A series of furniture by Rio Kobayashi, in twisting forms and crafted from salvaged redwood, is set in dialogue with the pulsating, hallucinatory canvases of mid-century artist Fritz Rauh at Blunk Space's ongoing showcase, Rio Kobayashi & Fritz Rauh. The design exhibition, on view from January 18 – March 1, 2025, sets off dialogues between art and furniture design that are neither loud nor forced but rather a quiet, rhythmic call and response.
Blunk Space was envisioned as an art gallery that preserves the legacy of artist and sculptor JB Blunk. Carrying forward Blunk's legacy and approach to art, where craft became deeply enmeshed with the natural world, the gallery is an ecosystem of ideas—hosting dialogues between designers and makers whose work speaks through wood, clay and pigment. Within such fertile ground, it aims to curate showcases where contemporary designers encounter craftsmanship in novel formats, revealing unexpected affinities between past and present. The pairing of Kobayashi and Rauh is one such instance. At first glance, the wooden furniture and paintings occupy disparate worlds—one, an abstract expressionist whose work pulses with a near-spiritual vibrancy, the other, a furniture maker whose practice is methodical and intuitive. But as their works sit side by side, unforeseen commonalities unfold.
During an informal residency at the Blunk House in 2024, Kobayashi sourced salvaged redwood from a local sawyer, Evan Shively, at Arborica, selecting pieces that retained their raw edges and irregularities. Rather than force them into rigid geometries, he followed their natural inclinations, letting the shapes dictate their final forms. The result is the capsule collection of the furniture on display in the gallery.
Under Kobayashi's deft hands, a table edge softens into a curve, its surface a collage of deep ochres and golden streaks. Similarly, a low stool with soft, rounded edges occupies the gallery space, set against Rauh's vibrant canvases. The inclusion of Rauh in the current showcase highlights the atmosphere of collaboration that Blunk fostered in his creative circle and his close friendship with Rauh.
Rauh's paintings are rich with dense clusters of forms that seem to tessellate when looked at closely, creating a hypnotic balance between precision and spontaneity. In response, the Austrian-Japanese designer Kobayashi brings in an element of playful seriousness through his work, engineered yet organic furniture. Together, their works form an axis—one filtering colour through oil and canvas, the other absorbing it into wood and form.
"When I met Rio and saw the beautiful furniture he was making with such detail, colour and care, I immediately thought of Fritz's paintings and wanted to bring their work together," Mariah Nielson, curator and director of JB Blunk Estate and Blunk Space, shared in the official release.
Kobayashi's use of colour is perhaps the most immediate bridge between his work and Rauh's. Where the painter flooded his canvases with controlled explosions of pigment, Kobayashi inserts colour with restraint but no less impact. A deep blue circles a hole in a low side table, not as decoration but as punctuation, an interruption that sharpens the composition. In a table design, streaks of the redwood's natural variation mirror the shifting hues of a Rauh painting nearby, its greens and yellows colliding in the same quiet chaos. A bench features an underside with blue-painted details, inviting discovery from an unexpected angle. It is a gesture reminiscent of Rauh's own process, where a single stroke can recalibrate the balance of a piece.
The two artists' works, though materially distinct, are bound by a shared pursuit of rhythm, form and the deep intelligence of the handmade. In the quiet light of Blunk Space, this dialogue unfolds, not in words but in the language of surface, structure and the spaces in between.
'Rio Kobayashi & Fritz Rauh' is on view from January 18 – March 1, 2025, at the Blunk Space in California, US.
(Text by Arryan Siingh, intern at STIR)
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