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CONTENTS JUNE 2016
EDITOR’S PA/
SHOOT PRODUCTION Aliette Boshier (Reader Enquiries)
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antennae roundup
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30
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of use and age on surfaces. Exhibiting masterful creative and technical
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DIEGO RIVERA AND FRIDA KAHLO IN DETROIT (ed. Mark Rosenthal; Yale, tion in Detroit. She hated the city; she dismissed it as ‘an ancient and
rrp £30) Twenty-fourteen was not the first time that the near-bank- impoverished hamlet’ and found the factories ‘completely lacking
rupt city of Detroit has considered selling the collection of its own in sensibility and good taste’. At one of Ford’s dinner parties, she
institute of art. In 1932, in the midst of the Great Depression, the amused herself by asking her famously anti-Semitic host, during a
city’s economy was in dire straits, and the Ford Motor Company’s lull in conversation, if he was Jewish.
workers took to the streets in protest at lay-offs and pay cuts. The In one of several specialist essays, Salomon Grimberg details
Ford Hunger March was renamed the Ford Massacre after four Kahlo’s excruciating medical travails, which began in 1925 when
demonstrators were shot dead by company security guards and her pelvis was injured in a road accident. She arrived in Detroit two
police, and 20 more were injured. months pregnant, but aborted her baby in July because of her health
The Mexican artist couple Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo arrived concerns. The following September, her mother died.
in Detroit just six weeks after the protest, in April 1932. Rivera was a All the while, Rivera was immersed in his monumental fresco.
communist, and professed sympathy with the workers, but he was An enormous, multi-panelled work in the museum’s Garden Court,
also a pragmatist, according to Mark Rosenthal in a scholarly new it depicts in exacting detail the automotive assembly line, operated
book. Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo in Detroit is pub- by handsome muscular workers. It is flanked by
lished to accompany an exhibition at the Detroit allegorical figures, including female nudes cra-
Institute of Art, where in 1932 Rivera had re- dling apples and grain, and – poignantly – a cen-
ceived a generous mural commission, funded tral motif of a baby in utero.
by none other than Henry Ford’s son, Edsel. Kahlo, meanwhile, was untouched by Rivera’s
Rivera does not come off well in this story. His wife optimistic embrace of American values. Her paintings
observed dryly that he ‘never worried about embrac- from this period were, like her subsequent work,
ing contradictions’, and despite his radical affilia- mainly self-portraits: terrible, nightmarish images
tions he was hugely excited by American industry, of herself on a hospital bed, for instance, or giving
and basked in the attentions of Detroit’s elite. He birth to a corpse. One senses in these paintings
later praised in his autobiography the capitalist an unflinching self-scrutiny, and a boundless con-
Henry Ford as ‘an amiable genius’ and ‘a true poet fidence. Arriving at Detroit train station, when
and artist, one of the greatest in the world’. asked if she was an artist too, she responded: ‘Yes,
It is Kahlo, 21 years younger than her famous the greatest in the world.’ Having emerged from her
husband, who is painted in the book as the more au- husband’s shadow, it was in Detroit, writes Rosenthal,
thentic, gutsy and tormented of the pair, and the one that Rivera and Kahlo ‘became equals’ $ JONATHAN
who experienced the more significant artistic evolu- GRIFFIN is an art critic based in Los Angeles r
To order Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo in Detroit for £28.50 (plus £5.50 UK p&p), ring the World of Interiors Bookshop on 0871 911 1747
37
Iroko Wallcoverings
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books
THE HIGH LINE (by James Corner Field Operations and Diller Scofidio; Phaidon,
rrp £49.95) After the final section of the High Line was completed in 2014,
members of its design team met to discuss their acclaimed ten-year collabo-
ration that produced a year-round public park from a 2.4km section of ele-
vated freight railway, disused since the early 1980s. That meeting led to
another creative partnership: the co-authoring of this comprehensive book
that focuses on the design, development and building of the project.
Several books have already been published about the High Line, located
on Manhattan’s west side; but this one, a feat in its own right and surely a
labour of love, documents through a series of conversations between the
designers the whole creative process from concept to completion. It also
contains previously unpublished material such as the original design pro-
posal and construction images.
It’s hard to believe the High Line, now a beloved fixture in the streetscape
and a role model for dozens of other projects worldwide, was once a cause
célèbre. Some people called for the demolition of the abandoned strip; they
considered it an eyesore and an impediment to development. Fortunately,
in 1999, a group of urban visionaries called the Friends of the High Line,
inspired in part by the 4.8km Promenade Plantée in Paris (1993), began
advocating for the preservation of the railway and its rehabilitation as a
public amenity. Against many odds, the Friends successfully navigated
legal, political and funding obstacles.
As one of four finalists, the team first visited the dilapidated structure in
2004 before winning the competition. The curiously beautiful decaying rail-
way was overgrown with wild flowers and meadow grasses, amid concrete,
barbed wire, graffiti and garbage left by trespassers. As I discovered when
I visited around that same time, there was something inexplicably special
about walking on this urban relic that courses through and in between build-
ings, and viewing the city from three storeys above the street.
Subsequently, as competition winner, the team was inspired by the native
and wild-seeded vegetation that overtook the railway, making a commit-
ment to keeping the High Line simple, wild, quiet and slow. Based on the
principles of ‘agritecture’, organic and building materials are combined to
accommodate natural zones, including woodlands, grasslands and plant
beds, with programmatic ones such as a sundeck with a water feature, an
amphitheatre and a space for public-art installations. Built in three stages,
upon completion the park runs from the Meatpacking District, uptown
through Chelsea and terminates at the Hudson rail yards – all neighbour-
hoods forever changed by the presence and popularity of the park.
As a New Yorker, I visit often. Though nothing replaces being there, this
book, with its abundance of photos, renderings and plans – its cover mimics
the concrete planks of the walkway – is an enriching accompaniment for an
architect, landscape architect, designer, urban planner, or if you happen to
be one of the millions of people who love the High Line $ LINDA G. MILLER is
an editor at ‘Oculus’, a publication of the American Institute of Architects, New York r
ARTISTS LIVING WITH ART (by Stacey Goergen and Amanda Benchley; Storr’s essay puts such casual collecting and domestic decorat-
Abrams, rrp £37.50) It is a truism to suggest that artists begin their ing into two neat piles: the magpies, ‘who can’t resist owning things
careers in digs with other artists and later gravitate from their garrets that catch their eye,’ and the obsessives, who pursue collections of
to living with only their art and themselves. However, after much singular or similar objects, from folk art to cookie jars. Firmly in the
peering into the lofts and duplexes of some famous artists living latter category comes Andres Serrano, famous for his blasphemous
in and around New York, it is clear that lifelong relationships with Piss Christ photograph (1987), who, far from being a heathen, is a
artists are often as important as the accumulation of their works. hoarder of religious artefacts – from Gothic furniture and Mother
An opening text by the eminent critic and curator Robert Storr and Child icons to a casually placed decapitated wooden head of
cites the loneliness of the artist’s lot by referencing how Philip St John the Baptist from 17th-century Spain.
