Autoprogettazione Revisted: Easy-to-Assemble Furniture by Enzo Mari and Invited Guests

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Autoprogettazione Revisted: Easy-to-Assemble Furniture by Enzo Mari and Invited Guests is a group exhibition that traces the influence of Italian designer Enzo Mari's 1970's project for self-made furniture. Using the AA Gallery as a project space, ten artists and designers were commissioned to respond to Mari's instruction-based furniture plans with their own set of instructions. In a text accompanying the instructions, Mari writes that ‘anyone, apart from factories and traders, can use the designs to make them by themselves'. Seen originally by Mari as a means for the self-fabrication of quality design objects, Autoprogettazione continues today as an expression of collaborative design thinking made topical by a recent proliferation of digital technologies. As part of the exhibition, AA First Year Studio Master Valentin Bontjes van Beek will lead a workshop allowing AA students — Korey Kromm, Alma Wang and Stefan Laxness — to respond to the Autoprogettazione manual, and through the modification of Mari's instructions, generate work that experiments with the scale and material of the furniture. Contributors: Phyllida Barlow Broussard/Seilles Martino Gamper Ryan Gander Graham Hudson Keung Caputo Lucas Maassen Joe Pipal