Robert Davidov’s Small Acts of Permanence explores architecture at the scale of the hand

As the founder and director of Davidov Architecture & Interiors, Davidov works in a discipline shaped by long timelines, layered decision-making and the slow translation of ideas from drawing to built form. Ceramics, by contrast, allows him to work physically and intuitively, testing form, proportion, shadow and mass directly through the hand.

His exhibition, Small Acts of Permanence, now showing at Oigåll Projects in Fitzroy, Victoria, brings that parallel practice into view.

Founded in 2021, Oigåll Projects is an independent gallery and experimental design space on Gertrude Street in Naarm/Melbourne. Operating somewhere between commercial showroom and conceptual playground, the gallery has become known for material-led exhibitions that blur the boundaries between art, design, furniture, object and installation. It is a fitting setting for Davidov’s ceramic works, which sit in a similarly unresolved space between sculpture, architectural model and interior object.

The body of work has been developed over the past year, with Davidov dedicating regular studio time to building up the collection. While he began working with ceramics around eight years ago, the practice has become increasingly connected to his architectural thinking since returning to it in 2022.

“I’ve just been doing everything in this deep blue colour,” says Davidov, describing a series of stacked and fused forms that continue to evolve through repetition, testing and material response.

Some pieces are composed from loose, slab-like elements; others appear more unified, their forms held together as small architectural fragments. Across the collection, the works sit somewhere between object, model and ruin. They are not functional in a conventional sense, although they could occupy many places within an interior: a coffee table, entry console, kitchen island or shelf. Instead, their purpose is more atmospheric.

Davidov describes the work as “an exploration of architectural form, but within my hands.”

That connection is clear. The pieces have a sense of mass and enclosure, with voids, openings and stacked volumes that recall rooms, thresholds and remnants of larger structures. At first glance, they can appear almost archaeological, like miniature monoliths, boulders or fragments of something older. Their scale, however, shifts that reading. These are small objects that carry the weight and presence of larger forms.

The deep blue glaze gives the work another layer of tension. It is saturated and reflective, introducing colour while still holding a certain depth and restraint. In a simple interior, Davidov sees the pieces acting as focal points, not decorative accents so much as condensed expressions of space.

“They’re almost like little rooms in a way,” he says.

For Davidov, the value of ceramics lies in the speed and physicality of making. Architecture is often conceived through conversation, drawings and renders before being passed on to builders and craftspeople. Ceramics allows him to test an idea himself, quickly and directly. What might appear convincing on paper can behave differently once built in three dimensions, and the process offers a way to explore depth, shadow, balance and proportion without the distance that often exists in architectural production.

There is also freedom in the scale. No client, no consent process, no extended timeline. The work can be made, tested, altered and understood through touch.

In this sense, Small Acts of Permanence sits closely beside Davidov’s architectural practice. Both are concerned with mass, tactility, restraint and atmosphere. Both ask how form can hold memory, calm and presence. And both suggest that permanence is not always a question of scale, but of feeling.

Small Acts of Permanence by Robert Davidov is showing at Oigåll Projects, 122 Gertrude Street, Fitzroy, VIC, until 19 July.

Explore more from Davidov Architecture & Interiors on ArchiPro.