“On one hand, the drawings of the Bouroullecs are works of independent artistic value, whose tender, often crosshatched and at times almost naïve-seeming pictorial motifs create their own unique world of forms. On the other hand, they act as important steps within the design process to gradually mov
e toward the ultimate proposal of a new object. The designers proceed like natural scientists who investigate and continually retest the forms of their own array of ideas with a spirit of curiosity. Inspired by this approach, the exhibition stages the objects in a manner reminiscent of a natural history museum or a laboratory.
The exhibition album shows that the work of today’s designers is a complex process in which numerous structural and technical problems must be solved. Yet even in the age of computers, drawing remains an indispensable tool for many designers, as it makes it possible to capture spontaneous, sometimes unexpected design ideas on paper and to develop an individual formal language. In so doing, the exhibition emphasises the significance drawing has always had for the conception of objects – from da Vinci to Le Corbusier. The very word “design” can be traced back to the Italian term “disegno”, which was used in the Renaissance to refer to the sketching out of a pictorial motif.”