Maarten Van Severen, born 1956 in Antwerp, Belgium, studied architecture at the Sint-Lucas Art Academy in Ghent, Belgium. He designed his first furniture pieces in 1986 and in the following year he established an independent workshop, where he pursued the limited, semi-industrial production of his own furniture designs. This unified process of design and production was a fundamental aspect of his work over a long period of time, in which he devoted himself to the examination of basic furniture types: chair, table, chaiselongue, shelving and cabinet. He developed primary solutions for these categories based on a comprehensive exploration of the questions of form, material and construction. Beginning in 1990, Maarten Van Severen began to collaborate closely with Rem Koolhaas and also turned his attention to interior design tasks. During this period he also assumed teaching positions at a variety of institutions, including University College West Flanders in Kortrijk (1996), the Academy of Fine Arts in Maastricht (1996-97), Delft University of Technology (1998) and universities in Helsinki and Barcelona. The beginning of his collaboration with Vitra in 1996 marked a new phase in his career. It offered him the opportunity to work with new materials and also brought a much wider degree of exposure and influence. Until his death in 2005 in Ghent, Maarten Van Severen developed a range of new designs for Vitra, which have progressively entered series production.
Exhibitions:
2001 Salon du Meuble, Paris
2000 Intérieur 00, Kortrijk
1999 "Maarten Van Severen – Collection", New York
1998 Intérieur 98, Kortrijk
1998 Internationale Möbelmesse (IMM), Cologne
1996 Triennale di Milano, Milan
1994 Stool Nr. 2, Tafel: new acquisitions in the Vitra Design Museum Collection, Weil am Rhein
1994 Intérieur 94, Kortrijk
1990 "New Furniture", Museum für Angewandte Kunst, Ghent
1988 "Salon Refuse", Surplus Gallery, Ghent
Vitra