Benedetta PompiliDesignCeramicsMaterial researchEditorials

About Benedetta Pompili (IT, 1995) is a social designer based in Amsterdam. A dedication to materials with a focus on their narratives and environmental impact identifies her practice. She retraces the know-how of materials and their aesthetics toward circular making. Her research aims to learn, retrace, and share knowledge by thinking and acting in an interdisciplinary way.
Education


Master’s, Social Design, Design Academy Eindhoven (NL), Gijs Bakker Award nominee, 2019–2021.
Erasmus, Peter Behrens School of Architecture and Design, Düsseldorf (DE), 2017–2018.
Bachelor’s, Industrial Design & Advanced Ceramics, ISIA Faenza (IT), Cum laude, 2014–2018.


Recent work
Ceramic workshop specialist, Gerrit Rietveld Academie, Amsterdam (NL), Febraury 2023–ongoing.
Designer in residency, Creative Residency Arita (Japan), January–March 2024.
Main lecturer in Natural Materials in Ceramics, The Material Way, January–June 2024.
Fellow Researcher, LINA x TU Wien, Vienna, October 2023–August 2024.
Tutor, Gerrit Rietveld Academie, Amsterdam (NL), September 2023–June 2024.
Ceramic production consultant, Bruno Baietto’s In Bones We Dwell, Dordrecht’s Museum (NL), 2023.
Ceramic workshop specialist, Royal Academy of the Arts, The Hague (NL), January–August 2023.

Selected shows
Conversing with Matter, WaterSpiegelingen, Cuyperhuis, Roermond (NL), June 2024–ongoing.
RAW.obj, Pioneers in Ceramics, Prinsenhof Museum Delft (NL), February 2024–ongoing.
Conversing with Matter, Princessehof Museum Leeuwarden (NL), November 2023–ongoing.
In Presence of Your Absence
+ RAW.obj, Open Studios, Rijkskademie, Amsterdam (NL), 2024.
In Presence of Your Absence, Hong Kong Design Institute, Hong Kong (China), January–May 2024.
In Presence of Your Absence, Milan Design Week, ADI Design Museum, Milan (IT), 2023.
Vestiges, Alcova, Milan Design Week, Fuorisalone, Milan (IT), 2023.
In Presence of Your Absence, Material District, Utrecht (NL), 2023.
Raw.obj, The Future of Art Making, Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten (NL), 2022.
Ciona Are Doing Well, SVA Bio Art Lab, New York, 2022.
SPAZIO 1/2: Worskshop “Clay Dialogues”, Drop City, Fuorisalone, Milano (IT), 2022.
Sea Silt, collaboration with Humade, Ceramics Museum Princessehof, Leeuwarden (NL), 2022.
Conversing with Matter, DAE75!, Fuorisalone, Milano (IT), 2022.
Conversing with Matter, Rethinking Plastic, Yksi Expo , Eindhoven (NL), 2022.
Conversing with Matter, Design Fest Gent, Design Museum Gent, Gent (BE), 2022.
Conversing with Matter, From the Ground Up, Material Source Studio, Manchester (UK), 2022.
Conversing with Matter, Design Open, Kazerne, Eindhoven (NL), 2021–2022.
Conversing with Matter, Dutch Design Week 2021, DAE Graduation Show, Eindhoven (NL).
Ciona Are Doing Well, Interspecies Futures, by Oscar Salguero, NY Center for Book Arts, 2020.

Publications
Conversing with Matter, Design Unlimited Turkey, October 2023.
In Presence of Your Absence
, Italy: A New Collective Lanscape, Mousse Magazine Ed., April 2023.

Conversing with Matter, DAMN Magazine, Issue N° 82, June 2022.
Conversing with Matter, Plural Magazine, 2022.
Conversing with Matter, Elementa Oslo, 2022.
Conversing with Matter, The Color Association, 2021.
Conversing with Matter, Het Financieele Dagblad, Culture section, 2021.
Conversing with Matter, Wallpaper Magazine, Design section, 2021.
Ciona Are Doing Well, Design Parallax, curated by Angela Rui, MDFF Greece, 2020.

RecognitionsGrant, Starting Design Grant, Stimuleringsfonds, The Netherlands, 2023 - 2024.    
Award, Young New Talent, Material District, Utrecht (NL), 2023.
Grant, Creative Residency Arita, Japan, Stimuleringsfonds, 2024.
Grant, Building Talent, Stimuleringsfonds, The Netherlands, 2021.
Nominee, Gijs Bakker Design Award, Design Academy Eindhoven, 2021.

Studio detailsKvK 84375779

The font in use is Authentic Sans in support of fonts drawn by womxn designers.
Instagraminfo@benedettapompili.com

IndexHAMA
Raw.obj
In Presence of Your Absence

Conversing With Matter

FU Review Berlin N11 Still
Sea Silt by Humade
FU Review Berlin N10 Restoration
BC/99
SILT Studio
Crú

Reclaiming the domestic and everyday spaces

HAMACreative Residency Arita
Single fired porcelain wares, various sizes, 202

Developed during three months of residency in Arita (Japan), the tableware collection focuses on the Hama, one of the most ancient and applied  technologies in Arita. Consisting of a porcelain disc made to shrink under the porcelain ware, the hama prevents the warping and cracking of the porcelain during firing. By design, after one use, it is tossed away. The linearity of the life-cycle of the hama as well as the recent closure of the only hama maker, have become an issue for the community.
       While working side by side with the local craftspeople and applying the porcelain of the area,the project aimed at enhancing the circularity of the cycle and raising conversation around the topic. As the local knowledge focuses on the making o fine tableware, HAMA is a porcelain family designed within the sizes of the traditional hama, to reuse nd prevent its waste.



   Studies and archival of hama types, Arita, Japan, 2024.

On the one hand by reusing hamas already fired and thrown away by designing the sizes of a tableware collection to perfectly fit them after firing, so that the hamas can be reused as lids, coasters and holders.
On the other hand, the project included the remaking of the hamas and adding interventions that allow the shrinking plate to perform its function but adding future uses of it preventing its waste. By applying holes or indents, the hama after firing can become incense holders, drippers, hangers.

In Japan, porcelain is graded depending on its whitenesses. HAMA gives to each type equal space and presence by matching and mixing them in the collection. A playful and hidden aspect of the making process, common to each porcelain despite the grade, unifies the different shades: the light pink hue of the porcelain after bisque. Like the hama, the shade disappears after the last firing.

The challenge stood in reproducing the bright and warm “bisque pink” despite the cool and dim tones given by the iconic reduction firing of Arita craftspeople. Started as a playful element, the reproduction of the bisque hue became a way to stop in time the actual composition of the most applied types of porcelains in the area.