F!NK alternative jug project
27 August - 17 October 2020 Alex Asch | Chick Butcher | Bengt Cannon | Scott Chaseling | Cobi Cockburn | Cesar Cueva | Matthew Curtis | Xanthe Gay | Marie Hagerty | Jess Higgins | Alison Jackson | Harriet Schwarzrock | Louise Scrivener | Tom Skeehan | Brian Tunks F!NK alternative jug project is a collaborative exhibition which pays homage to the late Robert Foster, designer and founder of F!NK + Co, who was tragically killed in a car accident in 2016 and is deeply missed. F!NK has a long history of collaborating, mentoring and supporting fellow artists, designers and craftspeople. In 1993, F!NK was established by Foster in Queanbeyan, NSW, Australia, with the aim of creating a design and manufacturing business that would support and generate opportunities for Australian designer-makers. Joined by Gretel Harrison in 1995, together they built F!NK into the business it is today – a much loved and respected Australian design company with an international reputation for producing world-class tableware, hollowware, jewellery and lighting. F!NK invited 15 creatives with a direct connection to Robert and/or F!NK over the past 27 years to reimagine the iconic F!NK jug with the intent to be included in the F!NK collaborative jug project auction earlier in the year. Two blank F!NK jugs were provided to each artist with which to begin. The first set of finished bespoke artworks created as a result of this collaboration were sold in the online auction to raise funds for charity. Due to the success of the live auction, Craft ACT invited F!NK to showcase the alternative designs in the F!NK alternative jug project exhibition to allow people to view this wonderful collaboration in person.
27 August - 17 October 2020
Alex Asch | Chick Butcher | Bengt Cannon | Scott Chaseling | Cobi Cockburn | Cesar Cueva | Matthew Curtis | Xanthe Gay | Marie Hagerty | Jess Higgins | Alison Jackson | Harriet Schwarzrock | Louise Scrivener | Tom Skeehan | Brian Tunks
F!NK alternative jug project is a collaborative exhibition which pays homage to the late Robert Foster, designer and founder of F!NK + Co, who was tragically killed in a car accident in 2016 and is deeply missed. F!NK has a long history of collaborating, mentoring and supporting fellow artists, designers and craftspeople. In 1993, F!NK was established by Foster in Queanbeyan, NSW, Australia, with the aim of creating a design and manufacturing business that would support and generate opportunities for Australian designer-makers. Joined by Gretel Harrison in 1995, together they built F!NK into the business it is today – a much loved and respected Australian design company with an international reputation for producing world-class tableware, hollowware, jewellery and lighting.
F!NK invited 15 creatives with a direct connection to Robert and/or F!NK over the past 27 years to reimagine the iconic F!NK jug with the intent to be included in the F!NK collaborative jug project auction earlier in the year. Two blank F!NK jugs were provided to each artist with which to begin. The first set of finished bespoke artworks created as a result of this collaboration were sold in the online auction to raise funds for charity. Due to the success of the live auction, Craft ACT invited F!NK to showcase the alternative designs in the F!NK alternative jug project exhibition to allow people to view this wonderful collaboration in person.
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F!<strong>NK</strong> Alternative Jug Project<br />
Water is life and water that we share<br />
together at a table is that most basic<br />
of offerings to any guest. This <strong>project</strong><br />
has equally been an offering back from<br />
the 15 designers, makers and artists<br />
to celebrate and acknowledge Robert<br />
Foster’s impacts on their practice and<br />
his wider legacies.<br />
At this marker point of 27 years since<br />
the <strong>jug</strong>’s design, the Alternative Jug<br />
Project gives visible form to how<br />
Foster’s generous spirit and enquiring<br />
determination has inspired and informed<br />
the work of others. Of course this<br />
moment should never have had to<br />
come so soon, but with space from the<br />
numbness of sudden and tragic loss and<br />
the natural tendency towards retreat,<br />
through Gretel Harrison’s leadership, has<br />
come a purposeful response that would<br />
certainly have made Foster smile.<br />
Formal recognition has already come.<br />
Foster was posthumously inducted<br />
into the Design Australia Hall of Fame<br />
in 2019, the <strong>jug</strong> is held in prestigious<br />
museum collections and used in the<br />
restaurant of the Museum of Modern<br />
Art in New York. This <strong>project</strong> however<br />
reveals those things that are less easily<br />
defined but, which in many respects<br />
are more important – not only for the<br />
individuals involved and the on-going<br />
resilience of the company that Foster<br />
founded, but also what they say about<br />
the new levels of maturity in current<br />
Australian design.<br />
Utilising a diverse range of techniques,<br />
each contributor has collaborated with<br />
the team at the F!<strong>NK</strong> workshop to realise<br />
their ‘<strong>alternative</strong> <strong>jug</strong>’. Some are indeed<br />
quite different, and their unique qualities<br />
are such that there is no expectation<br />
that any would go into production. As<br />
Harrison has observed however – just<br />
the challenge of realising these works<br />
has been an important opportunity of<br />
research and development for the studio<br />
and those learnings may find their way<br />
into future objects.<br />
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