(25 August — 1 October 2011)
Kemistry Gallery and Fletcher Studio are proud to present Mind Over Matter: Alan Fletcher’s The Art of Looking Sideways – a celebration of ten years of this seminal publication and the work of a true design icon.
The exhibition brings together a collection of original material and notes from Alan Fletcher’s archive, documenting thirty or so years of attentive curiosity by Alan at large – throughout a career that (he asserted) was made from being in the right place at the right time. The accumulation of coincidence, chance and choice, that eventually led Alan to make the book, will pique curiosity and enlighten minds. A truly unique and personal collection of visual imagery, design articles, factual and cultural curiosities and quotations, The Art of Looking Sideways captures the sensory overload of contemporary visual culture, while also acting as a primer in visual intelligence. Fletcher’s work is instantly recognisable for its effortless simplicity, visual wit, and an inherent joy and surprise that was intensely personal. A compulsion for collecting useless information and putting it to work combined with a mastery of book design, shaped his thoughts and fed the fire.
Fletcher reminds us that a strong idea is always at the heart of a great design and that one must constantly reconsider the relationship between thinking and looking, telling and showing. His work, as reflected in this exhibition, is as refreshing and inspiring today as ever.
Alan Fletcher belongs to that élite international group of designers who have transcended the conventional boundaries of their craft. He was a member of the now legendary design consultancy Fletcher Forbes Gill, and a founding partner of the international design group Pentagram. Whilst as Consultant Art Director at Phaidon, he not only set high design standards for its art, architecture and design books, but worked with a generation of younger designers as well as to tell his design story by publishing his own books.
Kemistry Gallery, together with the estate of Alan Fletcher, have made available two beautiful, limited edition giclée prints – A Pizza and Two’s a crowd, three’s company. Exhibition posters and copies of the book The Art of Looking Sideways , published by Phaidon, will also be available for purchase during the exhibition.
