Driaan Claassen’s Bronze Designs

WORDS Maciek Dubla

By adding a raw texture to bronzed luxury, Driaan Claassen creates furniture and sculptures that are perfect in their imperfection.

In his book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell concludes that it takes roughly 10 000 hours to achieve mastery in a field. At 23, bronze artist Driaan Claassen seems to have already achieved mastery.

Before he started working in bronze, Driaan dabbled in drawing, photography and writing, and focused on creating photo-realistic images for product visualisation. “But sitting behind a desk all day for long periods of time became a bit too much for me,” he says.

In early 2014, Driaan came across the Southern Guild Show and fell in love with the idea of creating furniture pieces that resemble works of art. Seeing how bronze has the ability to bring a new level of attention and appreciation to mundane objects, he changed his focus. He was taken in by Otto du Plessis, founding member of Bronze Age, and given a studio space where he learnt how to cast bronze.

Driaan finds beauty in nature’s ability to create forms that are flawless and random, a simplicity underlying chaos that cannot be replicated by man. This is what inspires his work.

In a world where cultural trends are fleeting, the young bronze artist wants to create sculptures, vessels and furniture pieces that are timeless one-offs.

To see more of Driaan’s work, visit reticence.co.za.