Virtual Textiology

Year 2012

Pieces 1

Video
Commissioned by: Textile Museum

Virtual Textiology (2012) was created for the Textile Museum of Canada's reDesign 2012 and acts as an interpretation of the mass-produced and textile-terse Eames chair. The Eames chair, was released in 1956 after years of considered and painstaking development by designers Charles and Ray Eames for the Herman Miller furniture company. The Eames' brothers famously sought to create furniture that would be mass-produced and affordable, with the exception of this particular Eames Lounge Chair that was intended as a luxury product. For many, this chair represents both extremes in the design world: the mass-produced (and largely plagiarized design), as well as the exquisitely-design and crafted, represented in the original. The looped video displays 63 individuals on the iconic chair. Viewers aren’t granted access to audio, but each “sitter” engages in discussion with the artist through their individual loops. Virtual Textiology is meant as a subtle criticism of mass consumption and production, casting each participant as a focus over the chair, its design and its infamous legacy.