Last night we ambled out of our comfortable winter coccoon to check out MADE‘s Radiant Dark 09: Elegant Corruptions exhibition. It was the opening night party and there was good reason we had to rsvp to attend because it was a full house. Displayed in the format of a curated exhibition, 39 new works by independent Canadian designers showcased new concepts, material use and skill.

This modern Canadian design exhibition featuring the work of 33 design studios runs all weekend (February 5-8):
Thursday to Saturday from 11am to 7pm
Sunday from 11am to 6 pm
360 Dufferin St, rear of the courtyard, unit 201 (just south of Queen St W)

One of our favourite pieces was Snowcover by Angela Iarocci, a hand-knitted blanket constructed using snow depth data from Environment Canada (1977-2007) for 13 major cities across Canada. The designer converted this data into binary code to construct subtle shifts in the hills and valleys in the pattern. She then put together the strips from West to East, to make a snow map of the great expanse of the country. We love this piece because of it’s thoughtful process and subtlety.

Stag
Giant Heaps brings us this tapestry, a tribute to the kitschy yet iconic image of a stag in it’s natural setting. A very large and striking piece, the strong stag is contrasted against the delicate construction of the tapestry, a nod towards the laborious needlework intended to bring artistic taste to the home.

Old School 2X4 Table
made by Lubo Brezina, created from discarded 2X4s from home renovation sites. We can see this beautiful table being sold right back to the original home renovators that didn’t regard the material as anything more than garbage.

Dram (Chandelier)
From Vancouver’s Propellor Design, Dram is comprised of 120 vintage tumbler glasses varying in shape and colour. We’ll drink to that!

Gold Desk
by Mazzie Design & Sandy Plotnikoff, this table is the height of glamour combining gold and walnut.

Grey Shadows (pendant light)
from Cali Balles & Don Maclennan, this pendant lamp is mouth blown glass with the initial shape of a perfect oval. Their corrupting form is due to a process of prolonged heating where the once perfect glass oval shape begins to collapse upon itself. The glass then has the air drawn out from it creating folds and wrinkles and what remains is a ghostly shape, which makes for a striking pendant light.

A Drink to our vices
Brad Turner brings us drinking glasses featuring different sins/vices on each bottom, a drink to our vices begs the question, bottoms up?

Love Spoons
Annie Tung presents an erotic poem in Braille transcribed on the back of the series of spoons.

Shinny floor lamp
Barr Gilmore pays tribute to our national sport in this quirky hockey stick light.

Dirty Dishes – by Bev Hisey
A series of carpets resembling microscopic or petrie dish photographs.

Healing Wound
by Taliaferro Jones, this delicate tea service resembles the look of salt, referencing it’s uses for good and harm.

Empire Drawer Cabinet
From Heidi Earnshaw the Empire Drawer Cabinet is a contemporary expression of a nineteenth century idea.

Knot
The Knot seat prototype comes from Yvonne Ip.

Solar Bench
Deanne Lehtinen’s Solar Bench is made from recycled materials and is a fully functional solar light, which illuminates the acrylic slats in between the wood.

Freaksware
Freaksware tableware comes from ceramic artist Katherine Morley, a play on society’s obsession with abnormality.

Shot Glass
Timid gives us a look at a suspended moment were a bullet meets a glass, the bullet is held in place as if the glass is in a liquid state.

Tag Out Paint Can
Molo produced these ready to go paint cans to combat taggers near their Studio in Vancouver. Each colour is the exact colour of the various objects that were being tagged, allowing Molo to paint over it as if it never existed.

Camouflage Light Box
Andrée Wejsmann’s light box hides an underworld of naughty actions and Unscrupulous beasts.

Torrent
by Jeremy Hatch from Ricochet Studio, you can read more about them from an article we did in January here.

To read about each object further, as well as the few we missed, visit the MADE Radiant Dark 09 link here.