Garry Knox Bennett: Call Me Chairmaker

by Glenn Adamson, Stefano Catalani, Arthur C. Danto

The chair holds an enduring fascination as the ultimate design challenge. Artists, craftspeople, designers, and architects have relentlessly sought the perfect an ideal chair blending ergonomic, aesthetic, and material considerations - all in the hope of enticing us to sit. Never one to shy from challenges, Garry Knox Bennett has for more than 30 years been one of America's most important and influential furniture makers. This full color, 96 page catalogue is a beautiful companion to the exhibition Garry Knox Call Me Chairmaker , which debuted at the Bellevue Arts Museum, and featured 52 chairs which exemplify Bennett's boisterous bravado and professed disdain for validated technical and artistic practices. The works in Call Me Chairmaker also reveal the essence of Bennett's artistic personality and his passion for pursuing the many possibilities the chair presents. Inspired by past and present famous architects and designers of chairs, Bennett lets his raucous humor, sly wit, and visual puns dance with full abandonment. His free-spirited, irreverent oeuvre forsakes not only conventional principles of art and design but, even more, the canons of furniture craftsmanship. Includes essays by Deputy Head of Research from Victoria and Albert Museum, Glenn Adamson, art critic and philosopher Arthur C. Danto, and independent art critic and curator Matthew Kangas. Also included is an interview with Garry Knox Bennett conducted by curator Stefano Catalani.

96 pages, Hardcover

First published July 1, 2006