The opening promised to be grandiose and solemn from the very beginning - considering that the gallery's project was developed by the famous Italian bureau Metrogramma Milano, and the curators of the first exhibition entitled "Reproduction" were personally Yulia Burdova and Olga Aleksakova from Buromoscow. Apparently, no one expected such an influx of guests, which happened at the ceremony on February 19: the atmosphere in the hall, filled to overflowing with exhibits, resembled rush hour on the Moscow metro ring line. Meanwhile, the mood of the audience was more than positive - the DJs turned on fiery rhythms, and the waiters continually offered food and drinks with the same flavor of Italy.
The Gallery of Contemporary Art in Moscow was created at the initiative of the Italian industrial group IRIS Group, a major ceramics manufacturer. The first showroom of its kind - SpazioFMG, designed to promote achievements in the field of design and architecture, was opened in Milan more than seven years ago and has since become widely known in professional circles. Now the leadership of the consortium has started talking about expanding its borders, and after the Moscow gallery, the appearance of which, among other things, is associated with the construction of a new ceramic factory in Russia, two more IRIS galleries will appear this year: in Hong Kong and Berlin.
As the organizers of the exhibition explain, the transformable exhibition space is intended for a wide variety of cultural events - from traditional exhibitions to public events and professional discussions. The main goal is to attract architects, designers, researchers - in a word, everyone who is close to the topic of ceramic coatings.
If innovations were the work of an artisan who made ceramic products by hand, now, in the conditions of conveyor production, designers are undoubtedly the engine of progress. That is why the company closely follows the development and achievements of world design, actively participating in this process and helping young artists and architects.
The main hero of the exhibition space, regardless of the change in the expositions filling it, will be ceramics - the maxi-format tiles that gave the name to the entire gallery (“surface” means “surface”, “covering”). The general concept of the project was developed by the Italian architect Andrea Boschetti. “My goal was to create a simple yet complex space solution that eludes sight, but remains firmly imprinted in the mind, refined like ceramics and rough like concrete,” says Boschetti. “This is a theatrical illusion with a truthful essence. It is a space that encompasses the city and is perceived as public."
The space of the new gallery is an extended hall measuring 25x8 m. The brick walls are painted black. The windows are framed by heavy red curtains, exactly the same textiles cover the opposite wall with beautiful soft waves, creating the illusion of being in the backstage of the theater. The authors of the project emphasize that in the architectural concept they relied precisely on theatricality and virtuoso transformation of space, which should become a kind of urban stage for cultural and artistic events. The mirrored ends of the hall are a well-known technique that seeks to visually expand its boundaries to infinity. The high ceilings are densely hung with multi-colored spotlights, creating colorful light overflows inside the hall. One of the mirrored walls also serves as a screen: its entire plane turns into a constantly changing dynamic exposition.
The central part of the hall is occupied by a massive stage transformable structure, which looks like a narrow and long table top hanging in the air. It is formed from three separate lifting platforms on a steel frame, covered with ceramics on top. This amazing movable structure serves as the basis for a wide variety of expositions. In the program of the presented exhibition, it was collected into a single surface more than 20 meters long with numerous sensual, streamlined bends, recesses and recesses. But when changing an exhibition, the configuration of the structure will not be difficult to change: for example, for mass events, platforms can be raised to the ceiling itself, turning them into a frame for a light installation, or, on the contrary, lowered down and turned into a podium.
The first Moscow exhibition of the new gallery - "Reproduction"; its curators, Buromoscow architects Yulia Burdova and Olga Aleksakova, tried to use the example of an ordinary chair to tell about the evolution of a handicraft product of design, which gradually turned into an object of mass production, and then into a narrowly individual design item. The architects plan to hold four more exhibitions in SuperSurfaceSpace during the year, united by a common concept.
The organizers promise that the showroom will become a platform not only for acquaintance with the products of the concern, it will become a place for demonstrating the latest innovations in the field of design and modern technologies.
Exhibition "Reproduction" will be open in SuperSurfaceSpace until March 11 inclusive, from Monday to Friday - from 18:00 to 21:00, on Saturday and Sunday - from 12:00 to 20:00.
