Wendell Castle Transforms Objects Into Furniture Pieces

A pioneer of the “American Studio Craft” movement, industrial designer Wendell Castle is both artisan and artist. His signature stack-laminated pieces are honoring the wood, while in this series they are revolving around powerful tones of black. The organic shapes reference Modernism and are inspired by big names of the movement, like Jean Arp, Constantin Brancusi and Joan Miró. Carved in our mind is the piece named ‘Equal Partners’, an object with a shape of uneven equilateral arch that features the space for a seat and a table.

Wendell Castle belongs to the group of artists who don’t believe in the stereotypes and the settled forms. Furthermore, he considers that the furniture pieces merit the same acknowledgment as the sculptural objects. The collection of objects created in the period between 2014 and 2016 is currently on display in the retrospective exhibition ‘Planting Seeds’, at Carpenters Workshop Gallery in Paris. “I actually think of my work as If I had planted a seed and that this organic thing grew up,” remarks the artist while wondering, “why couldn’t furniture be just as expressive and have every bit as much power and strength as sculpture?”