Ronan Bouroullec

Ronan Bouroullec is a French designer born in Quimper (Brittany) in 1971.

He went to the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Appliqués et des Métiers d’Art when he was 17. The following year he exhibited for the first time at the Salon du Meuble in Paris. This determined the beginning of his collaboration with French design companies, with numerous design projects during his student days given precedence over his college work. He continued his studies at the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs. In 1996, his Vase Soliflore took its place in the Centre Pompidou’s permanent collection. In 1997, the Néotù gallery gave him his first solo exhibition with Vase Combinatoires. Giulio Cappellini noticed his work at the Paris Salon du Meuble, giving him the opportunity to create his first pieces of industrial design, and he was awarded the Grand Prix du Design by the City of Paris. In 1998 he was joined by his brother Erwan.

In 1999, Ronan Bouroullec was awarded the New Designer Award by the International Contemporary Furniture Fair in New York.

Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec’s subsequent meeting with Rolf Felhbaum, then head of Vitra, was to mark the beginning of their ongoing partnership, and to instigate others with international design companies such as Flos, Hay, Magis, Mutina, etc.

Their designs span from craftsmanship to mass production, via permanent public space installations around the world.

They have been the subject of several monographic exhibitions, including at the Design Museum (London, 2002), the Museum of Contemporary Art – MOCA (Los Angeles, 2004), the Centre Pompidou–Metz (2011), the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago (2012), and the Musée des Arts Décoratifs (Paris, 2013). The Philadelphia Museum of Art recently showed a retrospective of their work.

Their designs are represented in the collections of the most important international institutions, including MoMA New York, the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the Art Institute of Chicago, and the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris.

Alongside his work as a designer, drawing – which has been a regular activity since early childhood – occupies an important place in Ronan Bouroullec’s daily life. Over the last few years, his drawings have been introduced into large public and private collections around the world, including those of the Art Institute of Chicago, Cooper-Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum. His works have been presented in a range of contexts and places around the world: Giorgio Mastinu Fine Art Gallery (Venice, 2018 and 2022), Galerie kreo (Paris, 2019 and 2022, London, 2021), Licht Gallery (Tokyo, 2021), Casa Mutina (Modena, 2021).

His drawings have also been exhibited as part of group exhibitions, including at MAK–Museum of Applied Arts (Vienna, 2019), Vitra Design Museum (Weil am Rhein, 2019), Caixa Forum (Barcelona, 2020, Madrid, 2020) and at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs (Paris, 2021).

Drawings have also occupied an important position in monographic exhibitions of the work of Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec, notably:

• Album, Arc en Rêve (Bordeaux, 2011), Vitra Design Museum (Weil am Rhein, 2012), Philbrook Museum of Art (Tulsa, 2014);
• Bivouac, Centre Pompidou–Metz (2011), Museum of Contemporary Art (Chicago, 2012)
• Momentané, Musée des Arts Décoratifs (Paris, 2013).

The drawings have also been the subject of publications:
In 2013, Drawing, published by JRP Ringier, showed drawings made by Ronan and Erwan between 2005 and 2012.
Between 2018 and 2021, five works were published by Nieves: Drawings (2018), Ronan Bouroullec 18 (2019), Crayon-Pinceau (2020), Janvier (2021), Stylo-Bille (2021).
In 2021, a monograph was published to accompany the exhibition at Mutina: Ronan Bouroullec – The Sound of My Left Hand.

In 2023, Phaidon will publish Day After Day, a major work imagined as a personal journal covering more than a decade.

Ronan Bouroullec is represented by Galerie kreo, in Paris and London, and by Giorgio Mastinu Fine Art Gallery, in Venice, for his original drawings. Limited and non-limited editions are distributed by The WrongShop.