Guston – himself a painter of irascible, solitary, hard-drinking fig- John Currin likes to look at nothing so much as himself (or at
ures – had placed an impression of Dürer’s 1514 engraving Melencolia least his own paintings) and his wife, Rachel Feinstein, who is also
over his small kitchen table. And yet, throughout this admittedly often muse for Currin’s languid, sexy compositions, which are more
insular tour of American artists’ homes and interiors, the overriding Cranach than contemporary art. Luckily, he still has space to hang a
sense is of mutual admiration and kinship. great carnivalesque painting by Cornelis van Haarlem and a pre-
Perhaps this has to do with the editors’ address books, their choice cious Carracci drawing, which we frustratingly don’t get to see.
of artists from a similar generation, or maybe it was all an exercise It is when the camera lingers too closely on the details that we
in that other art-world staple – nepotism. Whatever the truth, there don’t get access to the wider context. A great younger talent and
are many crossovers here, with photos by abstract artist, Tauba Auerbach, is not well
Cindy Sherman and Chuck Close adorning represented here, as her flat appears cropped
each other’s walls and much talk of trading and hemmed in, only a few glimpses of cheq-
ideas or bartering works between artists. uerboard prints and a Klein bottle (a glass ves-
My own partisan tendencies came to the sel with Möbius-like properties) giving much
fore when encountering those artists at home, sense of where her real artistic interests lie.
such as the saccharine ex-pâtissier Will Cot- Ultimately when not just hung in homage or
ton or the feminist sculptor EV Day; because in comradeship, as in the triumvirate of great
these names were not familiar to me, they African-American artists included here –
seemed less consequential. Certainly Sher- Mickalene Thomas, Glenn Ligon and Rashid
man, a legendary artist and self-portraitist Johnson – the presence of another artist’s
whose collection includes the aforemen- work can act like a Trojan horse, or as Storr
tioned Day, comes across as the most eclec- puts it, ‘like an assertive guest in the house:
tic and supportive in terms of her collections one with whom it is impossible to avoid con-
of ceramics, paintings and sculpture, even versation, even argument: one who whispers,
recalling the superb and dense section of the mutters… even harangues’ $ OSSIAN WARD
Venice Biennale she curated in 2013. is head of content at the Lisson Gallery r
To order Artists Living with Art for £33.75 (plus £5.50 UK p&p), ring the World of Interiors Bookshop on 0871 911 1747
41
books
www.therugcompany.com
SHAKESPEARE’S GARDENS (by Jackie Bennett; Frances Lincoln, rrp the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust bought it and laid out a garden
£25) How fitting it is that the life of our greatest playwright should in hey-nonny-no style. After extensive archaeology, a new garden
be filled with so many gaps and mysteries, so many ‘could haves’ will be unveiled this July to commemorate the 400 years since the
and ‘probablys’. Jackie Bennett takes an interesting angle on the great man died. The new design incorporates the shape of Shakes-
life by looking at the places – more particularly the gardens – as- peare’s original house, outlined on the ground in bronze.
sociated with William Shakespeare and his family, but even she The Birthplace Trust, which bought Henley Street in Stratford
cannot escape the occasional ‘it seems likely’ or ‘maybe’. at auction in 1847, went on to acquire all the properties now most
In a handsome book with wonderful photographs by Andrew closely associated with Shakespeare, including, of course, Anne
Lawson, she tells the stories of five gardens with Shakespeare con- Hathaway’s cottage. The garden here is everyone’s dream of what
nections, from his birthplace in Henley Street, Stratford, to the a cottage garden should be: roses, sweet peas, cowslips, a strange
property, New Place, that Shakespeare bought for himself and his lack of mud. Paintings made in the middle of the 19th century
wife, Anne, in 1597. To anyone with an in- show what allure these places had, in their
terest in the man, this – his own home for 19 original unreconstructed state.
years, the place where he died – might seem Old paintings, photographs, maps and
the most significant of all the Shakespeare artefacts from the various properties fur-
shrines, but its history illustrates the many ther enhance the book (though the cap-
ironies associated with our urgent desire to tions don’t always tell the reader where they
commemorate and celebrate the past. can be found). Good use is made of the bold
The house that Shakespeare actually lived woodcut illustrations in contemporary her-
in at New Place, once reckoned the second bals such as John Gerard’s of 1597, and there
most important house in Stratford, was de- are eye-catching spreads of plants popular
molished in 1702 and remodelled in 18th- in Shakespeare’s time: household herbs,
century style. It was later bought by the Revd roses, salads, orchard fruit.
Francis Gastrell, who got tired of complete Are the gardens authentic? That is, are
strangers banging on his door and asking to we seeing what Shakespeare saw? Probably
see Shakespeare’s mulberry tree. So in 1758 not, says Bennett, but does it really matter?
he cut it down, causing a violent quarrel with Shakespeare’s father was fined for having an
the town corporation. They rather liked the unauthorised dung heap in Henley Street,
Shakespeare tourists and the money they the famous birthplace. Now we have holly-
brought into Stratford. Gastrell, unrepent- hocks. Who’s complaining? $ ANNA PAVORD
ant, then pulled down the house as well, and is the author of ‘Landskipping: Painters, Plough-
the plot remained empty until 1884, when men and Places’ (Bloomsbury) r
To order Shakespeare’s Gardens for £23.75 (plus £5.50 UK p&p), ring the World of Interiors Bookshop on 0871 911 1747
44
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FLORENCE
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THE HEVENINGHAM books
COLLECTION
NEW THAI STYLE (by Michael Freeman and Kim Inglis; Laurence
King, rrp £29.95). This is a pleasant picture book of, mostly, the
interiors of smart Thai hotels and of houses that look like smart
Thai hotels – with one spectacular exception. The intention is
to show what expensive fashionable interior design in the coun-
try now looks like, and Freeman’s sharp and professional pho-
tography does the trick. And what it looks like is a combination
of various artefacts from different Eastern countries assembled
in one room, as Inglis’s breathless text explains.
There is hardly a room here that doesn’t have one substan-
tial piece of Chinese furniture in it, and some in which the effect
is created by carefully placing objects that are Burmese, Laotian,
Moroccan and, in one royal residence, designed by an Italian,
Indian and Korean as well. In fact, even the idea of having large
rocks springing out of the floor within a house could equally
be Sri Lankan – Ulrik Plesner was doing it with Geoffrey Bawa
in the 1960s – or Californian, from John Lautner, and ten years
later it was all over House & Garden. But the unifying features,
much luscious polished teak and rosewood, some gold leaf and
some bright red silk: these are authentic Thai elements that hold
many of the rooms together.
The only thing I am not sure about is the swimming pool
with the crimson tiles, which looks like the scene of a massacre.
That spectacular exception is, however, well worth seeking
out. Baan Suan Sanghob is a house on the outskirts of Bangkok
designed by the architect Prabhakorn Vadanyakul to combine
elements drawn from the unexpected combination of jungle and
aviation metaphors, rather as if a plane had crashed down into
the trees and people were living in some style and comfort there.
The architect and his wife are pilots, and they evidently wanted
to live in perpetual flight, yet nested at the same time up in the
tree-tops. They have achieved this with a home of deep glossy
timber floors and an airy steel frame covered in elements drawn
directly from aircraft: wings and flaps for benches and stair rungs,
stainless-steel cables and powder-coated aluminium pipes. The
house nestles so deeply in the trees that its windows seem to
brush the branches, and a black-leather chaise-longue, a model
aircraft hovering at its feet, sits on a narrow glass floor with foli-
age just the other side of the ceiling-height glass on one side, and
the open well of the staircase just down to the other.
