Ontwerpen voor een stoel c. 1928

Carel Adolph Lion Cachet made these chair design sketches sometime in his life using graphite on paper. He’s trying to figure something out, scribbling down ideas. The lines are tentative, like he's thinking out loud. I can imagine him circling, muttering, stepping back, squinting. It’s like a dance, the artist and the design, each trying to lead, each responding to the other. What I really love is the way the paper holds the trace of that searching. It’s not just about the final chair design, but about all the possibilities he considered and discarded. You see some odd squiggles – like he’s testing out a curve or an angle. There’s something really beautiful about that kind of unfinished thinking. Like a peek into the artist’s mind as he works toward clarity. Design is a form of art, after all. It’s about giving shape to an idea.