CHAIRFUL

Halla Hannesdottir is currently the Resident Armchair Artist at The Beaney in Canterbury.

This week I´d like to share with you some of my drawings of chairs and furniture pieces that I have been sketching during my residency at the Beaney. Some of them are drawn as possible collectors pieces to use for display, others have their own little quirks inspired by some of the miniature furniture pieces found in the Materials and Masters room.

These drawings are a part of an ongoing series entitled Chairful – a collection of sketches of cheerful, quirky and imaginative chairs. I started using chairs as a means of exploring sentimental attachment towards objects. A chair can incorporate a collector into the same space as his or her objects of affection – a way in which a collector can sit amongst and engage with his or her collection.

World of miniature

The miniatures and the dollhouse pieces have totally consumed me in my last few visits to the Beaney. As I´ve mentioned I am really interested in emotional attachment towards objects and I like to imagine how precious these items used to be to someone. It´s so curious to think which pieces were played with and used as toys, or if some of them served more as a cherished collection on display.

I also wonder about the functionality of the pieces on display – the furniture pieces that served their purpose as toys have to have functioning drawers and openable cabinets whereas some pieces are purely decorative and have been glued shut.

Collection within a collection

As I mentioned in my last post the items within the Beaney along with the miniature are the pieces and displays within the curiosity cabinet. So I was thrilled to spot a few miniature collectors cabinets within the dollhouse collections – one displayed a collection of rocks, another a collection of statues. This inspired me to develop a few Chairful sketches which incorporate a collection.

The beauty of the miniature furniture, I think, is that you can set your mind free and imagine all sorts of scenarios and functions because the end result doesn’t need to be too practically thought out. Which is why I think the Chairful drawings are well suited to developing a collection of miniature models – their practicality can be tested within the magical and imaginative world of the miniature. So on the next blog I´ll be sharing some of the Chairful sketches in 3D!