It really is a breathtaking ensemble, and for all the evident
lush comfort of the other interiors here, it is the one that makes
the greatest impression $ TIMOTHY BRITTAIN-CATLIN is an archi-
tect and the author of ‘Bleak Houses: Disappointment and Failure in
Architecture’ (MIT)
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SWATCH
S P L A S H
H I T S
When it comes to toiles, are you out of your depth? Whether you dive in with
Pop-bright neons and azure blues, or prefer your pastoral prints in more clas-
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the waters, Miranda Sinclair presents her top 40. Photography: Neil Mersh
1 ‘Hunt of the Raj 5177-04’, by Rose Cumming for Dessin Fournir, £73, Fromental. 2 ‘Escarpolette
B2544-001’, by Charles Burger, £136.60; 3 ‘Pondicherry Emeraude B2433-1’, by Charles Burger,
£108; both Turnell & Gigon. 4 ‘Chinese Leopard Toile BR-79227-0’, by Brunschwig & Fils, £102,
GP&J Baker. 5 ‘Chinese Toile LW90153’, £84, Lewis & Wood. 6 ‘Chinoise Exotique 16211-004’,
by Scalamandré, £394, Colony. 7 ‘Les Muses et le Lion B1826004’, by Braquenié, £156, Pierre
Frey. 8 ‘Xian SL01-01’, £115, Nicholas Herbert. Sunglasses, from left: oversized round, by Miu Miu,
£205; round ombre-lens, by Marc Jacobs, £119; both Liberty. Tumbler: green ‘Vita’ highball, £140,
William Yeoward. Background: ‘Pool by the Sea’ mural, by Slim Aarons, from £60 per sq m, Surface
View. Fabric prices are per m; all prices include VAT. For suppliers’ details see Address Book r
SWATCH
6 8
5
7
4
2
10
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1 ‘Le Tapis Vert RBP10032-02’, £80, Borderline Fabrics. 2 ‘Guatan 06545-001-002’, by Etro, £76.80, Pierre Frey. 3 ‘Nanking HB-427-3’,
by Clarence House, £212, Turnell & Gigon. 4 ‘Rome 33039’, £98, Zoffany. 5 ‘Coromandel SCH-175482’, by Schumacher, £258, Turnell
& Gigon; trimmed with ‘Valmont 36026-9000’ bullion fringe, £30, Houlès. 6 Red ‘Temple’, £75, Paolo Moschino for Nicholas Haslam.
7 ‘Pillement L3322002’, by Le Manach, £156, Pierre Frey. 8 ‘Bengale 01468-02’, by Manuel Canovas, £78, Colefax & Fowler. 9 ‘Matin d’Eté
8013132-195’, by Brunschwig & Fils, £98, GP&J Baker. 10 ‘Diana the Huntress LW67111’, £75, Lewis & Wood. 11 ‘Toile des Travaux 97932-
020’, by The Twigs, £195, Simon Playle. Tumbler: ‘Alexis’ highball, £220, William Yeoward. Background: ‘Poolside Chez Holder’ mural, by
Slim Aarons, from £60 per sq m, Surface View. Fabric prices are per m; all prices include VAT. For suppliers’ details see Address Book r
rugiano.com
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1 ‘La Fayette B1597-005’, by Charles Burger, £125, Turnell & Gigon; trimmed with ‘Valmont 36026-9500’ bullion fringe, £30, Houlès. 2 ‘Mercury JP 6465’,
by Michael S. Smith, £189.60, Jamb. 3 ‘Hambledon 07’, by Titley & Marr, £45, Tissus d’Hélène. 4 ‘Cathay 44086-997’, by Travers, £110, Zimmer & Rohde.
5 ‘Diana the Huntress LW67111’, £75, Lewis & Wood. 6 ‘Continenti SCH 175470’, by Schumacher, £351, Turnell & Gigon. Background: ‘Pool by the
Sea’ mural, by Slim Aarons, from £60 per sq m, Surface View. Fabric prices are per m; all prices include VAT. For suppliers’ details see Address Book r
SWATCH
1 ‘La Balançoire 6204-12’, £64, Marvic Textiles. 2 Double-width ‘Valbonne Toile de Jouy 149504’, £373, C&C Milano. 3 ‘Royal Journey Reverse
II 306353F’, by Quadrille, £226, Tissus d’Hélène. 4 Pink ‘Child’s Garden’, £66, Ralph Lauren Home. 5 ‘Josette 223985’, £55, Sanderson.
Sunglasses: ‘Ornate’ cat-eye, by Prada, £435, Liberty. Tumbler: rose ‘Vita’ highball, £140, William Yeoward. Background: ‘Poolside Chez Holder’
mural, by Slim Aarons, from £60 per sq m, Surface View. Fabric prices are per m; all prices include VAT. For suppliers’ details see Address Book r
SWATCH
2
3
1 ‘Shepherds LDF7000-001’, by The Twigs, £145, Simon Playle. 2 ‘Old Macdonald 132-02’, £99, Nicholas Herbert. 3 ‘Coutances Négatif-Satin
F2430004’, £91.20, Pierre Frey. 4 ‘Barbary Toile NCF4193-03’, by Nina Campbell, £55, Osborne & Little. 5 Blue/oyster ‘English Toile’, £190,
Bennison Fabrics. 6 ‘Les Quatres Vents B7544006’ by Braquenié, £160.80, Pierre Frey. 7 ‘Chinese Toile JP 7183’, by Michael S. Smith, £204,
Jamb. 8 ‘Albertine Toile RBP10000-01’, £78, Borderline Fabrics. Sunglasses: photographer’s own. Background: ‘Poolside Chez Holder’ mural,
by Slim Aarons, from £60 per sq m, Surface View. Fabric prices are per m; all prices include VAT. For suppliers’ details see Address Book r
tomfaulkner.co.uk
SWATCH
1 Switch House,
opening 17 June.
2 Shirley Baker,
Manchester,
1964, 1964, The
Photographers’
Gallery at Photo
London, 19-22 May.
3 A selection of insect
jewellery, c1895-
1900, T. Robert at the
Antiques and Fine
Art Fair, 10-12 June
1 2
No visitor to London’s Bankside in recent years can have failed to notice that
something’s been going on, not least since plans were announced in 2009 for
Tate Modern’s vast new complex. But six years of building and one deadline
(the 2012 Olympics) later, the wait is finally over. As of 17 JUNE the gallery’s
new extension will be open to the public. Designed by Herzog & De Meuron,
who converted Gilbert Scott’s original power station in the 1990s, the new ten-
storey brick-clad pyramid (of sorts), called the Switch House, will add 60 per
cent more gallery space. Meanwhile, it’s all change in the existing spaces too,
as the Turbine Hall sees a seven-metre tree by Ai Weiwei take root, and the 3
Boiler House galleries get a total rehang. Expect faces familiar and less
so; works by Matisse, Monet et al will now rub shoulders with new
acquisitions by 250 artists from around the world. Fancy joining
the celebrations? Everything is free, including two weeks of per-
formance art in the underground Tanks, and over the inaugural
weekend, the gallery will be staying open until 10pm every
night. Details: 020 7887 8888; tate.org.uk.
BRITAIN 4
15 MAY PENINSULA GARDEN, GREENWICH PENINSULA, LONDON SE10 URBAN VILLAGE FETE.
Simple twist of fête: no tombolas here – instead expect immersive theatre, art-
ists’ workshops and contemporary galleries. Details: urbanvillagefete.co.uk. 4 Robert
19 MAY SOTHEBY’S, NEW BOND ST, LONDON W1 PHOTOGRAPHS. Darling buds of May: Mapplethorpe,
delicate snaps of orchids and lilies by Robert Mapplethorpe are picks of the Orchid, 1989,
bunch this month. Details: 020 7293 5000; sothebys.com. Sotheby’s, 19 May.
