John Cederquist

I want to share these 2 videos from John Cederquist. He is a californian furniture artist whose work is highly recognizable. By combining 2D images with 3D objects, he creates visual illusions, where the reality is not what you see. It often looks like there is some object on the furniture, though it is all flat wood and you can actually use the furniture.
The first video shows him explaining his work during an exhibition, and the second one shows the Kosode serie, which are some of his last works. I found it particularly interesting to see how he uses the different wood species to get the colours and aspects he wants. I like his way to "go crazy" with the wood, too often designers don't really care about the wood, and woodworkers don't dare to go off the track. John Cederquist is very personal and innovative in his designs, but shows a great respect for the material at the same time.
The best would be to see the artworks in real but it is not easy on this side of the atlantic, so have a look at the pictures on his website: johncederquist.com.

Furniture artist Erwan Boulloud

I was in Paris last weekend, and it is a great pleasure to discover each time I am there new galleries showing and selling unique pieces of art furniture.
I visited the Acabas gallery on the Boulevard des Filles du Calvaire, and they had an impressive cabinet, 2,60 meters high, called "Fracture verticale", made by Erwan Boulloud. It is made of burned and waxed wood on a steel structure and it looks like it has been crushed by a big bloc of concrete. Eye-catching and humorous at the same time. Erwan Boulloud works with wood, metal, concrete, and some nice lights were also on display at the gallery.
Here are some of his previous works, find out more on acabas.fr