(4.4) I want this canoe. Not to paddle in water but to hang upside down from my own ceiling. This beautiful “Skin on Frame Canoe” is the work of Jake Pill (BFA Industrial Design, 2017). It is made of ash, Dacron fabric, and Douglas fir (Special Agent Dale Cooper’s favorite tree).
The RISD Senior shows are never boring, but the variety within Industrial Design makes it one of my favorites. Some helpful wall text explains ID, “We design across a range of materials and media, working with real people and real situations, to shape the world around us. . . Above all, we make things.”
This year those things include: outerwear, footwear, furniture, plastic totes, bicycles, and a plan for re-purposing the Superman building.
I also love the look of “Lawn Chair 1” by the team of Sarah Crist and Lauren Klein. It has been fabricated out of woven astroturf, foam, and mercerized cotton textile on a bent laminated frame. Whether one wants to flop down on this in a wet bathing suit is impossible to say.
Next show up will be “FAV Open Media/ Glass.” (FAV is film/animation/video.)
(If I may speak for a moment to the head of the Industrial Design Department — While I love that you are “Fostering Global Futures” and that your NASA coordinator is “Preparing for Mars” could you please have your students design a better parking meter for the City of Providence?)
Industrial Design Senior Exhibition runs through April 4, Woods-Gerry Gallery, 62 Prospect Street, (directions)