19-22 MAY SOMERSET HOUSE, STRAND, LONDON WC2 PHOTO LONDON. This year’s 5 Matthew Smith,
Master of Photography, Don McCullin, is the focus of a special exhibition. Still Life of Fruit and
Catch him in conversation with Tate’s photography curator, Simon Baker, Flowers, 20th-century,
on 19 May. Details: 020 7759 1169; photolondon.org. Chorley’s, 24-25 May.
6 Marcel Duchamp,
23-30 MAY CHARLESTON, FIRLE, LEWES, E. SUSSEX CHARLESTON FESTIVAL. Centenary
Nu sur Nu, 1910-11,
celebrations with Virginia Nicholson, Claire Tomalin and others, plus talks by Artcurial, 6 June.
Ian McEwan and Tim Berners-Lee. Details: 01323 811626; charleston.org.uk. 7 Julio González,
24-25 MAY CHORLEY’S, PRINKNASH ABBEY PARK, GLOS 20TH-CENTURY ART AND MOD- Forme Rigide,
ERN DESIGN. Amazing limited-edition Spider-Man prints by Stan Lee are a 1937, Christie’s
highlight in this Marvel-ous sale. Details: 01452 344499; chorleys.com. Paris, 8-9 June 5
25 MAY CHRISTIE’S, KING ST, LONDON SW1 SHAKESPEARE: THE FOUR FOLIOS. Friends,
Romans and countrymen alike can bid for the Bard’s collected works, includ-
PHOTOGRAPHY: © HAYES DAVIDSON AND HERZOG & DE MEURON (1)
1 Diagonal-square footed bowl, $375, Frances Palmer. 2 Crystal ‘Trafalgar’, £225, Linley. 3 Bowl, by Carlo Moretti, £70, William &
Son. 4 Gold-painted salad bowl, by Bertozzi, £350, Summerill & Bishop. 5 Dark ceramic bowl, by Laura Carlin, £190, The New Craftsmen.
6 Brass ‘Bash’, by Tom Dixon, £195, Liberty. 7 ‘Sarrià’ basket, by Lluís Clotet, £45, Alessi. 8 Fruit bowl, £750, Asprey. 9 ‘Coral’, £595,
William Yeoward. 10 ‘Cobra’, by Constantin Wortmann, £53, Georg Jensen. All prices include VAT. For suppliers’ details see Address Book r
SHORTLIST
4
3
10
Shelf life
If the display in your dresser is past its sell-by date, perhaps it’s time for some finer china. This clutch of bowls,
whether brass or bamboo, footed or fluted, will also make whatever you lay in them live longer in the memory. So
if your vessels need refreshing, it dozen get better than Max Egger’s crack selection. Photography: Anders Gramer
SHORTLIST
2 3
5
3
2
4
7
8
2
4
WWW.ROSEUNIACKE.COM
INTRODUCTION
The past is always present, and nowhere is its effect more subtly felt than in the visual arts. Alberto Giacometti,
for example, was spurred by the elemental power of ancient Cycladic, Etruscan and Egyptian sculpture;
Avigdor Arikha’s rapidly sketched or painted domestic still lifes sprang from Caravaggio’s gritty naturalism;
and the Chinese artists decorating an extraordinary pair of enamelled sconces in 18th-century Canton drew
on that country’s traditional depictions of courtly life. All, of course, creatively transformed such influences
to make works that are vigorously their own (and in the case of the sconces, unlike anything you’ve prob-
ably seen), yet the inspiration of history resonates. So this 76-page guide to the world of art and antiques,
in which these stories feature, can be said to look both backwards and forwards: to celebrate creativity
while acknowledging the debt to makers who have gone before. Paul Strand’s photographs of his own
garden are similarly multilayered, offering a worm’s-eye view of nature in elegiac images that convey the
never-ending cycle of life, death and rebirth. Also here is a painstaking evocation of the sort of asylum
in which Jean Dubuffet encountered work by the insane, which, in turn, gave rise to Art Brut.
So what lessons are discernible in the work of today’s practitioners? Our roundup of multiples and
limited editions finds contemporary artists from Julian Opie to Maurizio Cattelan fashioning fresh work in
the form of objects as familiar as blankets and bars of soap. And quite how future makers will reinterpret
Ryan Metke’s gold ‘Wasp Nest’ is anyone’s guess. But like much of the material brought together over
the succeeding pages, I’m sure it will stay in the imagination $ RUPERT THOMAS, EDITOR
CONTENTS
85 ANTENNAE ROUNDUP
Choice multiples: Charlotte Edwards picks fine limited
editions and products by artists
OPPOSITE 30 JUNE CHRISTIE’S, KING ST, LONDON SW1 DEFINING BRITISH ART Golden-haired actress and habitué of her father David’s
Gargoyle Club, Pauline Tennant is the subject of this luminous Lucian Freud drawing of c1945. It comes to auction for the
first time this month, in a sale of British art that marks Christie’s 250th anniversary. Details: 020 7839 9060; christies.com
design centre LONDON
ACCESSORIES
LOTS ROAD, LONDON SW10 0XE
BATHROOMS WWW.DCCH.CO.UK
CURTAIN POLES & FINIALS
CARPETS
FABRICS
FURNITURE
HARDWARE
KITCHENS
LIFESTYLE TECHNOLOGY
LIGHTING
OUTDOOR FABRICS
ABBOTT & BOYD ALTFIELD
OUTDOOR FURNITURE ALTON-BROOKE ANN SACKS ARMANI/CASA
PAINT ARTE AZUCENA AT GMR BAKER BAKER LIFESTYLE BEACON
HILL BELLA FIGURA BESSELINK & JONES BIRGIT ISRAEL BLACK &
TILES KEY BRIAN YATES BRUNSCHWIG & FILS C & C MILANO CASSINA CECCOTTI
TRIMMINGS & LEATHER COLLEZIONI CHAPLINS CHASE ERWIN CHRISTOPHER GUY CHRISTOPHER
HYDE LIGHTING CHRISTOPHER PEACOCK COLE & SON COLEFAX AND FOWLER
WALL COVERINGS COLONY CREATION BAUMANN CRESTRON DAVID SEYFRIED LTD DAVIDSON DECCA (BOLIER)
DECORUS DEDAR EDELMAN LEATHER ELISE SOM ESPRESSO DESIGN EVITAVONNI FENDI
CASA FLEXFORM FOX LINTON FROMENTAL FRONT RUGS GALOTTI&RADICE GIORGETTI
GLADEE LIGHTING GP & J BAKER HARLEQUIN HOLLAND & SHERRY HOULES IKSEL - DECORATIVE
ARTS INTERDESIGN INTERIOR SUPPLY J. ROBERT SCOTT JACARANDA CARPETS JASON D’SOUZA
JEAN MONRO KRAVET LEE JOFA LELIEVRE LEWIS & WOOD LIZZO MARC DE BERNY MARVIC
TEXTILES MCKINNEY & CO MCKINNON AND HARRIS MULBERRY HOME NADA DESIGNS NICHOLAS
HASLAM LTD NINA CAMPBELL NOBILIS ORIGINAL BTC PIERRE FREY POLIFORM POLTRONA FRAU
PORADA PORTA ROMANA PROVASI RAMM, SON & CROCKER REMAINS LIGHTING R.I.M TILE
BOUTIQUE ROBERT ALLEN ROMO RUBELLI/DONGHIA SA BAXTER ARCHITECTURAL HARDWARE
SAHCO SAMUEL AND SONS PASSEMENTERIE SAMUEL HEATH SANDERSON SIMPSONS
MIRRORS & FURNITURE STARK CARPET STARK FABRIC STUDIOTEX SUMMIT FURNITURE
SWD TAI PING CARPETS THE NANZ COMPANY THE SILK GALLERY THREADS AT GP
& J BAKER TIM PAGE CARPETS TISSUS D’HELENE TOP FLOOR BY ESTI TUFENKIAN
ARTISAN CARPETS TURNELL & GIGON TURNELL & GIGON AT HOME TURNSTYLE
DESIGNS VAUGHAN VIA ARKADIA (TILES) VICTORIA + ALBERT BATHS
WATTS OF WESTMINSTER WEMYSS WHISTLER LEATHER
WIRED CUSTOM LIGHTING WOOL CLASSICS
ZIMMER + ROHDE ZOFFANY
1 2
1 ‘Enough Already’ neon, by Deborah Kass, $18,000, Paul Kasmin Gallery Shop. 2 Soap (from top: ‘Why Me?’, £19 approx for two; ‘Bitten’, £16
approx for two), by Maurizio Cattelan & Pierpaolo Ferrari for Seletti Wears Toiletpaper, Toiletpaper Shop. 3 Gold-plated brass-cast ‘Wasp Nest’,
by Ryan Metke, from $450, Paul Kas min Gallery Shop. 4 Two-piece stoneware ‘T42’, by Mona Hatoum, £4,320, White Cube. 5 Plexiglas/MDF
‘Recessed Discussion Stream’ sculpture, by Liam Gillick, $3,500, The Glass House. 6 ‘Cyan Nude’ bronze, by Jessie Flood-Paddock, £1,500; 7 ‘La
Volta’ bronze, by Rebecca Warren, £6,500; both Counter Editions. 8 ‘Astray’ cast of plastic ashtray, by Becky Beasley, £350, South London Gallery.
