The Austrian designer, based in Paris, creates a dialogue between food, art, and design in his whimsical "OMG-GMO" collection. His work, which also includes installations and performances, draws an interesting parallel with the centuries-old processes of agricultural domestication, selective breeding, and bioengineering.

He examines the relationship between humans and their environment through genetic manipulation, highlighting the artificial form of cultivated and consumed fruits and vegetables. This engineering has become "far more extreme" in recent years: it has incorporated sophisticated cultivation techniques that give them " an almost artificial perfection and symmetry (calibrated cherries, square watermelons, straight cucumbers…) ", as the Carwan Gallery, which represents the designer, puts it. Robert Stadler thus borrowed these modified forms to create nine humorous ceramic objects, hand-painted and textured by the Italian company Bitossi Ceramiche.

The organic is thus transformed into something structural and functional, as the gallery explains: The rectangular slice of watermelon becomes a stool, while the zucchini bends into an L shape to create a set of shelves. Meanwhile, the wheel-shaped eggplants support a glass coffee table, a reference to Gae Aulenti's Tavolo con ruote. "After the Fuorisalone in Milan last April, the series
“OMG-GMO” is on display this summer in Piraeus, in the center of Athens, in the flagship space of the Carwan Gallery.

“ROBERT STADLER: OMG-GMO”
CARWAN GALLERY – POLIDEFKOUS 39, PIRAEUS (GREECE)
UNTIL SEPTEMBER 16, 2023
ROBERTSTADLER.NET