The Orbit's Orbit
Installation Rendering
©Matilde Cassani Studio/Salone del Mobile.Milano
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The Orbit’s Orbit.
The Salone del Mobile.Milano, in collaboration with West Bund Art & Design, presents a performative installation by the artist Matilde Cassani in Shanghai
The Salone del Mobile.Milano is holding an extraordinary event devoted to Italian design and a talk between Chinese and Italian designers in the new surroundings of The Orbit, the recently-completed building designed by Heatherwick Studio. The event is intended to underscore the importance of dialogue between different cultures and design visions and confirm the prominence of this particular market for Made in Italy.
NEWS
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The Orbit’s Orbit:
The Orbit's Orbit
Installation Rendering
©Matilde Cassani Studio/Salone del Mobile.Milano
a performative installation devoted to Italian design by Matilde Cassani
From 8th to 10th November, the Salone del Mobile.Milano will be holding its second great international event in China, a strategic market that ranked 7th in the top 25 export destinations for the wood-furniture supply chain in 2023, offering interesting business opportunities for Made in Italy. At the end of the year, Italy was thus confirmed as the leading furniture exporter to China, with a value of 479.01 million euros. This interest was confirmed at the 2024 edition of the 2024 edition of the Salone del Mobile.Milano, which – following the lengthy post-pandemic transition – saw China back in first place in terms of visitor numbers. The Salone, accompanied by the ITA – Italian Trade Agency, has chosen to make its return to China at and with West Bund Art & Design – its Partner for the occasion – a reference point in Shanghai's cultural scene, attracting galleries and visitors from all over the world: a prestigious event, a crossroads of the Chinese contemporary art system, which shares with the Salone the focus on innovation, creativity and being the ideal platform to explore the intersections between the two worlds.
This unique and visionary event, held at the futuristic property of the West Bund Central and designed by the architect Thomas Heatherwick, the Orbit blends design, art and culture into an immersive, powerfully impactful scenic and emotional experience. Inside the exhibition space, The Orbit’s Orbit: a performative installation devoted to Italian design and created by the artist Matilde Cassani – enlisted for her ability to move across the bounds of architecture, art and design – will come to life with recurring performances, demanding the participation of visitors invited to experience the installation and flesh out the suggestions proffered. The work is characterised by concentric spirals occupied by iconic products that embody the excellence of Italian design, and create an organic and constantly evolving structure. The exhibition area evokes a radial city playing host to an urban party, enlivened not just by the spatial mobility of the locals/spectators, but also and especially by an ideal and cultural mobility. The performers, walking in a single direction, take possession of the spaces occupied by design and turn them into an inhabited interior. Cassani’s work was directly inspired by The Orbit, by its shape, its semantic resonances and its expressive qualities. The space has become a repository of meaning, a virtual score played out by the powerful presence of furnishings by more than 30 exhibiting brands, the ballet dancers and the expertly choreographed visitors.
The Orbit's Orbit
Installation Rendering
©Matilde Cassani Studio/Salone del Mobile.Milano
Matilde Cassani had this to say: “The shape of The Orbit building implies a ritual dimension that we wanted to emphasise, using its spaces as the location for an orbiting performance, in which the interaction between the visitors and the environment becomes an integral part of the experience itself. For me, an exhibition means an encounter with the public, the project finds fulfilment with the arrival of the visitors. In this exhibition, public and objects share the role of protagonists of the performance, dialoguing in a perfect equilibrium”.
“With this second international event in China, the Salone del Mobile.Milano aims to oversee and stimulate a market that seems to be suffering, even though its high end is very lively and of great interest to Made in Italy,” commented Maria Porro, President of the Salone del Mobile.Milano. “As a trade fair, another major objective that we set ourselves is to support the exhibiting companies in grasping new opportunities in the processes of growth, development and marketing in this region; but equally, we are keen to strengthen our leadership of thought and vision which, today, goes beyond the bounds of traditional design, embracing the interaction between culture and design, architecture and art. This great, evocative performative event, born of a happy meeting with Matilde Cassani, is designed to become a hub where Italy and China intersect, where Italian design and Oriental culture and tradition can dialogue. A tangible sign of the Salone’s commitment to creating interdisciplinary and cultural connections that expand the language of design and throw open new avenues for contemporary creativity” she concluded.
Augusto di Giacinto, Director of the ITA – Italian Trade Agency in Shanghai had this to say: “Despite the new challenges facing the Chinese interior design sector, in 2023 Italy was the leading exporter to China in the furniture sector. This is clear evidence of the Chinese public's appreciation of Italian design and its recognition as a true global excellence. It is for this reason that the Salone del Mobile.Milano, with the support of the Italian Trade Agency, will be present in Shanghai this year with a series of events during the West Bund Art & Design in November, including the special project The Orbit's Orbit: a performative installation dedicated to Italian design by the artist Matilde Cassani.”
