Daniel Rybakken – Daylight and Objects at Design Museum Helsinki, 8 June – 26 August 2018

In 2017 the young Norwegian designer Daniel Rybakken was awarded the Torsten and Wanja Söderberg Prize, the world’s largest design prize.  Rybakken’s prize exhibition will open in Design Museum’s Gallery in Helsinki in early June and present his work in light design, his professional speciality, with special focus on the relationship of space and light.

Light and furniture designer Daniel Rybakken was born in Oslo in 1984. He studied design at the Oslo School of Architecture and the Academy of Design and Crafts in Gothenburg. Rybakken lives with his family in Gothenburg where he has had his own design firm, Studio Rybakken, since 2008. Daniel Rybakken’s works are often in the interstices of art and design. He has received, among other distinctions in design, the Red Dot Award (2007), the Bruno Mathsson Award (2011), the Compasso d’Oro Prize (2014 and 2016) and the Wallpaper* Design Award (2017).

Rybakken began his collaboration with Artek in 2014, which also marked the beginning of his career in furniture design. Furniture designed by him for Artek was on show for the first time at the Stockholm Furniture Fair in 2017.

According to the award committee for the Söderberg Prize, Rybakken creates poetic and magical effects recreating daylight, thus producing new experiences of light. The exhibition at Design Museum focuses in particular on Rybakken’s integrated processes of design. The exhibits include: Screened Daylight and Surface Daylight.

The Torsten and Wanja Söderberg Prize was established by the Torsten Söderberg and Ragnar Söderberg Foundations and awarded for the first time in 1994 in connection with the centenary of the birth of Torsten Söderberg. Söderberg’s wife, Wanja née Aminoff was one of the donors of funds to the Torsten Söderberg Foundation. The Söderberg Foundations are among the Sweden’s leading patrons of research. Worth one million SEK, the Torsten and Wanja Söderberg Prize is the largest of its kind in the world. It is administered by the Röhsska Museum and awarded annually to a Nordic designer or craftsperson.

The exhibition will be on show at Design Museum from 8 June until 26 August 2018. 

Daniel Rybakken can be interviewed in Helsinki on July 6 and 7. Interviews in advance by telephone or email can also be arranged. Please address requests for interviews and further information to Päivi Balomenos, PR & Communications, Design Museum, paivi.balomenos@designmuseum.fi, tel. 040 753 67 25

The Söderberg Prize:
http://rohsska.se/en/t-w-soderbergs-pris/om-priset/371/

Daniel Rybakken’s webpages:
http://www.danielrybakken.com/Daniel_Rybakken.html