Rietveld's Universe

As an exhibition exploring the life and works of Gerrit Rietveld opens at the Centraal Museum in Utrecht, Ida van Zijl, the curator of Reitveld's Universe and author of Gerrit Rietveld, reveals the significance of the works and inspirations of the Dutch architect and designer, beyond his best known projects, the Red-Blue Chair and the Schröder House.

The meaning of ‘Rietveld’s Universe’ is two-fold. It is the world surrounding Gerrit Rietveld himself: the social context, contemporaneous developments and questions that he and his colleagues were endeavouring to resolve. Le Corbusier, Mies van der Rohe, Marcel Breuer and many others were seeking solutions to similar problems, but adopted a different approach and manner of execution. Space and mass production were the principal themes. Designs by these contemporaries are also presented alongside work by Rietveld in the exhibition.

‘Rietveld’s Universe’ is also the world that he personally created, the things that inspired and drove him, what he aimed to achieve, and the way he embodied this in his work.

The exhibition only presents materials from his era and preferably things he held in his own hands, in order that visitors can approach as close as possible to Rietveld the person: the initial sketches for a design, scale models he produced, journals he read and vintage photos that he took himself or commissioned from others. Quotes from Rietveld and his contemporaries are included in explanatory notes, and visitors can even hear Rietveld himself providing a commentary to several projects in an audio tour based on a 1959 recording.

The material and technical aspects of Rietveld’s work are presented in two galleries where visitors can see the construction materials he used, the way he had walls constructed and hung doors in their frames. There are also displays showing how he constructed the Red-Blue Chair, the experiments he carried out using fibreboard and plywood, and how he treated the surfaces of his furniture pieces.

For those who wish to venture deeper into Rietveld’s mind, there is the hands-on opportunity to reproduce Rietveld furniture – in miniature or full size – in the workshop, or to reconstruct his architectural designs using the same materials as Rietveld: card, paper, glue and matchboxes.

The Rietveld’s Universe exhibition is part of the Rietveld Year events, which offers the pubic the opportunity to become acquainted with this great Dutch architect and designer's work in every way imaginable. (There's even a free iPhone app with GPS data and information about all the extant buildings realised by Rietveld around the world).  

This introduction to Rietveld is not simply about the quality of his designs; it also explores how his originality, independence and unbridled urge to experiment typify his stance as a creative artist. In that regard Rietveld continues to serve as an example and a fount of inspiration.

Ida van Zijl is deputy director of the Centraal Museum in Utrecht, the holder of the main collection of Rietveld's work. She is the author of Gerrit Rietveld.