News su design ed architettura

Abet Laminati

Abet Laminati &Alessandro Mendini

Since its inception, Bra-based Abet Laminati has always been able to engage with the world of design and architecture, supporting artistic movements and stylistic revolutions that have strongly influenced the history of Italian design. An example of which was at the end of the 1970s with the Alchimia movement, of which Alessandro Mendini was a valued collaborator.

From that moment, the synergy between Abet Laminati and the Atelier Mendini has never stopped, giving rise to furnishings, collections and major architectural projects in which laminate has been able to assume a primary role and capable of expressing what was to be "a free and continuous movement of thought". (Alchimia Manifesto, Alessandro Mendini, 1984).

"The relationship between Alessandro Mendini and Abet Laminati began in the early 1980s. A continuous, unstoppable exchange of ideas, projects and proposals, sometimes complex, to which Abet has always responded with technique and precision, but also with care and curiosity in facing new challenges". Elisa and Fulvia Mendini

Alessandro Mendini writes into a text dedicated to the company:

"Abet Laminati's long activity in the field of surface decoration represents a particular and very important phenomenon in the history of Italian design. The reasons for this particularity are various, and together they have contributed to an excellent catalogue. First of all, the intrinsic modernity of this synthetic material, a perfect support for techniques typical of communication printing, which makes it a neutral icon available to the 'abyss of imagination', in the same way as a painter's blank canvas. Then the cultural farsightedness of the managers of this industry, who, over time, contacted a large number of well-known and lesser-known authors for advice and designs, resulting in one of the most extensive gyms of decorative experimentation of the last thirty years. Then the generous response of the authors approached, who have from time to time returned to ABET those new styles, visual systems, inventions and techniques that have characterised and still characterise the aesthetic history of this industry.

The decoration of surfaces is a very ancient act that perhaps precedes architecture. It is a way of writing, of involving objects in the literariness of the human mind and psyche. It is a basic attitude in the deepening of the relationship between men and environments.

Many ancient materials have resolved with admirable examples this human need to relate to the skin of things with an aesthetic medium.

ABET plays a leading role in the contemporary world in this social, cultural and artistic responsibility. Not least because the results of its latest technical achievements are directed towards an agility of intervention in matter, which makes it almost available to the decorative desire of everyone. And it is well known that combining the high print run with the customisation of the unique piece is one of the great goals of design." (2003)

April 2024 also saw the opening at the Triennale of 'Io sono un drago. La vera storia di Alessandro Mendini" an extensive retrospective on the work of Mendini, the architect, designer, artist and theorist who marked the revolutions in thought and costume of the old century and the new millennium.

The exhibition, on display until 13th October 2024, is produced by Triennale Milano and Fondation Cartier pour l'Art Contemporain in collaboration with Archivio Alessandro Mendini, curated by Fulvio Irace, with installation design by Pierre Charpin.

With the collaboration of the Alessandro Mendini Archive, Abet Laminati, a partner in the exhibition, has reconstructed decorative panels in digital print that recreate two historical installations: Interno di un Interno, room with Proust decoration (1990) and Le mie prigioni, black and white optical environment (2016). Also on display are 21 models of architecture designed by Atelier Mendini - including nine from Abet's private collection, along with a large panel reproducing studies of decorations for the façades of buildings in the Posco Quarter in Seoul.

ABET LAMINATI

Founded in Bra in the late 1950s, Abet is the ambassador of ‘Made in Italy. Since its conception, the company has promoted partnered synergies with major international designers, creating materials capable of interpreting the evolutions and revolutions that, year after year, have characterised contemporary style and its regular cultural associations.

From supporting the foundation of Alchimia in the late 1970s when the collaboration with Alessandro Mendini first began, to its role towards the Memphis Group in the early 1980s, with the interpretation of coloured laminates by Ettore Sottsass, Abet has written the story of what Giò Ponti used to call “an extraordinary man-made material for architecture”.

Under the guidance of current design curators Giulio Iacchetti and Matteo Ragni, the company now promotes projects of free creative exploration of surfaces, inspired by the desire to look at each material beyond what it appears, thinking of it in a different context by giving new and disruptive dignity.