Matteo Cibic interviewed by Margherita Pincioni for French Fries #2

Interview by Margherita Pincioni / margherita_pincioni

Matteo Cibic's world is a fantastic place, animated by anthropomorphic and iconic objects, born to create empathy with the user and last forever; his research starts from art, he designs cheerful and playful shapes, made with great care and materials of great value, created by craftsmen of the highest level and, often in a few pieces. Matteo does not chase the function, but claims the right to devise disengaged projects for the sole pleasure of having fun designing them and casually admits to working "only with people who are nice to him".

If we could meet for this interview, where would you meet me?

In a grove of mulberries or cherries.

Your latest project published on Instagram is about Smart Social Tools, what do you think of the "social distance" that seems so necessary today?

I believe and hope we will soon forget it. I have fun drawing dividers that for the first time that serve to unite rather than separate people.

On social media you describe yourself as "Master in Luxury Fun", can you tell me where this attitude comes from?

Luxury has always represented for me a decadent and sad image of society, tied to predictable clichés.

I like to create objects with unexpected shapes and functions, in a productive combination of craftsmanship and advanced technology, believing in a client who is looking for timeless products that put you in a good mood.

Your objects generate wonder, real "poetic oddities", what do you want to communicate?

That objects have a soul, which deserve respect. In a society with little respect for objects, there is little respect for people and relationships.

In a world where objects are conceived to be disposable, relationships between people also risk being conceived to be disposable.

It becomes a systematic and scaling problem. Fast-food, fast-fashion, fast-design have influenced the speeding up and dematerialisation of many other industries, we think of politics (Twitter) or sentimental relationships (Tinder).

You know you are an atypical designer, your way of working is defined as transmedia, a demanding word.

My friend and curator Caroline Corbetta coined it, ... I do not find it demanding, in fact it helps me to explain my work that stems from experimentation and the use of very different technologies and materials.

Can you tell me about an "extravagant space" in Milan?

Arizona2000.

How the Jaipur Wunderkammer project was born, which brought you to a fascinating place, Rajasthan?

For some years now I have been drawing for the first Indian design publisher, Scarlet Splendor, which has had some success internationally.

Jaipur Rugs is a social company that has reinvented business model and distribution of carpet production, eliminating any intermediary between small artisans in rural areas of India and the end customer, becoming the largest foundation to support rural communities in India, with 40,000 craftsmen.

After visiting Jaipur, the pink city, I thought of telling my visual experiences through a collection of rugs, presented in 2019 in Milan and then Paris, London and Hanover, winning the 2 awards at the Carpet Design Award for best collection and best contemporary design .

Are the animals of Paradiso Dreams, anthropomorphic fantastic creatures, still roaming the world?

In the world of my dreams always. This dreamlike landscape materialized at the Palazzo Podestarile in Montelupo Fiorentino with an exhibition of 150 ceramic works and a catalog book that tells the 20 years of research on ceramics.

What is "luxurious" for you?

Leave the house on foot, have coffee in the pastry shop at the counter, walk in a grove for 30 minutes breathing scents of flowers and plants that have just bloomed, sit in a square to draw without seeing a car munching peanuts before returning home and starting to work.

It seems trivial to us Italians that live in small provincial towns, but traveling a lot I realize it is a real luxury.

In your projects I see a constant link with nature, how do you deal with it daily?

I have a very bad green thumb and I can't understand it, therefore nature fascinates me and makes me feel inadequate.

What message do you want to leave for posterity?

That we are part of 0.1% of the world's population, but that we consume 70% of its resources. That the world is probably unfair to many, and we can hold ourselves accountable if we don't do something to understand and improve it.

And finally, where did you eat the best French Fries?

Probably in Belgium but I don't remember. I eat the fried potato chips with El Coq wasabi mayonnaise; the restaurant of the young starred chef Lorenzo Cogo that I recently redesigned in the center of Vicenza.