All prices include VAT. For suppliers’ details see Address Book r
85
LONDON
ART 2016
Courtesy of Richard Green Gallery, London
Francis Campbell Boileau Cadell RSA RSW, Reflection (detail), circa 1915
WEEK
1-8 JULY
Supported by
Preview by
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Complimentary catalogue available
Subscribe online
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antennae roundup
1
6
4
7 8
1 ‘Split-Rocker’ vase, by Jeff Koons, $5,000, Gagosian Gallery. 2 Solar-powered LED lamp, by Olafur Eliasson and Frederick Ottesen, £17 approx,
Little Sun. 3 Cast-acrylic ‘Rising’ sculpture, by Alison Wilding, £3,250, Plinth. 4 Bronze/steel ‘Jules et Jim’ mice, by Claude Lalanne, £14,177 approx
for a pair, Louisa Guinness Gallery. 5 ‘Untitled’ cast of beech-tree root, by Hemali Bhuta, £1,200, Yorkshire Sculpture Park. 6 Kitchenware (from
left: ‘Breakfast’ tray, £16 approx; ‘Apples’ plate, £26 approx), by Maurizio Cattelan & Pierpaolo Ferrari for Seletti Wears Toiletpaper, Galerie
Perrotin. 7 ‘A Very Long Chat’ bookends, by Saint Clair Cemin, $6,500 per pair, Paul Kasmin Gallery Shop. 8 ‘Full Stop’ bean bags, by Fiona
Banner, £6,000 each, Frith Street Gallery. All prices include VAT. For suppliers’ details see Address Book r
87
antennae roundup
1
8
6
7
1 Ceramic ‘Siatkarka/Volleyball Player’ figure, by Paulina Olowska, £2,049 approx, Parkett. 2 ‘Islands’ tiles, by Eric Great-Rex, £550 each, The
Multiple Store. 3 Lambswool blankets, by Matt Connors (left) and Enrico David (right), £520 each, House of Voltaire. 4 ‘M’ bench, by Sarah
Lucas, £12,000, Sadie Coles HQ. 5 Aluminium ‘Untitled (Side Table 3)’, by Nicolas Deshayes, £1,200, House of Voltaire. 6 Red ‘Figure’ chair, by
Keith Haring, $130, Pop-Shop.com. 7 ‘Sheep’ blanket, by Julian Opie, £450, Plinth. 8 ‘Untitled (Palette Drawing)’, by Richard Jackson, £2,350,
Hauser & Wirth. All prices include VAT. For suppliers’ details see Address Book $
88
FAIR
Battersea Park, London
THREE TIMES A YEAR
F I O NA McD O NALD
Fiona McDonald has been sourcing antiques for
more than twenty years, and her London showroom
has an established reputation for elegant and
distinctive mid-century design. Inspired by Italian
craftsmanship, Fiona has developed her ‘Makes’
collection, a range comprising Italian-made mirrors
and lighting, and British-made furniture and
seating, all of which is created by small teams of
skilled artisans. Produced with both commercial
and residential projects in mind, the ‘Makes’ collection
offers a bespoke service to suit any scheme, with
flexibility over measurements and finish. Fiona
McDonald, 323 Fulham Palace Rd, London SW6 (020 7731
3234; fionamcdonald.com).
BE E DH AM ANTIQUES LTD
A family firm founded more than 40 years ago,
Beedham Antiques, which specialises in early
English and European furniture and sculptural
works of art, is now run by second-generation
owner, Paul Beedham. Having evolved the business,
he now deals in high-quality furniture dating
from the 15th to the 17th century, and sources
rare sculptural carvings in stone and timber, such
as the Romanesque capital shown here. Depicting
scenes of daily life throughout the seasons, it is
made of Caen stone and once resided in a cloister.
Paul exhibits in London at both the Bada and
Lapada fairs in spring and autumn, but items may
also be viewed by appointment, either on-site in
Derbyshire, or at clients’ homes. Beedham Antiques.
Ring 07798 936308, or visit beedhamantiques.co.uk.
B ROW N R IG G
Brownrigg is located in the heart of the historic
Cotswold town of Tetbury in a beautiful Georgian
building that boasts original features and open
fires. Specialising in an eclectic mix of conven-
tional antiques as well as more unusual items, the
firm refreshes its stock online and on Instagram
daily. Brownrigg, 44 Long St, Tetbury, Glos GL8 8AQ
(01666 500887; brownrigg.co.uk).
RIGHT, FROM LEFT: 18TH CENTURY
SWEDISH LONGCASE BLUE CLOCK;
19TH CENTURY DANISH LONGCASE
CLOCK; A MORA CLOCK, ALL WITH
ORIGINAL PAINT
A RTS AN D AN TIQUES 쮿 P RO MOT I O N
PAN GO LI N LO N D O N
Pangolin London is one of the city’s few galleries
solely dedicated to exhibiting sculpture. Rep-
resenting a solid stable of both established and
emerging artists and estates, Pangolin curates a
dynamic exhibition programme that focuses on
both the historic developments of British sculpture
as well as the cutting-edge contemporary.
Pangolin’s affiliation with Europe’s leading
sculpture foundry, Pangolin Editions, enables
the gallery to offer a unique service to collectors
and artists alike, with expertise in all areas of the
making, commissioning and installation of works.
To support sculpture from grass roots, the gallery
also organises a biannual sculpture residency in
collaboration with the PJLF Arts Fund.
Pangolin, which is based in the Kings Place
culture hub in up-and-coming King’s Cross,
exhibits sculpture in the gallery, as well as in the
public spaces of Kings Place and the canal side.
A new exhibition, Sculpture in the Garden, runs 13
May-9 July. Pangolin London, Kings Place, London N1
(020 7520 1480; pangolinlondon.com).
