Wandi Riyadi Smooth Speeding Tomato Handmade Briar Pipe, New

Description

Over the last decade or so, Indonesia has produced some impressive pipe makers in the ever-expanding global artisan scene. Since taking up pipe making in 2013, West Java’s Wandi Riyadi has shot to international acclaim, and has even inspired something of a “Riyadi school” back in his native land. Riyadi’s work has been inspired by Scandinavinan masters, such as Sixten Ivarsson, Lars Ivarsson, Bo Nordh, and Jess Chonowitch, and the Japanese master Hiroyuki Tokutomi. As gestured, Riyadi himself has also become an influence for numerous other artisans both home and abroad, and has even joined the ranks of pipe makers such as J. Alan, David Huber, Alex Florov, and Cornelius Manz in being invited to design pipes for Zhang Guo Hui’s GH.ZHANG project.

So-called “speeding” shapes are fascinating, not just because they look so unusual, but because they tap into a problem that extends beyond pipes and into the wider world of art and design: how do you convey movement through an object that is, essentially, static? There are plenty of techniques to pick from in painting, for example, but it gets more difficult when the object doesn’t represent anything. Aside from certain meerschaums and a small number of briars, a pipe typically doesn’t depict a scene of something happening, from which viewers could extrapolate a “before” and “after” and, thus, a movement between the two. Even if a shape has a non-pipe namesake, like the “tomato,” it’s not because the former faithfully recreates the latter. The relation is closer to analogy, with any resemblance taking place on a more “abstract” level. But the same can be applied to movement. For example, what happens when an object—especially an organic object—travels at high velocities? It becomes the site of a great clash of forces, with its form becoming warped a consequence. This tomato from Wandi Riyadi isn’t “moving” in any meaningful way, but it nonetheless conveys a strange sense of being pushed and pulled in separate directions, just like in the experience of genuine speed. Even the grain perfectly follows this abstracted complex of forces, which can’t have been easy to pull off. When you handle thousands of pipes a year for a living, this is the kind of thing you love to see.

Details:

Length: 5.9″ / 149.8mm

Bowl Width: 0.81 / 20.57mm

Bowl Depth: 1.58″ / 40.13mm

Weight: 2.4oz / 70g