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Jasper Morrison: Thingness

Grand-Hornu hosts Jasper Morrison’s first-ever retrospective, bringing together key moments in his 35-year career, across furniture, kitchenware and home electronics.

Jasper Morrison, at the pinnacle of his profession after 35 years, has accepted the Grand-Hornu’s invitation for his first retrospective.

His ideas have taken shape in a remarkable variety of highly successful products: from chairs and tables to tableware, toasters and telephones, to bus stops and a tram for the city of Hanover. For these products, he has worked with leading manufacturers in Europe including Cappellini, Alessi, Flos, Magis and Vitra; Japanase brands such as Muji; and technology companies Samsung and Sony. Several books, numerous exhibitions and even his own shop in London have emphasized Jasper’s status as an innovator and free thinker. The Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London are among the museums to have collected his pieces.

**Top**: Jasper Morrison, Rotary Tray, Vitra. © Jasper Morrison. **Above**: Jasper Morrison, set made for an exhibition at the DAAD Galerie, Berlin © Photo Studio Morrison C-Cid

Jasper Morrison’s work – whether sofa, watch or drinking glass – is characterized by lines that are simple yet rigorous. His concern is to serve function, to be true to the object itself. This design philosophy was affirmed in collaboration with Japanese designer Naoto Fukasawa by the Super Normal manifesto, which became an international touring exhibition.

Jasper Morrison, Thinking man's chair, Cappellini © Jasper Mortimer

For his retrospective, Jasper Morrison has collaborated with Swiss designer Michel Charlot to devise a simple, reproducible, wooden unit that will serve as a support for the pieces he has created from the 1980s to the present day.

The chronological presentation will be illuminated by reproductions of designs and drawings, archive documents, ephemera and photographs to illustrate the process that accompanies the creation of each project. The exhibition will be the occasion for Jasper’s first new monograph since Everything But The Walls (Lars Muller Publishers, 2006).