ARCHITECTURAL FORUM
Architectural Forum specialises in antique
fireplaces and unique salvage pieces. Based in
Islington, the company offers a spectacular array of
antique and vintage items, ranging from grates and
decorative radiators to period doors, furniture
and chandeliers. The majority of the items are
reclaimed from prominent London properties,
such as this fire-basket and mahogany doorway,
which came from the former home of Sir Joseph
Beecham, eldest son of Thomas, the founder of
the Beecham medical empire. Sir Joseph spent
vast amounts renovating his Hampstead mansion,
and the great and the good of London society,
including Edward VII, were entertained in the
ballroom from which these items were removed.
Architectural Forum, 312 Essex Rd, London N1
(020 7704 0982; thearchitecturalforum.com).
GALERIE
GLUSTIN
PA R I S
OS S OWS K I
For almost sixty years Ossowski has been dealing
and restoring 18th-century mirrors from its gallery
on London’s Pimlico Road. Created during a period
that saw great technical advances and aesthetic
achievements, pieces from this era are among the
finest ever made. If you are after a beautiful mirror,
Ossowski is the place to look. Ossowski, 83 Pimlico Rd,
London SW1 (020 7730 3256; ossowski.co.uk).
73 PIMLICO ROAD, LONDON SW1W 8NE. TEL.020 7730 8810 NEW YORK TEL. 212 956 1586
info@keshishiancarpets.com www.keshishiancarpets.com
ARTS A N D AN TIQUES 쮿 P RO MOT I O N
HERES
Stonecutting no longer holds any secrets for Louis-
Joseph Lamborot. Representing the fourth gener-
ation in a family of stonecutters, he is an absolute
master, having spent the past 30 years restoring
France’s most beautiful monuments. It was on the
work sites of the Louvre, the Pont Neuf and the
Palace of Versailles, among many others, that he
learned the grammar of classical architecture.
Now he heads up Hérès, one of the best stonecut-
ting workshops in France.
Based on a simple sketch, Lamborot draws,
cuts, sculpts and makes possible all kinds of solid-
stone constructions, whether decorative sculptures
or exceptional residences. Devoting himself entirely
to the building of brand-new classical-style projects,
he offers his services to both private clients and
institutions. Hérès. For more information, contact
request@heres.paris, or visit heres.paris.
106
G R E E N E N E R GY
For the last two decades of his life, Paul Strand trained a camera on his garden in Orgeval, a village
outside Paris, capturing nature’s pulsating cycles of life, death and rebirth – and the paradox of pattern
and chaos in the plant kingdom. Assessing this late work in the context of his whole career,
Richard Mabey argues that the American photographer was never going to settle for pastoral tranquillity r
107
GREEN ENERGY
IN 1955, aged 65, the American photographer Paul dead season. The path to the garden, the human staging of growth,
Strand decamped with his third wife, Hazel, to the village of is blocked by the living plants. No surprise that Strand follows
Orgeval, some 30km outside Paris. Their house had a large and this with intense close-ups of the almost geological weathering
overgrown garden, and Hazel, for the first time in her life, dis- of ancient willow bark, of a single buoyant spray of wisteria, of
covered the delights of working with plants. Paul worked too, a cat’s-cradle of dried stalks and leaves whose focus is a snail shell.
but with his own instrument of cultivation: the camera. After a Ten of Strand’s Orgeval studies are on display in the V&A’s
lifetime of groundbreaking photography, which spanned the current retrospective of his career. Seen in the context of his life-
globe and most of the 20th century’s artistic frontiers, he would time’s work, this superficially odd digression in his last decades
have been forgiven for retreating into a quiet, pastoral mood, becomes part of a coherent vision. Strand was one of the most
and making impressionist studies of the herbaceous borders. innovative and versatile photographers of the 20th century. His
Instead, over the next 20 years, he took a collection of startling work ranged from abstract still lifes, heavily influenced by Cubism,
vegetal portraits, intimate, unsanitised insights into the chaotic to fiercely political Neo-Realism. He was fascinated by pattern
energy of growth, that were a world away from the superficial and form, but outraged when order and regimentation subju-
prettiness of conventional garden photographs. gated the human spirit. What is probably his best-known pic-
One of his earliest (Driveway, 1957) announces quite unequiv- ture, Wall Street (1915), brings these two commitments together.
ocally what draws him to the plant world. The hard geometry of A group of black-clad figures, their faces invisible, are walking
the crazy paving is obscured by a riotous cascade of winter twig- into the sunset dwarfed by the blank corporate architecture of
gery, curving and twisting with potential even at this supposedly finance. Through the 1950s and 60s he turned increasingly to r
Top left: in The Garden, 1967, a grassy glade can be seen through trees. Top right: Fungus, 1967, shows the bracket variety climbing an old willow
109
ENQUIRIES
+44 (0)20 7499 7470
masterpiecefair.com
FAIR LOCATION
South Grounds, The Royal Hospital Chelsea
Chelsea Embankment, London SW3 4LW
Top left: Lynn Chadwick, Sitting Couple on Base II, Cast by Fiorini, 1973. Image
courtesy of Osborne Samuel. Top right: Agostino Bonalumi, ‘Rosso’ (detail), 1984.
Image courtesy of Tournabuoni Art. Bottom left: Damask Silk Necklace, 2016, Fancy
Coloured Dimaond, Pink Sapphire, White Agate. Image courtesy of Wallace Chan
International Limited. Bottom Right: Sleigh Chair, Designed by Børge Mogensen for
Tage M Christensen & Co, Denmark, 1950. Image courtesy of Modernity, Stockholm.
® RBC is a registered trademark of Royal Bank of Canada. Used under license.
® Masterpiece is a registered trademark of Masterpiece London. Used under license.
GREEN ENERGY
documenting the lives of ordinary workers in the poor regions of His pictures seem wired, their moraines of stones, twigs, beads of
Africa and the Scottish Hebrides. He worked with a meticulous moisture, fungi, dead foliage and new buds connected by seem-
reverence for the individuality of his subjects, as if he were a studio ingly illegible tangles of stalks and creepers (ivy is ubiquitous at
portrait photographer working en plein air. Orgeval). Strand understands that pattern in the plant world is
Imagine this sensibility let loose at Orgeval: the search for the not just a matter of spatial arrangement but of the flow of time
capricious rhythms of nature inside the garden’s formal structure; and energy. What may seem dead or arbitrary is just waiting to
the challenge of recognising individuality in the cryptic other- be recycled and reborn.
