a sales exhibition with:
A series of prints called
"Still Lives With Borrowed Furniture" by
Jan van Toorn
Selection of furniture from the collection of
Frans Leidelmeijer
Cris Agterberg
H.P. Berlage
Jac. van den Bosch
Dolf Breetvelt
W.H. Gispen
Hildo Krop
A.J. Kropholler
Geert Lap
Marc Newson
Gaetano Pesce
Gerrit Rietveld
Paul Schuitema
November 13, - January 22, 2012
opening Sunday November 13, 4 pm by
Dr. Timo de Rijk, Professor Design Cultures at VU University Amsterdam
Jan van Toorn is one of the most significant and influential Dutch graphic designers to have emerged since the early 1960s. While graphic design often does little more than give unthinking visual form to the status quo, Van Toorn focused on meaning rather than smooth stylistic expression and developed critical alternatives to the usual design world conventions.
Van Toorn aligned himself with the reflexive tradition of art and communication exemplified by Brecht and Godard. His designs persistently call attention to their status as visual contrivances, obliging the viewer to make an effort to process their complexities. Van Toorn wanted the public to measure the motives of both the client and the designer who mediates the client’s message against their own experiences of the world. He hoped in this way to stimulate a more active and sceptical view of art, communication, media ownership and society.
Projects such as Van Toorn’s posters and catalogues for the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven and his long-running series of calendars for the printing firm Mart.Spruijt are powerful demonstrations of graphic design used as a means of commentary and as a tool of critique. Later, as director of the Jan van Eyck Academy, Van Toorn drew together all the strands of his critical practice into a multi-levelled educational initiative that urged designers to think harder about design’s role in shaping contemporary reality.
In 1971 Frans Leidelmeijer and his late partner Daan van der Cingel opened a shop selling Art Nouveau and Art Deco, gradually specializing in Dutch styles which were then relatively unknown: Nieuwe Kunst, Amsterdam School, De Stijl, Haagse School and Functionalism.
In 1983 they wrote Art Nouveau en Art Deco in Nederland, the first survey of Dutch decorative arts from 1880-1940. In 1997 his gallery celebrated its 25 years anniversary. For that reason he took the initiative of publishing a new book on Dutch decorative arts 1880-1940, which he also co-edited. In the same year he curated in the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam an exhibition of interiors from Nieuwe Kunst to Amsterdam School. In 1990 Leidelmeijer became the first certified expert and appraiser of applied arts dating from 1850 to the present. He works with the Dutch version of the Antiques Road Show, Tussen Kunst en Kitsch and contributed to exhibitions at many musea, including Kunstmuseum Düsseldorf, Van Gogh Museum, Paleis voor Schone Kunsten in Brussels and Palazzina della Socièta Promoticie delle Belle Arti in Turin.
