Céline Hurka

in collaboration with Yamuna Forzani, commissioned by Amsterdam Museum, represented by Rademakers Gallery

Idyll is inspired by my time with my dear friend C at her organic farm, Terrafranta, in the hills near Florence—a place so beautiful, so unreal. It's an ode to the resilience of plants facing climate change. I drew these letters last spring and summer as a love letter. A love letter to starry nights and midday heat. To sage, lavender, orchids, and bees. To our friendship, and to what might one day be lost forever.

Idyll is inspired by my time with my dear friend C at her organic farm, Terrafranta, in the hills near Florence—a place so beautiful, so unreal. It's an ode to the resilience of plants facing climate change. I drew these letters last spring and summer as a love letter. A love letter to starry nights and midday heat. To sage, lavender, orchids, and bees. To our friendship, and to what might one day be lost forever.

Digital composition and illustration of the ornaments of the typeface Reverie. It was a reverie in summer. Calmness, clarity, after the mists of winter and spring. A reverie in summer. Fennel flowers and sea buckthorn. Bees and butterflies. Anticipation of years, excitement. Sunlight gradually gracing trees. A choreography, rehearsed and subtle. A longing (finally satisfied). An afternoon in August. Unreal. Unexpected (despite being dreamt of many times). Lilies of the day, only blooming once, to be consumed. A reverie in summer. Fleeting and enticing. Gradients of subtle blues and greens and yellows over calm waters. Preludes of darkness. A bouquet of wildflowers, freshly picked. A reverie in summer, long gone, remembered in sweetness. Reverie is a single style monospaced typeface with floral ornaments, encapsulating the dreamlike state of summer.

in collaboration with Yamuna Forzani, commissioned by Amsterdam Museum, represented by Rademakers Gallery

in collaboration with Yamuna Forzani, commissioned by Amsterdam Museum, represented by Rademakers Gallery

Illustration drawn during my time at Sopra Sotto Residency in Florence

Typeface drawn based on the closed gates of Versailles. my mother decided to join me spontaneously. we drove to versailles. on the way, i dreamt of entering the castle, of touching the gold and marble, of getting lost in the devastating beauty of it all. it felt like versailles was the answer to everything; it felt like versailles was everything. we parked the car. it was monday, the 6th of september, a day too early. the gate was closed. a stranger walked towards me, saying “i am very sorry”. i couldn’t believe it, it was the wrong time, the wrong day. i touched the gate, golden flowers, crosses, and suns. the closest i would ever come to paradise. this moment broke my heart a little. it felt like a dream coming to an end. it felt like versailles was lost forever. most likely i will never return. the gardens were the closest i ever came to experiencing the fantasy.

Print and composition of the typeface Letters, shown at Bicepts Editions in Marseille. Letters is an open source typeface designed with Jules Janssen.

food performance, house van hat boek with Mattia Papp and Trang Ha

food performance, house van hat boek with Mattia Papp and Trang Ha

The secret type garden is a a collaboration with Studio Pointer as a reaction to the typeface collection and visual language of type designer Céline Hurka, accompanied by an immersive generative soundscape created by Torus. This work is a part of Variable Lab, an ongoing exchange between Céline and Studio Pointer on the current state of variable typography and type design. The Secret Type Garden is an exploration of the relationship between typographic voice, storytelling, and the nature of digital font formats. Typefaces are simultaneously pieces of fiction and tools. They are small entities of software – perhaps the most consumed pieces of digital technology of all time. Here they transcend their utilitarian nature, escaping their day jobs in the misty wilderness.

The secret type garden is a a collaboration with Studio Pointer as a reaction to the typeface collection and visual language of type designer Céline Hurka, accompanied by an immersive generative soundscape created by Torus. This work is a part of Variable Lab, an ongoing exchange between Céline and Studio Pointer on the current state of variable typography and type design. The Secret Type Garden is an exploration of the relationship between typographic voice, storytelling, and the nature of digital font formats. Typefaces are simultaneously pieces of fiction and tools. They are small entities of software – perhaps the most consumed pieces of digital technology of all time. Here they transcend their utilitarian nature, escaping their day jobs in the misty wilderness.