worldliness of plants. Strand did take one traditional garden por- The focus of Crocuses and Primroses (1957) is a crocus flower
trait. A harmonious arrangement of one pale- and one dark- that has toppled over. Behind it is a miniature stockade of what
trunked tree, set off by the diagonal of what looks like a fallen may be the old leaf-blades of maize. They are desiccated and with-
Robinia sprouting new leaf-shoots along its length, is pointedly ered, blotched with the grainy figures of invading viruses and
entitled From Hazel’s Window (1972). It’s a touching tribute to his moulds. As Janet Malcolm wrote of Richard Avedon’s unflinch-
wife’s vision, and her work in the garden. But it is not the view ing portrait photographs: ‘Avedon sought out faces on which life
from Paul’s ‘window on the world’. had left its mark.’ Sixteen years on, Strand makes a study of Iris
His penetrating gaze is mostly fixed on what is happening just Facing the Winter. One of the iris leaves has collapsed, another is
a few feet in front of his face, on a fallen apple, garlanded by dead split. The remaining four are covered with minute droplets of
stalks; the lianas of old vines, frosted, arthritic, mutually sup- moisture, as if they are bleeding sap. There may be more than an
portive; a single mulberry leaf caught in a snarl of iris blades. enthralled attention to detail at work here. By this time Paul r
Top left: a weeping elm – Orme Pleureur, c1970 – with contorted branches. Top right: primula leaves surround double daisies in The Happy Family, 1958
111
GREEN ENERGY
THIS PAGE, LEFT: VICTORIA & ALBERT MUSEUM, LONDON © MARTINE FRANCK, MAGNUM PHOTOS. ALL OTHER PICTURES: © APERTURE FOUNDATION, INC. PAUL STRAND ARCHIVE
Strand was suffering from bone cancer, and his activities in the before dividing into a shower of descending twigs. The title is
garden were severely restricted. Another portrait from this year ambiguous. It may be a simple horticultural label – there is a vari-
(1973) is openly titled Great Vine, Alive in Death. Against an empty ety of elm whose branches ‘weep’ like those of a willow. Or it
black background, the ancient vine stems are twisting upwards, may be metaphorical, a description of a tree ‘distressed’ by such
entwined with the sprigs of ivy (again) whose aerial roots are anatomical contortions. I don’t think it matters. Strand has cho-
visibly edging into the void. sen a camera angle that poses this wonder against the house, which
There are plainly metaphorical layers in these late portraits. appears as a bland background wall. The power balance of Wall
But I don’t think looking for simplistic echoes of the human con- Street is turned upside down. The drama of life overwhelms the
dition in plants was ever Strand’s main motivation, more per- human structure. Then in his eighties, and working among an-
haps a search for the challenges common to all life. He called the other kingdom of fellow organisms, Paul Strand was still cele-
garden his ‘observatory’, and wrote: ‘For the artist, the moment brating survival and grace under fire $
of seeing can also be a moment of revelation. Such moments are ‘Paul Strand: Photography and Film for the 20th Century’ is at the V&A,
closely related to those of the scientist when he discovers his Cromwell Rd, London SW7 (020 7942 2000; vam.ac.uk), until 3 July.
hypotheses concur with the structure and organisations of nature, ‘Paul Strand: The Garden at Orgeval’, selected and with an essay by Joel
either by lucky chance or as a result of patient research.’ Meyerowitz, is published by the Aperture Foundation (aperture.org/shop/
The most remarkable of the Orgeval pictures is Orme Pleureur paul-strand-the-garden-at-orgeval-book). The latest Aperture book
(weeping elm), c1970. It shows the bole of a tree turning into a releases and limited-edition prints will also be available at Photo London,
whirlpool of wood, the emerging branches coiled round each Somerset House, Strand, London WC2 (photolondon.org), 19-22 May
Top left: Paul Strand Photographing the Orgeval Garden, by Martine Franck, 1974. Top right: the ground is wired for new beginnings in Fallen Apple, 1972
112
ELISE SOM
116
Opposite: rambling
flowers, just like
those in hammered
copper that frame
them, creep up
a stylised blue rock
formation in this
central panel. This
page: the birds could
well be qingniao
– the ‘bluebirds of
happiness’ of
Chinese folklore
ALL PHOTOGRAPHS: PJ GATES PHOTOGRAPHY
FOREIGN AFFAIR
Made in c1750, these Cantonese enamelled sconces were created for the king of Portugal – flamboyant symbols of
the court’s love of the Orient. Chinese in style, European in form, and full of references to both Eastern and Western
culture, they tell an enigmatic tale of cross-continental taste and trade in the 18th century. Text: Grace McCloud r
24th–30th June 2016
Albert Memorial West Lawn,
Kensington Gardens, London
119
FOREIGN AFFAIR
120
THE ATELIER ON Manhattan’s 95th Street announces itself with little
fanfare, but once behind the plain front door, one is soon basking in reflective
glory. Here at Mirror Fair, founded in 1911, a series of dazzling roomscapes
unfolds: one, all shimmering columns and capitals, is Palladian in style; another
channels the Neo-Baroque of mid-century French designer Serge Roche. The
powder room, meanwhile, conjures up an 18th-century palazzo in Venice.
The third-generation head of the atelier, Stephen Cavallo, knows that the set-
tings are effective at seducing potential clients, be they traditionalists such as the
National Trust, A-list modern architects like Robert AM Stern or big-name inte-
rior designers such as Brian McCarthy. Recently, the luxury-goods department
store Bergdorf Goodman commissioned a mirrored fireplace surround for a dis-
play, while custom cast-glass bolection surrounds by Mirror Fair bring sparkle
to a 57th Street store window. In addition to elaborate large-scale projects, the
three-storey workshop, which houses a team of skilled artisans, also specialises
in mirrored and glass architectural details. A nearby table displays the fruit of
their etching, tinting, engraving and carving labours: bevelled plaques, frosted
panels, crystalline capitals, classical mouldings and silvered panes.
Centuries-old techniques underlie much of what one sees in the atelier, from
mouldings that shimmer like mercury to a mantel faceted to resemble rock crys-
tal. Truly, if the craftsmen behind Versailles’ Galerie des Glaces have a spiritual
descendant, it has to be Mirror Fair $
Mirror Fair, 320 East 95th St, New York, NY 10128 (001 212 288 5050; mirrorfair.com)
TH E WO R L D O F IN TE R IO R S 쮿 PRO MOT I O N
SILVER LININGS
Once renowned for its bespoke looking-glasses, Mirror Fair, a century-old atelier in Manhattan, now focuses
on architectural mouldings and historic mirror interiors. Its pedigree is crystal-clear, discovers WoI
VAUGHAN
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M IND’S EYE
In the 1940s Jean Dubuffet began visiting asylums, encountering the art of the mentally ill – and the effect on his painting was
potent. To complement his show on the artist at Frieze Masters, Helly Nahmad last year commissioned a fictional reconstruc-
tion of just such an institution, richly imagined by a team of collaborators. As the dealer tells Marcus Field, the mise-en-scène
explained so much more about the champion of Art Brut ‘than just having pictures on a wall’. Photography: Antony Crolla
Based on photographs of real 19th-century institutions, this exhibition space
by Robin Brown and Anna Pank evoked the day room of a French insane
asylum circa 1945. Built like a stage set at Scena studio in Croydon, it was
then reconstructed on Helly Nahmad Gallery’s stand at Frieze Masters 2015
in order to give a disquieting back story to the works of artist Jean Dubuffet
127
This page, clockwise from top: the white-framed Asylum, which sat opposite a display of the Dubuffet works on sale, contained mocked-up versions of a day
room, a patient’s bedroom and a doctor’s office; a team of eight craftspeople and calligraphers built up layers of Art Brut-style graffiti across the set; furniture and
props from the 1940s were sourced from French flea markets and auction sites, while the floor was painted to resemble institutional tiles from the period
This page, clockwise from top: while avoiding slavish re-creation, Brown and Pank’s design was thick with details gleaned from real asylums; in the doctor’s office,
some suitcases on the shelves opened, revealing more about the lives of fictional inmates; the staff pictures above the desk were taken from the archive at Ville-
Evrard, near Paris, where several exponents of Art Brut were treated. The cabinet of toothbrushes labelled with patients’ names was based on a photograph
a spellbinding presentation of a fictional Paris apartment as it
might have appeared in 1968, complete with furniture, books,
kitchen equipment and an art collection to rival a small museum’s.
The display was the highlight of the fair, and the challenge in 2015
was to make something to match it.
