata­logue is produced by the mudac and Infolio, with texts by Alex­an­dra Midal and Chantal Prod’Hom. It is the first mono­graph on Adrien Rovero.