My Omniverse Jacquard woven fabric has been applied in the soft fabric inlays for the Body Chair, designed by Kas Oosterhuis. The Omniverse fabric was cut into sixteen triangular pieces and wrapped around the inlays as to create a soft feel for the Body Chair.
Machining Emotion FFF | Future Flux Festival 3 June 2016 | Onderzeebootloods at RDM Campus in Rotterdam | 10m long robotic painting
During Beirut Design Week I showed two of my Jacquard woven tapestries, Omniverse #1 and Omniverse #2. The show was part of the Partners International Business [PIB] program supported by the Dutch Creative Industry [DCI]. Beirut was a very positive experience, a much more pleasant city than I expected. Although according to the Dutch Ambassador Hester Somsen the militia are unpredictable and may fight each other any moment, adding more bullet holes into the abandoned buildings, the general atmosphere in Beirut city was good and forward looking. The designer community is coming alive and is gaining momentum, especially with respect to sustainability and the relevance of design for the public realm.
During the design week I established a good contact with the famous carpet shop Iwan Maktabi and its present owner Mohamed Maktabi. Also we got to know his cousin Hadi Maktabi, also a carpet designer and carpet dealer. I will participate again with new work next year for the Beirut Design Week 2017 and 2018, again as part of the DCI.
Design Days Dubai 2016 | entrance | Burj Khalifa in background
Design Days Dubai | 13-19 March 2016
During Design Days Dubai 2016 from 13 to 19 March I showed two carpets designs of my series of FLOW carpets, the black and white carpet and the full colour carpet [16 colours]. The carpets were shown in booth G18 of the Dutch Creative Industry, adjacent to Marcel Wanders’s presentation.
![Design Days Dubai 2016 | Flow carpet full colour [16 colours] | designed in 2016 | dimensions 2 x 3m](http://lenard.nl/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/website_flowcarpet-fc.jpg)
OMNIVERSE paintings at Gallery Frank Taal
Powerlines is the leading theme for my autonomous paintings. The large canvases bear names like TANGLE series, TWIG series, FLOW series, UP series, FOLD series, LOOP series. At Gallery Frank Taal I exhibit my most recent works the Omniverse series. Large canvases of 200x180cm resp 190x180cm are built up of multi layered intuitive gestures, using the acrylic markers to paint on the canvases. The canvas is on the foor af my studio, I approach the painting from all sides, thus building a seemingly weightless personal universe. When the viewer approaches the painting [s]he is sucked into this universe, by seeing more and more detail. On closer inspection one sees the splashes fly off the canvas. The viewer becomes aware of the speed and the force of the intuitive explosive gestures. The speed of my gestures on the canvas is faster than I can think, thus surprising my unimaginable self with the unpredictability of my fast and furious abstract calligraphic traces.
Gallery Frank Taal | Inside Out [group show] |March 11 until April 8 2016
During Dubai Design Days 2016 I will show my FLOW carpets, based on a collage of fast and intuitive flow sketches on canvas. I will show one black and white hand tufted FLOW carpet and one larger machine tufted full colour printed FLOW carpet.
My presentation at DDD 2016 is supported by the Dutch Creative Industry [DCI] program Partners International Business [PIB] UAE.
The robotic painting project titled “Machining Emotion” establishes a mutual relationship between human emotions and robotic machines. The robotic painting process is based on a series of consecutive steps, initiated by fast and intuitive 3d sketches executed by the artists using a 3d digitizer and the leap motion controller. From these initial sketches – the “powerlines” – essential data like speed, angular movements and emotive pressure are used to feed the code with variables. Within this process some algorithms are mapping fractal self-similarity on the initial emotive curve, and eventually the 3d assembly is projected on a flat surface. Last step is to instruct the robot as to machine the emotive content with high precision. The human to robot interplay augments the art of abstract calligraphy with a cross-fertilization of intuitive gestures with logical rationale. The Machining Emotion #01 robotic painting is one out of a series of 4 large robotic circular paintings, executed during Dubai Design Week 2015.
Machining Emotion project team | Ilona Lénárd, visual artist | Kas Oosterhuis, the expert formerly known as the architect | Ana Maria Anton, programmer designer | Serban Bodea, programmer designer.
During the Dubai Design Week I handed over to the Dutch Consul of Dubai Mr Robert de Leeuw one of the robotic paintings from the Machining Emotion RDM series. The robotic painting will form part of the collection of the Dutch Embassy in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates. The Dutch recently moved to a new location in the Capital Centre district in Abu Dhabi, opposite the LIWA tower designed by Dutch architect Kas Oosterhuis.
PIB kick-off project Robotic Painting
As the artist member of the multidisciplinary Partners International Business [PIB] program for the UAE and Libanon [2015-2018] – supported by the Dutch Creative Industry [DCI] of the RVO – I proposed and organize a number of actions in cooperation with one or two other members of this multidisciplinary PIB group. The first action was PIB’s kick-off project, which took place in Dubai during the Dubai Design Week [DXBDW]. On the invitation of DXBDW director Cyril Zammit I organised together with PIB partner architect Kas Oosterhuis the Robotic Painting project, during which we produced 4 big circular canvases, named Machining Emotion.
My next action will the Abstract Calligraphy exhibition, in which I will involve both Dutch artists and artists from the Gulf region, to be organised in cooperation PIB members Judy Straten [Gallery Straten], architect Kas Oosterhuis and Neil van der Linden [founder Gulf Art Guide]. Abstract calligraphy is based on the power of traced human arm/hand gestures without a figurative meaning of the gesture. After the art fair the exhibition can be presented first in the UAE and later in NL, in collaboration with a Dutch and UAE Gallery. The aim of the Abstract Calligraphy exhibition is to demonstrate the power of the non-figurative line as produced by intuitive emotional gestures. Like non-figurative art, the meaning of the abstract calligraphic gestures are implicit in their movements disclosing powerful constructed emotive universes. The Abstract Calligraphy exhibtion intends to improve mutual understanding between the Arab and the Western world.
This black and white FLOW carpet is hand tufted. During Dutch Design Week 2015 I showed this FLOW carpet, based on a collage of fast and intuitive flow sketches on canvas. I also showed two paintings from the Machining Emotion series of robotic paintings made at RDM Campus in Rotterdam in summer 2015.
