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ART, DESIGN & CREATIVITY

Alcantara and the art of our time: dialogue and mutual exchange that allows artists to express their creativity with Alcantara being their medium with a myriad of possibilities.

Recognising the importance of direct relationships between the creatives of our time and the Alcantara material as well as the Company itself, in 2011, Alcantara launched a series of collaborations and projects, testing different formulas and approaches. In recent years, the company has established a thorough and diversified process, which today – perhaps even exceeding initial expectations – has led Alcantara to defining a new method of working with artists and other creatives.

A method that Alcantara feels to be truly its own, unique and tailor-made, perfectly in line with its values and identity.

The strength of this new method is building a mutual dialogue with the artists, emerging or already established, originating from different contemporary artistic fields (visual arts, fashion and industrial design, musicians, directors, video makers, architects, designers and collaborations with major Italian theatres), and always in close partnership with renowned curators, museums and cultural institutions worldwide. In recent years, the company has observed that this dialogue between apparently different and distant worlds – those of artistic disciplines and of the company – always gives rise to a genuine relationship of mutual exchange.

Over time, this method of liaising with artists has created a virtuous circle: although initially it was Alcantara who proposed projects and invited artists to measure up to the versatility and ductility of the material and of the relevant creative departments, today it’s the artists themselves who seek and choose Alcantara as an expressive medium to best show their creativity.

Alcantara thus chooses this dialogue with the artists in keeping up with its own missions and values. The artists choose Alcantara material for its ability to adapt to the challenges of creativity and to be a medium of surprising expressive potential.

The artists, indeed, in seeking to satisfy their own requirements, often subject the material to a level of stress that leads them to come up with entirely original solutions. Each encounter with an artist, each new work of art created together, initiated a fresh exchange of cultures and techniques.

Finally, it’s important to underline the variety of artistic disciplines and activities which Alcantara has come into contact with over the years, as well as the international dimension of its interlocutors: the artists, but also the curators and the institutions associated with the various projects. Visual artists, fashion and industrial designers, film directors and video makers, architects and musicians from all over the world have worked with Alcantara, creating pieces that have been exhibited in some of the most prestigious international museums, such as the MAXXI in Rome, Victoria and Albert Museum in London, Yuz Museum in Shanghai and Mori Museum in Tokyo.