“What art does — maybe what it does most completely — is tell us, make us feel that what we think we know, we don’t. There are whole worlds around us that we’ve never glimpsed.” Greil Marcus — Friday June 27th — —

The idea is to die young as late as possible. — Ashley Montagu — Friday June 27th — —

I love listening. It is one of the only spaces where you can be still and moved at the same time. — Nayyirah Waheed — Friday June 27th — —

Archives by Studio Job for NLXL

This inspiring collaboration between Dutch quality wallpaper producer NLXL and designers Studio Job was unveiled last April, during Salone del Mobile. In the collaboration existing patterns from Studio Job’s library of icons and images were adapted and extended to compositions of nine meters. Unique and without repeat, the collection reflects a retrospect of the history of Studio Job, which on a material basis was also the case in the design for Land Rover. Studio Job used archetypical drawings, combined as iconographic elements for patterns and compositions, ultimately creating 7 designs: Industry, Labyrinth, Perished, Alt Deutsch, l’Afrique and Withered Flowers, the latter in black and white and in color. These patterns, icons and compositions were originally created amongst others for their own work and projects in design, art and fashion and now applied beautifully as wallpapers.

The plain white wall behind a painting is an idea from modernism. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, it was not uncommon to present art on very ornamented silk wallpaper. But let me put it another way: with this wallpaper you no longer need any paintings. Viewed in this way, per running meter, it is relatively cheap art.

Studio Job was founded in 2000 by Job Smeets and Nynke Tynagel both graduates of the Design Academy Eindhoven now based in Antwerp and Amsterdam. They redefine the applied arts for the contemporary age. Their collaboration has created highly expressive, mainly one-off or limited edition works, from the outset. Opulent, intricate and ironic, Studio Job combine an extraordinarily high level of craftsmanship with extreme ornamentation. They reference both the traditional and the topical, the organic and the artificial. This narrative conveys a tension between the good and the bad exploring all facets of each.

NLXL was founded in the Netherlands in November 2010. The company focuses on premium quality wallpaper. NLXL is known for the Scrapwood Wallpaper collection, brainchild of designer Piet Hein Eek and NLXL founders Rick and Esther Vintage. This collection won the Editor’s award at ICFF New York in 2011 and can be found in the permanent collection of Smithsonian Cooper-Hewitt Museum. NLXL has developed collections with Paris based concept store Merci, Piet Boon, Arthur Slenk and Piet Hein Eek.

For more information see here.