 Ivana PorfiriFABRICATION STONE TABLE, flame textured Fossena stone, residence St. Moritz
FABRICATION OF STONE WINERY WALL, Louberon stone, residence Cap d’Antibes
FABRICATION OF STAIRCASE IN LIGhTENED, Vicenza stone, yacht Blowzy
THE SILENT NATURE Of STONES
Tomaso Garzoni's encyclopedic Universal Marketplace of all the Professions, a work so "monstrous" as to arouse "vehement wonder" in readers, was the last of the Renaissance "best-sellers."
In it he declares:
"In Book I Vitruvius defines architecture as nothing but the art of building well, which enrolls under its banner, as its ministers, carpenters, masons, stone carvers, blacksmiths and other such craftsmen, all of whom serve the architect as the mastermind."
The circumlocutions used by Garzoni to convey the concept of the author of De Architectura is clearly expressed, above all today, in the attitude of those who are capable of designing, embodying their vision in the result, managing the contributions of people and things. To use a relevant parallel, the orchestra plays well when the concertmaster, in giving form to a choral rendering, conveys the sense of his own interpretation to each individual member who is called on to contribute. In the case of the project - architecture, design - the choice of materials is closely related to the occasions for their use, the definition of this or that detail of the overall configuration.
"You see," says Ivana Porfiri, "I explore and experiment with the potential of materials in use, seeking and enhancing original contextual values. If I think of different kinds of stone or marble, I can't distinguish them from their weight. Their weight is a first point of identification and equally fascinating. By contrast I'm also attracted by everything that expresses lightness. An incommensurable recent example is graphene. It is due to the study of two Russian researchers, Kostya Novoselov and Andre Geim. A whole sheet of it is just a single atom thick, so it excludes the third dimension,
yet it's a hundred times stronger than steel. The two extremes are precise landmarks of behavior. Marble by its very nature justifies its weight, graphene its weightlessness. Each project is unique in terms of the choice of materials, the ways they relate to their respective spheres.
This is because, to reflect the lifestyle of a given client, I have to represent the most relevant theater of action. The modes correspond to the script. It's up to me to identify the components that best suit the staging."
A designer by training, Ivana Porfiri engages in non-specialized design across a wide range of sectors. She produces projects of ship and residential interiors, as well as work spaces and product designs in Italy and abroad.
Founded in 2001, Porfiri Studio is principally devoted to research based on perceptual qualities, the development of conceptions that represent a sensuous rather than a visual experience.
Porfiri again observes: "I've used stones and still do, for the sake of their silent nature, their smooth surfaces, the absence of decoration. The stone known as pietra di Clauzetto, alas no longer available, is a warm gray, very light and uniform, without veining. Certainly the use of neutrals has so characterized the minimalist expression of the last fifteen years that in general it very nearly verges on mannerism. So I take advantage of the need to regain the strength of materials, to abandon the practice of silence, by looking for clear, highly decorative signs in nature. A decoration that is absolutely not superficial, never gratuitous or unjustified or regimented, but intrinsic, structural. hence I use that particular stone or those kinds of marble as fragments, stories of nature, and I like to quote them and transfer them to contexts where they constitute, in color and substance, the distinctive nature of a project. So I don't limit myself to cutting out a dress made to measure, I try to explore its substantial quality so that it appeals to the senses of the client. I'm interested in stone and marble, in their structural complexity. I don't like to think of them as reduced to thin layers, appearances, products of advanced technology. This is another way to exclude their indiscriminate use. While they are present in some of my concepts of residential and marine interiors, at other times I don't use them. Everything depends on the character the project acquires."
In Ivana Porfiri's conceptual practice, the vision determines the choice of materials. And in this sense Porfiri sees her every project as the extraordinary - never ordinary - management of people and things. Including stone and marble, where the orchestration is the outcome of a constant process of coherent experimentation.
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