Join the club

You don't view the club chairs, you are viewed BY the club chairs. Or something

French artist Olivier Bardin installed this gaggle of chesterfield club chairs in the Tate Modern for their exhibition, The Fifth Floor:  Ideas Taking Space.  It is (they are?) a performance. What happens is this: you look at the club chairs, then you look at the people in the club chairs, then you become the people in the club chairs, and then other people look at you.  Bam!

Point is, given our affinity for things chesterfield, No Smarties will be moving offices to this room faster than you can say “brandy snifter.”

…and speaking of legs, unsettlingness, and taxidermy

HOLY GODDAMN CRAP LOOK AT THESE GUN HOOF HEELS.

(thanks, Anna!)

Thank you, Etsy

Are you aware that there is a person in Scotland who, for a mere $11.00 USD, will make you a humongous knit banana slug.  Just sayin.

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Emotionless Animals Melt Your Heart, Somehow

Here at No Smarties we don’t post very many things that one might describe as “too cute,” but check out this totally goddamn adorable photo series called “Fish Date” by Providence-based designer-slash-photographer Frank Cresencia.  Love it.

Bonus: he also does some pretty boss furniture, like this bench, which is all S&M-meets-wine barrel-meets-Saarinen airport terminal:

More from Fish Date after the jump.
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Nick van Woert is our future bff

Look at this people.  Look at this!

Nick van Woert, Mr. Potato Head, 2009

Nick van Woert is an artist in Brooklyn who makes things LIKE THAT, and like this:

And he shows at places like Nudashank in Baltimore, where Smarties Tatiana Berg and Ted Gahl also show.  What I’m saying is, Nick, time for us all to be buds.  More after the jump.

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Trend Report: Glop Art

Winsor&Newton must be happy.

Those of you who are contemporary painting nerds might have noticed a trend: one all about squeezing, slathering, scooping and smearing on the paint in generous piles. Great big gloopity gloops that, okay, might remind you of heaps of paint-poo. It’s messy, it’s visceral, but also it’s sculptural and silly and gosh dangit most of the time I find myself loving it. Why? What can I say: I’m a sucker for paint acting like paint.

So, as part of No Smarties‘ burgeoning fine arts coverage (ahem), I am here to bring you a trend report on what swank art bloggeur Joanne Mattera recently dubbed “Glop Art.” Hold onto your aprons kids!

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Dear Mr. Fantasy

Digital print, flourescent light, rock

These pieces by American artist Marlo Pascual are artwork and we should take them very seriously but HOW GOOD DO THEY WORK AS DESIGN OBJECTS.  How good!  Let’s be real, everyone would buy ten thousand of these.

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Metamorphosis Chair Fakes You Out, Rocks Your Socks

Whapow!  Get a load of this chair.  It’s called Metamorphosis and is by Colorado-based designer and recent RISD grad Ian Blasco.  Looks like it is carved out of volcanic rock, no?  No.  Actually, the chair’s massive form is sliced by hand out of 16 layers of expanded polypropylene foam – much like styrofoam (though denser – its volume is built out of thousands of tiny tubes rather than crappy crumbly balls [trend!]).

Detail

Blasco’s design is inspired by the relationship between rectilinear manmade structures and natural forms – intentionally leaving ambiguity about which is emerging and which is being consumed.
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ROBOT. PUPPY. LAMP.

The totally awesome Iditarod lamp is a beastly contraption that is basically a floor lamp which rides on the back of three robot puppies.  Oh, and their little brains have been hacked to walk around by remote control.  Yes!  More photos and video after the jump.
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Machine + Bioengineering

Shanghai designer Percy Chang describes himself as “a guy who loves not only Design but also Life and Wisdom.”  This cheerful philosophy has evidently led to the Light-4, which is this thing you see above.

What is it, you ask?  The answer is…I’m really not sure.  Looks like a lamp that points grass instead of light, and as we know, we are kind of into things like that here at No Smarties.  That said, it does seem like it has a legitimate purpose – it just isn’t super clear what that is.  However he does provide this helpful graphic:

Anyway, the proof is in the pudding, and this pudding is pointable grass that goes on your desk.  Holla!