Driade was born in '68, in the same period of the trends that characterized the twentieth century: on the one side the rigor of geometric and rational design and, on the other, the recovery of pop art and its influence on pop and radical design. Today, the "landscape of motifs" is very different, permeated as it is by globalization and all-encompassing digitization. To understand Driade, we recommend that you visit its headquarters in Fossadello, in the province of Piacenza. I've been there often in the past, but haven't been back in a long time. Seeing it again helped me understand what an "aesthetic laboratory" (as Driade likes to call itself) could be in these first years of the 21st century. It would be useful to organize one's own path along the central corridor that crosses the building, a clear and rigorous sign, an architectural promenade overlooked by finely furnished offices and rooms. At the end of the walk you will find a large hall featuring tall photographic panels representing the castle park of Würzburg, Germany. A winter garden immersed in infinite time Everything aims to build an atmosphere of subtle aestheticism, in which rational geometric structures, such as wooden or metal shelves, can coexist with furnishings that have marked the last decades of design: from "Melaina" by Bonetto (I reviewed, after many years, leafing through the catalog of the exhibition curated by Emilio Ambasz in 1972 at the MoMA in New York: "Italy: a new domestic landscape") for "Due Cavalli" by De Pas, D 'Urbino, Lomazzi , from the projects of Antonia Astori, Nanda Vigo, Enzo Mari, Philipe Starck, Oscar Tusquets, Borek Sipek, Tokjujn Yoshioka, Kazuyo Sejima, Ron Arad and many others, who have lived more than 40 years, up to artists such as the Chinese Xie Dong and the Indian Mann Singh. In this sense, the venue is a perfect "aesthetic laboratory" as it expresses the idea of an overall image in which everything contributes to creating a work of art; a Wagnerian Gesamtkunstwerk, where you can find pieces of architecture, furniture, objects, fabrics and carpets and where designers, photographers, graphic designers, web designers and workers can meet. There is something that reminds us of the Grand Duke Ernest Louis of Hesse, who in 1899 called the architect of the Viennese Secession Joseph Maria Olbrich to design the "artists' colony", Mathildenhöhe, Darmstadt: made up of buildings by Olbrich himself and, among the others, by the young Peter Behrens. It was right Behrens to give Darmstadt the sharpest definition: "Celebration of life and art". It was created to welcome artists, architects and designers in a place, a symbol of aesthetic research, aimed at disseminating applied arts in Germany. ,. through the design and production of furniture and objects for retail The era of Mathildenhöhe was the beginning of the 20th century, now we are in the 21st century: the era of the avant-garde, of rationalism against expressionism, of geometry against the dream figures, He went away. The conflicts that characterized the design of the last century, if not yet disappeared, are certainly disappearing and have acquired a different meaning. This phase is marked by the multiplicity of languages that make it difficult to identify trends or relationships. A variety of authors, not always easily assessable and not all completely acceptable, are building this century, which is characterized, in art and design, by pluralism, multiplicity of signs and "idiolects" - as Roland Barthes called the use of specific language of a single author. Driade's "aesthetic laboratory" is fully relevant in this new and pluralist 21st century, while continuing to pursue its dream of "celebration of life and art". Vanni Pasca
