PRACTICE FOR THE LOVE OF THEORY

    

Maxime Prananto runs an artistic design and production practice. It intervenes in the domain of architecture and infiltrates art spaces. The practice consists of public and private commissions as well as autonomous work. It sometimes functions as a production studio for other artists and makers.

The practice deals with the simultaneous conception and production of objects, scenography, furniture, exhibitions and sculpture. While its output is varied, each undertaking relies on a voluntary set of conceptual and physical boundaries. This practice attempts to reserve a substantial portion of its efforts for theory and reflection.

Underlying themes of the practice include manufacturing, logistics and iconography in the built environment. The attempt within the practice is for work to materialize intelligently within certain circumstances and references without the result of a self-intelligent work. In this sense, the aim is to be neutral and to propose a matter-of-factness about the conditions in which work is being made. Nevertheless, all interventions reflect a sensitivity to the beauty of constraints and gather meaning throughout the entirety of their process. 

This practice is linked to several courses and studios in architecture and interior architecture at the University of Leuven.


Table Setting
2023


Flemish Architecture Institute, Antwerp BE
Solo show curated by Petrus Kemme

Table Setting is an exhibition series on young architects from Flanders and Brussels, produced by DE SINGEL and the Flanders Architecture Institute (VAi). 
In each edition a young design practice presents itself on the square in front of DE SINGEL. A colourful set of tables supports the exhibition and acts as urban furniture, each time in a new configuration.

The fourth edition of Table Setting is built around an extension for the exhibition series' installation. Maxime Prananto created an element that combines several functions. But first and foremost, it forms a point of reference for the ever-changing arrangements of tables. In the central row of tables, Prananto gives an insight into his practice, using the process behind the new element for Table Setting as a
guide. The texts in this guide and on the tables thereby explore some aspects of his practice. Around the central new element and the row of tables, a number of triptychs with photographs by Prananto complete the exhibition. They illustrate his attentive view of the everyday environment. In their mutual confrontations, they evoke all kinds of associations, in a deliberate absence of explicit signification.


This exhibition unfolds as a polyptych, with more unknowns than equations. The design question consists of a few light chalk lines. The curatorial approach takes shape synchronously through the eyes of the institute, the makers, the producers, the writers. But if the object to be realized is still largely in flux, is there anything to curate at all? Yes, but only incrementally: the process tentatively announces itself more loudly. Gradually, interim results in the form of sketches, diagrams and correspondence gain in importance. They become independent and confront each other. They are then superimposed again. Materials, images and words not only form constellations but can strongly edit each other. This exhibition can  simply  be read as a lightly drawn contour, within which an endless and scale-less pleasure in confrontations plays out.
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