Soap Serie for Tom Van Dyck

From the way in which OBJET PORTRAIT was created, we can deduce that for Roel every creation is primarily an encounter. It is a dialogue with the other, which can be a person, a community, an environment, an object and so on. Actually, this involves the two most basic human questions. What is the world? Who am I? As human beings it is the task of all of us to find a relationship between these questions. That makes us who we are. We recognize both in Roel's meeting activity as a designer: his open attitude towards the world and his own freedom to interpret it. Nine people are listened to candidly about their way of being in the world. Although they are people 'of the world', with an explicit public image, they are withdrawn from this mundane image. They reflect on their own roots. How do they understand themselves in their way of being?

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Armed with this human wealth, Roel then makes his own interpretation of it. He develops two objects for each of these nine people, one applied and one free. One functional, the other symbolic: the two domains, in other words, between which he constantly moves. Each of these objects is, as it were, the 'face' of the people involved in which something of their soul is expressed. But the soul of the designer also takes part in the debate. As the design process proves: it is a long, uncertain, groping road that leads from listening to speaking. Finding this connection is what it comes down to. It is a meeting between two freedoms. Why should such dialogue not be possible? Or is this a utopian idea? That is ultimately the question he confronts us with Objet Portrait.

SOAP SERIE

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Anyone who knows Tom is aware that he wears rings regularly, some more extravagant than others. These jewels inspired me for a new design and to find a different angle. The fact that Tom is a neat freak could be accommodated perfectly in the design. The soap ring was born and Tom immediately began referring to a Soap Series.

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VERZAMELD WERK

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Precision, organisation, functionality and hygiene are the basic characteristics of an industrial kitchen but they also apply to Tom’s kitchen. Add an interest for (cook) books and you get Collected Works. Not cook books, but rather the chopping boards that refer to them. Each plank has a function and together they form a team.

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Portrait Photography by Lieve Blancquaert