Michael Samuels

Michael Samuels artistic vocabulary centres on 20th century modernist design, painting and sculpture. Through a process of dismantling and precisely reconfiguring industrially manufactured furniture he produces new sculptural forms. In these assemblages bright Perspex sheets or LED lights are added to allude to architectural models, G-clamps hold together tall towering forms or chairs, lams and ladders, suggesting ideas or making in progress, or more recently, cast concrete forms hold plastic objects such as cafeteria trays.

In recycling domestic objects Samuels references the way modernism and Scandinavian design entered into the mainstream of UK domestic life through brands such as G-Plan, which were a precursor to the more ubiquitous IKEA living of today. Beyond their commentary on design and social history Samuel’s works can also be felt as meditations on the passing of time, the nature of aspiration and even the status of the art object itself.