Project

Conceivably, The Object Is What It Seems (Publication)

Year

2010

Lucas
Maassen

Conceivably, The Object Is What It Seems (Publication)
Conceivably, The Object Is What It Seems (Publication)
Conceivably, The Object Is What It Seems (Publication)
Conceivably, The Object Is What It Seems (Publication)
Conceivably, The Object Is What It Seems (Publication)
Conceivably, The Object Is What It Seems (Publication)

PUBLICATION

Material:
Offset print

Size:
750 copies

 

Publisher: Onomatopee

Key to the work of Lucas Maassen is a process of validation through perception. To what extent are aspects of scale and matter fundamental to determine and pronounce typological objects? In a highly playful manner, Maassen manipulates the parameters of conceiving objects; deriving from recognisable functionality into a fictional realm of attributed economic value as limited or as matter, both effectively qualitative realities, he qualitatively measures these up to apparent conditions of the imaginary.
Utilising exclusive materials and technologies, a secondary layer of tension of conceiving objects arises. A toy chair made of pure gold, poured out of one bar of gold, raises the question of its value: emotional vs. real value. Likewise, a chair created by a Focus Electron Beam (FEB), results in a chair so small that even a regular microscope cannot reveal this seat. This chair is a leap of faith into technological authorship. Our day-to-day empirical reality is just not good enough to capture these objects. To what extent is technological culture able to transmit empirical experiences to our mindset? And moreover, our cultural tradition tells us that a chair has four legs but what happens when these notions are being challenged by a non-empirical, technological order?

Measuring up chairs to the extent that they seem to generate a life of their own; through a character derived from inner qualities beyond any man-conceived sphere, Maassen creates an imaginative order.

The accompanying publication features texts by Sonquis Moreno, writer/editor on design in various forms, and Freek Lomme, curator/writer and director of Onomatopee. Moreno lively portrays Maassen's 'design act' in its sphere of being, while Lomme playfully levels up the scope of his work to some ontological and empirical parameters. Furthermore, some processes and hypotheses hit the light within this publication!

Text by: Freek Lomme
Text publication: Shonquis Moreno and Freek Lomme
Graphic design: Raw Color
With the kind support of: City of Eindhoven and BKKC