Swedish-Chilean artist Anton Alvarez currently has a solo show, ‘Wrapper’s Delight’ at Gallery Libby Sellers in London until 17 April. The show’s title pays a playful homage to the iconic 1979 Sugarhill Gang hit and references Alvarez’s graffiti roots. Having studied fine art, cabinetmaking, interior architecture and product design the artist’s practice is a truly interdisciplinary one and focuses on ‘the design of systems and the creation of tools and processes for producing products’.
The exhibition houses 20 new works that have been made with The Thread Wrapping Machine, a contraption invented and constructed by Alvarez and to which he attributes the birth of a new craft: that of Thread Wrapping. This technique allows different materials such as wood, steel and plastic to be connected by an externalised joint using only glue coated thread while building up a decorative pattern of coloured thread in the process. The exhibits in this show are a progression from his successful collaboration with this gallery and his machine for Design Miami/Basel 2013. Now more chaotic elements in the form of paint and other media have been introduced into his methodical, ordered craft.
Gallery Libby Sellers launched in 2007 to support and sell design in a curated environment and has become established as a serious contributor to the design world and the careers of the designers with whom she works. There is another London installation of Alvarez’s work coinciding with this show at the private project space Siegfried Contemporary, viewing is by appointment.