The Orbit's Orbit
Installation Rendering
©Matilde Cassani Studio/Salone del Mobile.Milano
Through the talks and events, which follow on from each other, day by day, the installation reasserts its mission as a place where design, the performing arts and cultural fabric of the city come together, triggering conversations and providing an opportunity to get to know the great masters of design and the new promises the sector holds. Spectators will be able to listen to the talks, seated on the furniture on exhibit, bringing together the didactic dimension and the physical and sensory experience of design, engendering a further transformation of the event – from a form of entertainment to a catalyst of knowledge and renewal.
Thus, on Friday 8th November, the installation will be the scene for the official opening talk of West Bund Art & Design Shanghai, at which Maria Porro, President of the Salone del Mobile.Milano, will speak.
Saturday 9th November will see the ADChina 100Young talk and ceremony, which will take a rounded, multifaceted look at the young Chinese design scene: the guests will include Maria Porro, a member of the jury that identified the 100 budding talents, and Marva Griffin Wilshire, curator and founder of SaloneSatellite, the prime meeting place for entrepreneurs/talent scouts and designers under 35.
On Sunday 10th November, the talk When Design Meets Art. A Conversation Between Italy and China will be held. Curated by Annalisa Rosso, Editorial Director & Cultural Events Advisor of the Salone del Mobile.Milano, it will proffer a multi-layered and multidisciplinary perspective, highlighting the way in which the dialogue between art and design can open new avenues for creativity and innovation, especially in a global context such as that between Italy and China. The talks will feature the Chinese designer Wu Bin, the visionary and farsighted thinker, famous for his unmistakable interior design style, Modern Orientalism; Aldo Cibic, the renowned Italian designer described by Andrea Branzi as “the simplest, the most powerful and the most reckless of all”; and Matilde Cassani, an artist straddling the border between visual arts and architecture, interested in developing design objects, installations, displays, visual communication and investigations into spaces and architectures geared to the performative dimension. All these choices reflect the Salone's commitment to promoting an innovative and culturally inclusive vision, capable of inspiring and connecting a global audience through art and design.
When & Where
8th – 10th November 2024
8th November: 1pm – 6pm
9th November: 12pm – 6pm
10th November: 12pm – 6pm
THE ORBIT
3299 Longteng Avenue, Xuhui District, Shanghai
West Bund Central | ORBIT
West Bund Central | ORBIT
Scan to visit
The registration system will be open on Oct.20th
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Programme
The Orbit's Orbit
Installation Rendering
©Matilde Cassani Studio/Salone del Mobile.Milano
Programme
Friday 8th November
2pm - 4pm
Art Waterfront International Forum
Speakers
Alan Chan, Designer
Simon Groom, Director of the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh
Maria Porro, President of the Salone del Mobile.Milano
Moderator: Cao Dan, President of Meta Media Art+/ Meta Media Group, Publisher of The Art Newspaper Chinese, Art Review China & LEAP
By invitation only
Saturday 9th November
2pm - 4pm
ADChina 100Young Conversation and Award Ceremony
Speakers
Maria Porro, President of the Salone del Mobile.Milano
Marva Griffin Wilshire, Curator and Founder of SaloneSatellite
Sunday 10th November
2pm - 3pm
When Design Meets Art. A Conversation Between Italy and China
Curated by Annalisa Rosso, Editorial Director & Cultural Events Advisor
Speakers
Aldo Cibic, Designer and Architect
Wu Bin, Designer
Matilde Cassani, Artist
Moderator: Wang Xu, Design Media Expert
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List of exhibiting companies
*The following ranking is in no particular order
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List of Chinese media partners
*The following ranking is in no particular order
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Biographies
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Institutional Profiles
Salone del Mobile.Milano
An international benchmark for the design and furnishing world, thanks to its extremely high quality exhibits since 1961, the Salone del Mobile.Milano is more than just a trade fair – it is an ecosystem capable of accelerating business and growing relationships across the industry, proffering new visions of the future of living. It takes place in April, with four annual exhibitions – the Salone Internazionale del Mobile, S.Project, Workplace3.0 and the International Furnishing Accessories Exhibition – with the biennial Euroluce in odd years, and EuroCucina with FTK, Technology For the Kitchen and the International Bathroom Exhibition in even years. Held alongside them since 1998, SaloneSatellite is the launch pad for young designers under 35 from all over the world and a point of reference for companies on the look-out for new talents. In 2024, the 62nd edition of the Salone del Mobile.Milano featured almost 2,000 exhibitors from 35 different countries, boasting an overall turnout of almost 371,000 presences, with the number of professionals up 28.6% compared with the previous edition, 65.6% of them from abroad. The Salone del Mobile has ISO 20121 Sustainable Events Management certification and is a member of the United Nations Global Compact.
www.salonemilano.it
West Bund Art & Design
West Bund Art & Design has served as a platform for international and local galleries exhibiting high quality contemporary works of art in Shanghai since 2014. As well as numerous exhibitions and events in museums in galleries, West Bund Art & Design, China’s leading art fair, enriches the arts scene in Shanghai, making it a crucial destination on the global arts scene.
http://www.westbundshanghai.com/
Stay tuned！
