Verner Panton: The Collected Works is a travelling exhibition by the Vitra Design Museum from Germany, currently in Singapore at the National Museum until July.
Verner Panton (1926-1998) was a Danish designer who really pushed the envelope of household design. The exhibition includes more than a hundred pieces of furniture, lighting fixtures, textiles and documents. Fascinating stuff.
His work is fascinating. I thought furniture was going to be boring, but I was so wrong. His designs are a little retro but very functional, using color to announce their presence. The best term I’ve come up with to describe any of is “Ikea on steriods and LSD”, because it has that Scandanavian practicality but in bold, bright colors and plastic.
The children's play area
The exhibition had a children’s play area directly outside the gallery, with colorful jigsaw mats that could moved around and stuffed blocks with interesting information about color. There was also an activity booklet for children aged 6 to 9.
The Panton chair
Panton is most famous for his Panton chair, which was the first chair ever to be made out of a single piece of plastic. I know it looks unstable and uncomfortable, but there were a few in the exhibition that you could actually sit on, and I can tell you that they’re not unstable or uncomfortable. They’re quite comfy, actually, and they don’t wobble when you shift your weight.
Panton also designed light fixtures, some of which look quite spectacular. I read that his designs focused on delivery light in a way that wouldn’t produce glare, and his use of colored lights to create atmosphere is fascinating.
Panton was, at one point, also a big fan of modular furniture, which was basically furniture that were made up of different sections that could be rearranged at will.
Flying Chairs
Which isn’t to say that his designs were boring. Some of it was clearly experimental, and maybe with a little fine tuning, could have gone into production.
The highlight of the exhibition was probably Phantasy Landscape. Originally shown at the Visionia 2 furniture fair in Cologne in 1970, it was partially reconstructed for the travelling exhibition.
There are no real words to describe it, beyond wonderful; I don’t have any pictures as my camera battery died, but you could actually go inside and interact with the exhibit, which was primarily organic shapes created out of wood and a sort of wool-type material.