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Profile The Finnish designer Eero Aarnio (b.1932) is one of the great innovators of modern furniture design. In the 1960s, Eero Aarnio began experimenting with plastics, vivid colors and organic forms, breaking away from traditional design conventions. His now iconic plastic creations include the Ball (1963), the Pastil (1968), and the Bubble (1968) chairs which echo the pop culture and spirit of their time. Many of Aarnio’s works are included in the world’s most prestigious museums, including Victoria and Albert Museum in London, MoMA in New York and Vitra Design Museum in Weil am Rhein. Biography Born 21.7.1932 in Helsinki, Finland School of Applied Arts, Helsinki 1954-57 Married Pirkko Attila 1956 Children Marja-Leena 1959 and Rea 1961 Designer, Asko Oy 1960-62 in Lahti, Finland Own design office 1962 Helsinki, Finland Eero Aarnio Design Studio GmbH 1978-82 in Cologne, Germany Design Studio in Tapiola, Finland 1982 Eero Aarnio T:mi, Veikkola, Finland 1992 Aarnio Design Ltd., Veikkola, Finland 2001 Awards Valmet Trade Mark Competition, Helsinki, Finland 1958, First Prize International Furniture Competition, Cantu, Italy 1959, Third Prize Export Furniture Competition, Helsinki, Finland 1963, Third Prize International Competition on Furniture Design, Cantu, Italy 1964, First Prize Scandinavian Park and Street Competition 1965, Stockholm, Sweden, First Prize Steel Furniture Competition, Helsinki, Finland 1967, Second Prize International Design Award of the A.I.D. (American Institute of Interior Designers) for Pastil Chair (Gyro) 1968, New York, USA Honorary member of SIO (Finnish Association of Interior Designers) 1999 The Finland Prize 2005, The Ministry of Education, Finland Interior Innovation Award Cologne 2006, Germany The ADI Compasso d’Oro Award 2008, for Trioli chair, Italy Kaj Franck Design Prize of 2008, Finland Red Dot Design Award 2010, for Kubo bright light, Germany Pro Finlandia Medal 2010, Finland Green GOOD DESIGN 2010, for The Tree, USA Red Dot Design Award 2012, for Ghost lamp, Germany Solo Exhibitions That´s it, Art Gallery Árvore, Porto, Portugal 2001 Eero Aarnio, Kunsthalle, Helsinki, Finland 2003 Eero Aarnio – popfantasier og sittende dagdrømmer, Kunstindustrimuseet, Oslo, Norway 2004 Forestil dig en rund stol, Danish Design Center, Kopenhagen, Denmark 2005 Pop Fantasies: Furniture Design by Eero Aarnio, The Embassy of Finland, Washington DC, USA 2005 Fantasías del Pop. El diseño de Eero Aarnio, Museo Franz Mayer, Mexico City 2007 Eero Aarnio – Retropop, Phantasie und Tagträume, The Embassy of Finland, Berlin, Germany 2007 The Kaj Franck Design Prize of 2008 – Eero Aarnio, Design Forum Finland, Helsinki 2008 Kaj Frank Design Prize Exhibition at the exhibition center of the visual arts TR1, Tampere 2009 Eero Aarnio Life in Design, AXIS Gallery, Tokyo and Design Museum de sign de, Osaka, Japan 2014 Eero Aarnio, Design Museum, Helsinki, Finland 2016 Group Exhibitions Rattan Stools, Asko Oy, Helsinki 1961 7+7 Arkitekter, Stockholm, Sweden 1964 Triennale XIV, Milan, Italy 1964 Eurodomus, Genova, Italy 1966 and Milan, Italy 1970 Fiberglass Furniture, Asko Oy, Helsinki 1968 Plastic as Plastic, New York, USA 1970 Design aus Finnland, Asko GmbH, Cologne, Germany 1979 Masters of Modern Design, IBM Gallery, New York, USA 1991 Plastic Fantastic, Trapholt Museum of Modern Art, Denmark 2005 Pop Art Design, EMMA (Espoo Museum of Modern Art), Finland 2015 Golden Generations. Modernism in Finnish Architecture and Design, State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia 2015 Represented in Museums Museum of Modern Art, MoMA, New York, USA Victoria and Albert Museum, London, Great Britain Design Museum, Helsinki, Finland Vitra Design Museum, Weil am Rhein, Germany Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France Musée des arts décoratifs de Montreal, Canada Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, Netherlands Die Neue Sammlung, München, Germany Galerie für Avantgarde Kunst, Cologne, Germany Galerie für Zeitgenössische Kunst, Leipzig, Germany Kunsthal Rotterdam, Netherlands Kunstmuseum Düsseldorf im Ehrenhof, Germany Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe, Hamburg, Germany Brooklyn Museum, New York, USA Liliane and David M. Stewart Collection, Le Musée du Chateau Dufresne, Montreal, Canada Los Angeles County Museum of Art, USA Toledo Museum of Art, USA Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, USA Baltimore Museum of Art, USA Bauhaus Museum, Sydney, Australia San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMoMa), San Francisco, USA Veletrzni Palace (Prague Museum of Modern Art), Prague, Czech Republic Books of Eero Aarnio That´s it. Vestígio, Consultores de Design, Portugal 2001 Eero Aarnio. Fang Hai. China Architecture & Building Press 2002 Assume a round chair–Eero Aarnio and the 60´s. Kunsthalle Helsinki, University of Art and Design, Helsinki 2003 Eero Aarnio. Fang Hai. Southeast University Press, China 2003 Eero Aarnio, Kaj Frank Design Prize. Design Forum Finland 2008 I Protagonisti del Design/Eero Aarnio. Hachette, Italy 2011 A = 4 π r2 Eero Aarnio. Design Forum, Finland 2014 Eero Aarnio-Värin ja ilon muotoilija. (Eero Aarnio-Designer of Colour and Joy). WSOY, Finland 2016.