Curation and hosting a dinner and exhibition centered around variable shapes, in collaboration with Studio Pointer* as part of their collaborative project Variable Lab. On this occasion, Céline Hurka was also celebrating the launch of her new type foundry. Dinner installation by Mattia Papp, Trang Ha, and Céline Hurka. Contributions by Eurowitch, Fatima Ferrari, Torus, Seraina Fässler, Alexander Webber, Yamuna Forzani, and Huw Williams. With many more visual contributions by friends and colleagues. Quartair Den Haag

Curation and hosting a dinner and exhibition centered around variable shapes, in collaboration with Studio Pointer* as part of their collaborative project Variable Lab. On this occasion, Céline Hurka was also celebrating the launch of her new type foundry. Dinner installation by Mattia Papp, Trang Ha, and Céline Hurka. Contributions by Eurowitch, Fatima Ferrari, Torus, Seraina Fässler, Alexander Webber, Yamuna Forzani, and Huw Williams. With many more visual contributions by friends and colleagues. Quartair Den Haag

Curation and hosting a dinner and exhibition centered around variable shapes, in collaboration with Studio Pointer* as part of their collaborative project Variable Lab. On this occasion, Céline Hurka was also celebrating the launch of her new type foundry. Dinner installation by Mattia Papp, Trang Ha, and Céline Hurka. Contributions by Eurowitch, Fatima Ferrari, Torus, Seraina Fässler, Alexander Webber, Yamuna Forzani, and Huw Williams. With many more visual contributions by friends and colleagues. Quartair Den Haag

Curation and hosting a dinner and exhibition centered around variable shapes, in collaboration with Studio Pointer* as part of their collaborative project Variable Lab. On this occasion, Céline Hurka was also celebrating the launch of her new type foundry. Dinner installation by Mattia Papp, Trang Ha, and Céline Hurka. Contributions by Eurowitch, Fatima Ferrari, Torus, Seraina Fässler, Alexander Webber, Yamuna Forzani, and Huw Williams. With many more visual contributions by friends and colleagues. Quartair Den Haag

Illustration

Secret Flower language developed during Sopra Sotto residency to reflect on the less of biodiversity

Painting and installation in collaboration with Alexander Webber featuring Tonka. Presented at Art au Centre, Liege. Tonka is a three axis sans serif variable font, designed by Céline Hurka in collaboration with Huw Williams released in July 2023. The 'Early Bird' paintings by Alexander Webber are oil on multiplex and feature Tonka – the official typeface of Summer Camp Friends Forever.

Painting and installation in collaboration with Alexander Webber featuring Tonka. Presented at Art au Centre, Liege. Tonka is a three axis sans serif variable font, designed by Céline Hurka in collaboration with Huw Williams released in July 2023. The 'Early Bird' paintings by Alexander Webber are oil on multiplex and feature Tonka – the official typeface of Summer Camp Friends Forever.

Dark Academia is inspired by the first flowers in barren forests, misty afternoons by the sea, the scent of old books, dreaming in rose gardens, lonely night time walks, unbearable yearning and limerence, feeling melancholic and still having to work, losing yourself in love and imagination, floating in candle light, drunken meetings past midnight, romanticising the impossible, afternoons at the museum gazing at classical paintings of flowers and landscapes long gone, heartbreak and the glimmer of hope, pastel bouquets as whispered apologies, the solitude of the night, browsing through pages on the floors of bookstores, by longing, by tears on bare skin, by devastating beauty, by losing myself in the unreal, by never-ending endings and (false) promises, by rides at midnight, by moving in smoke and uncertainty, by hopes getting crushed over and over again, desolate places in pouring rain, whispering last goodbyes in an alternate reality, like a dream.