Free rights of use in the context of
reporting on the exhibition
„Experiment 70 - Visions of design by
Luigi Colani and Günter Beltzig“
and providing that copyright is indicated.

Ordering photographs
Telefon: +43/1/811 13
Telefax: +43/1/811 13-334

Brigitte Wachtl: DW 225
E-Mail: wachtl@schoenbrunn.at

Josefa Haselböck: DW 335
E-Mail: haselboeck@schoenbrunn.at

Press photographs
for downloading

Experiment 70

Experiment 70 is the subtitle of the spectacular spherical kitchen designed by Luigi Colani in 1969/1970. Arranged in a circle within a sphere, the kitchen was intended as part of a utopian house that was to soar high above the ground on the end of a long column. Spherical modules containing all the functional areas – kitchen, bathroom and workrooms – were to be docked onto a central living space.

This futuristic architectural concept is a spectacular embodiment of the era that started with the student revolts in 1968 and lasted until the oil crisis of 1973, an era which witnessed a process of intellectual reorientation in all areas of life. In Germany it was in particular Luigi Colani and Günter Beltzig who tried to translate these new visions of society into design. Their designs and experiments are united for the first time in this exhibition.

A revolution in interior living

Both designers wanted to break down traditional notions of living. New types of furniture, for example multifunctional items such as table-chair combinations, or 'landscapes for living', represented reactions to the changing needs of people, creating fluid boundaries between exterior and interior spaces. Plastics allied with innovative production processes enabled designers to experiment with colours and forms. Apart from their functional use, objects now frequently assumed the character of spatial sculptures. Colourful and unconventional living environments were created which today still retain their ability to fascinate the viewer with their freshness, lightheartedness and irony.

Design for children

This new thinking also showed itself in the field of children's furniture, which at that time occupied a special position in the oeuvre of both designers. For the first time in the history of furniture design a chair for adults – Der Colani – was developed out of a chair designed for children called Zocker. The Beltzig brothers also went public for the first time with a collection of children's furniture.

Thermoplastics and Polyester

The social visions of the 1970s took shape in the playful and sensuous designs of Beltzig and Colani. However, their ambition to create modern, inexpensive furniture out of thermoplastics and polyester received a setback in 1973 from the oil crisis and the subsequent rise in price of oil products.

Günter Beltzig's socio-aesthetic analyses from that time form the basis for his later designs for playground apparatus and playgrounds. By contrast, the early phase in the oeuvre of Luigi Colani documented by this exhibition later led to variform designs which put aesthetic and technical innovations into effect.

Luigi Colani and Günter Beltzig are today regarded as visionaries of German design.

Address / Information
Kaiserliches Hofmobiliendepot, Andreasgasse 7, 1070 Wien
Tel.: (++43 1) 524 33 57-0,
Fax: (++43 1) 524 33 57-666
email: info@hofmobiliendepot.at www.hofmobiliendepot.at

Opening hours
Tuesday to Sunday from 10 am to 6 pm

Admission fee
€ 6,90 / € 4,50

Catalogue
€ 31

An exhibition mounted in collaboration with the Museum of Concrete Art, Ingolstadt

Curatori Ingolstadt: Tobias Hoffmannn, Frank Schmidt, Almut Grunewald

Curators Vienna: Ilsebill Barta, Markus Laumann