The Mies’ Nightmare Table by Giuseppe Pulvirenti and Gandolfo David asks the epistemological question, “is More really a violation of van der Rohe’s Less is More maxim if it’s thoroughly encased in Less.” Sounds like a tongue (and brain) twister, I know, but it’s the most elegant way I can think of to phrase the punny proposition articulated in and inside of this ghostly bit of A&D tom-foolery. For the Mies’ Nightmare Table is all straight lines and rectilinearity, all solid and heft and industrial material on display; until, that is, one catches it in the right light to reveal its phantasmatic underpinnings. According to manufacturer Oji, the piece expresses “the pure and spotless linearity of shapes anguished by the demonic temptation of curves.”

Mies’ Nightmare Table. Designed by Giuseppe Pulvirenti and Gandolfo David.

Appropriating the Past to Comment on the Modern

Not that there’s much evidence that the great Mies would have quantified curves as such, nor that he would have characterized their sinuous allure as “tempting,” but one gets the point, as well as the joke. Mies’ nightmare pokes fun at Mies (and the Bauhaus) while celebrating same; likewise, the piece is a semi-parodic celebration of the evolution of A&D. By synthesizing in a single piece the kind of carefully-wrought ornamentation one might expect from, say, a Louis XV buffet, and the utilitarian elegance of the trendsetting style of the Modern, Oji has broken the boundaries, violated the usual distinctions between “old” and “new.”

But that’s perhaps an over-generalization too, as we all know that good contemporary decor is eclectic and versatile, capable of absorbing influences from across the centuries and thereby breaching the typical aesthetic divides. The difference with Mies’ Nightmare is that it achieves this in a deliberately self-conscious manner, thus having more than a bit of fun while inviting all manner of creative experimentation into its orbit.

See Mies’ Nightmare and other products from Oji’s 2011 collection during Milan Design Week, April 12-17.

Via MocoLoco.