Joris Laarman

Friedman Benda, New York
Acquired from the above by the present owner, 2009

Anita Star, ed., Joris Laarman Lab, exh. cat., Groninger Museum, Groningen, 2015, pp. 16 and 102-106
Anita Star, ed., Joris Laarman Lab, exh. cat., Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, New York, 2017, pp. 90-93
Delphine and Reed Krakoff, Houses That We Dreamt Of: The Interiors of Delphine and Reed Krakoff, New York, 2017, p. 107

Sotheby's would like to thank Anita Star for her assistance with the cataloguing of this lot.

The “Bone Rocker” armchair is a direct showcase of Dutch designer Joris Laarman’s unique intersection of art, craft, science, and technology. Software is vital for the development of this chair and other works in Laarman’s “Bone” series, as he co-opts from a late 1990s software built for a German General Motors subsidiary, in which the software simulates stress on specific areas of a three-dimensional model, making it so any non-essential surface matter can be eradicated, preserving the strength of the object while only the necessary points remain. What is left resembles a bone structure, creating the smooth organic lines of the rocking chair. 

The velvety black sheen is created out of an extraordinary mix of the rare Belge Noir marble that is known for having few to no blemishes, and resin. The two materials were combined and pressed into several 3D-printed molds and once the pieces were assembled, the chair was polished by hand. Laarman’s “Bone” Furniture series, including this “Bone Rocker,” showcases the marriage of science and design, creating a unique set in the design world.

The model is held within the permanent collections of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. Further examples from the Bone Furniture series are held within the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, the Centre Pompidou, Paris, and many others.