Jesse Schlesinger unveils designs shaped by the land and sea in Pacific at Gallery FUMI

Gallery FUMI presents Pacific, the first UK solo exhibition by San Francisco–based artist Jesse Schlesinger, marking his debut with the contemporary design gallery in London. Spanning over 15 years of multidisciplinary exploration, the art and design show distils the essence of Schlesinger's multidisciplinary practice—an intertwining of nature, philosophy, politics and personal craft. Through a new series of sculpture art and furniture designs, Pacific, on view from October 9 – November 29, 2025, invites viewers to experience materials not merely as a medium, but as collaborators—responsive and deeply storied.

At the heart of Schlesinger's work lies a profound reverence for wood. A second-generation carpenter, the furniture designer approaches his chosen material with both intimacy and humility, attuned to its grain, temperament and potential. He works primarily with locally salvaged wood, transforming fragments of his surrounding landscape into objects that carry both ecological and emotional resonance. His pieces, whether sculptural forms or functional furniture, emerge from a dialogue between maker and matter, in which the wood's natural directionality guides the evolution of form and scale.

For this series, Schlesinger, a second-generation carpenter who favours a hands-on approach, allows purpose and function to dictate form, yet his interpretation of 'function' resists rigidity. Each piece seems to breathe, inviting touch and presence. The surfaces bear traces of the hand, the marks of process and the rhythm of time, revealing an ongoing negotiation between control and surrender. As Gallery FUMI mentions in the show's press release, "Schlesinger bids the intended function of a piece to instruct the directionality of the material and the revelation of both scale and form. Sensorial by virtue of their materiality, each piece in this exhibition has been designed to be breathed in, felt, and inhabited."

Applied instinctively rather than methodically, Schlesinger's use of automotive paint transforms surfaces into shifting fields of light and reflection. The hues—deep oceanic blues, iridescent sheens reminiscent—evoke both the vastness of the Pacific and the fragility of natural phenomena, grounding the viewer in an experience that is at once physical and transcendent.

"Powerful and awe-inspiring, the Pacific Ocean is a constant presence in Jesse Schlesinger's oeuvre, directly impacting his materials such as the redwood trees that absorb moisture from its fog," the show's text mentions. "Used as quasiautobiographical material, redwood can be found in the remarkable freestanding sculpture c.o.II and wall sculpture M.06. Their circular shapes are carved then progressively smoothed before being charred with a torch. Schlesinger then uses a unique brush from Kyoto to reveal the raised grain. This final step in the process harks to the Pacific Ocean, connecting the Bay Area to Japan, a country which the artist has profound ties to. The shimmering and alluring rich hues of the automotive paint transform the pieces into other-worldly objects, existing between land and sea."

A deeper meditation on cultural and ecological consciousness takes centre stage at the design exhibition, or as the gallery puts it, "Schlesinger’s works also embody a quixotic call for peace in these turbulent times." The works, poised between sculptural design and contemporary furniture, history and immediacy, stand as intermediaries between material memory and lived experience. "They emanate a subtle, resilient primordial strength inspired by both the etymology of the word Pacific, meaning 'peace-making' and Zen Buddhist philosophy."

Circular forms recur throughout Pacific, serving as a guiding thread and symbol of both primordial creation and the continuous cycle of decay and renewal. The American artist preserves this motif in a striking coffee table carved from a discarded block of deodar cedar. The piece of wooden furniture invites quiet contemplation through the tactile shifts of its surfaces and the natural fragrance of the wood, its presence urging viewers to slow down.

The table design's man-made interventions—powder-coated steel covering the sawyer's initial cuts—honour California's lineage of critical thinkers such as Joan Didion, Rachel Kushner, and Robert Irwin. "These interventions are simultaneously a form of healing and a critique of the environmental disregard and capitalist individualism that are exacerbated by current political climates. These long-lasting designs do not simply bring comfort into our lives, they also offer a new mode of living in harmony with our natural and social environment," FUMI states.