DESIGN MUSEUM GHENT 2020
Vitrum
Vitrum is the Latin word for glass and the woad plant, yielding indigo.
Colour is an immaterial phenomenon generated by our senses through seemingly paradoxical mechanisms of reflection and absorption of light. When we modified the material to appear colourful this volatility becomes very tangible.
From the Egyptians to the “barbaric” Celts, blue has a history of its own. But if it weren’t for the acceptance of blue by the Christian religion, neither the cobalt blue stained-glass windows of the Basilica of Saint-Denis nor the altarpiece of Van Eyck would exist as we know them today.
The Vitrum installation aims to bring to life the colour and meaning of some of the most pivotal times in blue history. Like a painter’s canvas, glass sheets are suspended to depict each portrait. Vitrum is realised by WonderGlass in partnership with Studio Plastique using carefully crafted cast glass, vitrifying the colour to become alive only when exposed to light.
Vitrum was commissioned by the Design Museum Ghent for the exhibition Kleureyck: Van Eyck’s Colours in Design, 2020.
Photographed by Filip Dujardin.
ON DISPLAY:
Vitrum | Studio Plastique
PUBLIC DATES: 30th March 2020 – 21st February 2021
LOCATION: Design Museum Gent, Gent, Belgium