Tag: marian bantjes

The nail art has begun!

At the moment we have five nail artists from the Le gatte personal nail school in Milan applying their trade to a new purpose–they are intricately decorating 80 chairs revived by Marian Bantjes.

manicured chair saved by droog

Various themes are emerging–a chair with leaves and ladybugs that is asking to be put in the garden, a chair with tiny pink paw prints for animal lovers, dotted flowers and sprinkled glitter…

manicured chair saved by droog

manicured chair saved by droog

“For us it is a new experience to paint on such a big space. We are used to painting on nails that are especially large for our compositions, but nothing at this scale and with this shape. In a way, it has inspired us to see nail art with a different perspective,” say teachers Patrizia and Angela.

Make sure to come by to see it happen live during our event.

Q&A with Marian Bantjes

Marian Bantjes

What was your initial reaction when you read the brief?

“There is a kind of weirdo excitement we get in a thrift store. Basically you’re surrounded by junk that someone else didn’t want, but there’s a thrill of looking through that junk for the hidden gem … for that one thing that you see value in that was overlooked by others. This is urged by a slightly desperate desire to find it before anyone else does, and tempered by recognizing that it is all, after all, largely junk. So reading the brief and looking at the pictures was exactly like that.”

chair

Has the brief brought something new to your body of work?

“Yes, the chairs particularly … this is very new for me because I only conceived and gave directions for the work. I know many people work like this but I’ve never done anything before that I haven’t actually put my hands on in some way. At the moment it feels very liberating, but we’ll see how they turn out!”

Stay tuned to see what Marian did with 80 of these folding chairs and 1 dining table.