Martino Gamper first attracted widespread attention in 2007 with the project 100 Chairs in 100 Days, for which he reworked elements of existing chairs into a collection of charismatic new pieces of furniture. Born in 1971, Gamper grew up in Merano, an Italian town close to the Austrian-Swiss border. After spending a period in his teens as an apprentice to a furniture maker and a couple of years travelling the world, he enrolled simultaneously at the Academy of Fine Arts and the University of Applied Arts in Vienna. Finally settling on design over sculpture, he then worked for fellow South Tyrolean designer Matteo Thun in Milan. In 1998, he moved to London to complete his education at the Royal College of Art.
Since then, Martino has been treading the fine line between the worlds of fine art and design with disarming nonchalance, frequently challenging aesthetic and industrial conventions of the design world with humour and a deep personal investment in his work. At a time when design is mostly judged on its aesthetics and functionality, Martino is more concerned with a wider context: how design can interact with our daily surroundings and encourage social interaction.
Dodging the cult of personality that has been marking the world of design as much as any other creative industry, Martino’s approach has been characterised by frequent collaborations with a wide range of partners, in particular the design group Åbäke.
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56 pgs, 15 × 20 cm, Softcover, 2012,