Shiro Kuramata's 'Miss Blanche' Chair
photo: phillips
Shiro Kuramata first exhibited his now iconic Miss Blanche chair at KAGU Tokyo Designer’s Week, Axis Gallery Annex in 1988 and in Paris the following year in a solo exhibition of the designer’s work at Galerie Yves Gastou. The design initiated a series of works in Kuramata’s late career, which explored the expressive potential of acrylic. Experimenting with the material’s transparent ‘non-existent’ quality, often combined with industrial materials such as aluminium as seen in the present work, Kuramata created objects imbued with feeling and memory, which carried a meaning beyond their practical function. Reflecting Kuramata’s poetic approach to design and affinity for experimenting with new materials and innovative technologies, these works demonstrate a sensitive exploration of light, colour and form, considered within the surrounding space. Describing the present design, Kuramata explained, ‘This chair has no details. Or rather, please think of the whole chair as a detail. This work has been designed in homage to Miss Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire written by Tennessee Williams’