‘Helly decided to show Dubuffet, and when I started research-
ing I found the biggest influence on him was the art of the mentally
ill patients in the asylums he visited in France and Switzerland in
the 1940s,’ says Brown, ‘so this seemed the right period to focus
on.’ The designer began looking at ways to tell this story, and again
teamed up with Anna Pank, a producer of fashion shows and other
events with whom he had collaborated on The Collector, to help
realise his vision.
The idea was to give visitors an impression of the asylums in
which Dubuffet first encountered Art Brut, the term he coined to
categorise the work by psychiatric patients, and which he began to
collect from 1945. This same work also inspired the naive, uninhib-
ited style adopted by Dubuffet in paintings like the eight canvases
displayed on the stand. But as Brown is at pains to point out, his
design for The Asylum began as a heightened fantasy, its form based
on photographs of places visited by Dubuffet but not a slavish re-
creation. The rooms, complete with shutters, doors and mould-
ings, were then constructed by set builders in Croydon. Much
of the furniture and other contents, right down to the vintage
toothbrushes, clothes, suitcases and light fittings, came from the
French auction site Le Bon Coin.
PAINTINGS BY the French artist Jean Dubuffet More difficult to create was the art covering every surface. ‘We
will always attract attention wherever they are shown. How could looked at the art which we know Dubuffet saw; the important thing
they not? To begin with there is their huge scale and wild, childlike was not to plagiarise it but to work in the same spirit,’ says Pank.
expressionism. Added to this is the thrill of their sky-high prices – ‘Then we began looking for artists who had a particular sensibility
last year, Paris Polka of 1961 set a record for the artist, going for $24.8 and who might be able to interpret this work.’
million at Christie’s in New York – a frisson only exacerbated by Among those engaged were Mike Sharp, an admirer of Dubuffet,
the remarkable story of the man who made them. who worked in pen and ink on figurative drawings that were later
But there was more than the usual buzz on the stand of Helly transposed to the set. Joella Wheatley, whose work is inspired by
Nahmad Gallery at Frieze Masters in London last autumn, where architectural plans, spent days scratching directly into the table
eight canvases by Dubuffet were on display. For this was no ordi- surfaces. The calligrapher Kellie Walsh, who provides period writ-
nary art show. While on one side the paintings hung on pristine ing for films, worked in chalk and ink on the fictional French texts
white walls, on the other visitors were invited to enter into an un- covering the day-room walls. Even the vintage notebooks acquired
settling fantasy. Here, in the manner of an elaborate stage set, three surreal scribblings by artist Amy Haigh and Greek painter Ahetas
rooms seemingly lifted from a fictional 1940s French lunatic asy- Jimi. On site in Croydon the scene painter Luca Crestani coordi-
lum – the sort visited by Dubuffet and the inspiration for much of nated a team who added their own rich imaginings to the growing
his work – had been painstakingly constructed, with a large space layers of material. Finally the whole set was dismantled and reas-
to represent a day room, a smaller space showing a patient’s bed- sembled at Frieze.
room, and finally the office of the presiding doctor. Over the five-day event The Asylum became the talk of the fair,
Not only was every piece of furniture and architectural detail and three Dubuffet paintings were sold. Brown says that every
faithful to the period, but – more importantly, and for some crit- visitor he spoke to reacted positively to it. ‘Some people found
ics most controversially – the day room and bedroom were cov- it moving and sad; others liked the fact they were learning more
ered on every surface, including the ceiling, walls and doors, with about Dubuffet and his life.’ To the critics who questioned its
the imagined paintings, drawings and scribblings of the fiction- propriety, he responds by explaining that when the charity Mind
al inmates. A soundtrack of distant footsteps, music and voices was consulted it was supportive of the endeavour on the basis that
gave the disturbing sensation of looking onto a scene from which it raised awareness of mental-health issues.
these unquiet souls had only recently departed. Whether Dubuffet himself would have approved of the simula-
This bold theatrical gesture originated in the mind of Helly tion of Art Brut seems more doubtful. What is certain is that The
Nahmad, a dealer whose family collection is famed for its fabu- Asylum will never be seen again. Like The Collector before it, it was
lous holdings of Picasso, Matisse and other modern masters, all pulled apart and dispersed immediately after the fair. For its crea-
stored in an airport warehouse in Switzerland. According to Robin tors there will be another project with Nahmad at Frieze Masters
Brown, the film-set designer who created the installation – titled this year, on a theme yet to be decided. Meanwhile Brown is con-
The Asylum – the project began with Nahmad’s desire to provide tent with the dream-like legacy of The Asylum, which ‘now exists
a back story for Dubuffet’s art, ‘to explain more about him than only in people’s heads’ – and the pictures you see here $
just having the paintings on a wall’. To contact Robin Brown or Anna Pank, ring 020 7281 0881, or visit
Brown and Nahmad had already set a precedent for such a brownandpank.com. To contact Helly Nahmad London, ring 020 7494
scheme at Frieze Masters in 2014 when they showed The Collector, 3200, or visit hellynahmad.com
Opposite: details in a patient’s bedroom included vintage notebooks embellished
by Amy Haigh and Ahetas Jimi, plus an accompanying soundtrack of popular
songs from the 1940s. This page: the doom-laden atmosphere, aided by the
Art Brut additions, helped visitors get into the mindset of Dubuffet’s subjects
ARTS AND ANTIQUES fairs
An international round up, chosen by Henrietta Whitfield
BRITAIN
19-22 MAY SOMERSET HOUSE, STRAND, LONDON WC2 PHOTO LONDON. The second
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30 JUNE-6 JULY SOUTH GROUNDS, ROYAL HOSPITAL CHELSEA, ROYAL HOSPITAL RD, LON-
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27 SEPTEMBER-9 OCTOBER GOLDSMITHS’ HALL, FOSTER LANE, LONDON EC2
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6-9 OCTOBER SOMERSET HOUSE, STRAND, LONDON WC2 1:54 CONTEMPORARY
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6-9 OCTOBER REGENT’S PARK, LONDON N1 FRIEZE LONDON. A critically acclaimed
programme of talks and projects across the long weekend only strengthens
Frieze London’s ever-increasing international reputation as an unmissable
event in the art calendar. Details: 020 3372 6111; friezelondon.com.
6-9 OCTOBER REGENT’S PARK, LONDON N1 FRIEZE MASTERS. Art from the ancient
era rubs shoulders with old masters and major works of the late 20th cen-
tury alike. Details: 020 3372 6111; friezemasters.com.
5-9 OCTOBER BERKELEY SQUARE, LONDON W1, PAD LONDON. Details: 00 33 1 53
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31 OCTOBER-6 NOVEMBER OLYMPIA, HAMMERSMITH RD, LONDON W14 WINTER 0LYMPIA
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3-12 NOVEMBER LONDON ASIAN ART IN LONDON. The week-long celebration of
eastern art also presents a symposium titled ‘The Science of Art’, which will
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15-23 MARCH 2017 DUKE OF YORK SQUARE, LONDON SW3 BADA FAIR. Details:
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OUTSIDE BRITAIN
BELGIUM 21-29 JANUARY 2017 TOUR ET TAXIS, AVE DU PORT, BRUSSELS BRAFA. One
of Europe’s leading art and antiques fairs manages to stay eclectic, present-
ing pieces spanning antiquity to the modern day. Details: brafa.be.
CHINA 23-25 MARCH 2017 CONVENTION AND EXHIBITION CENTRE, EXPO DRIVE, WAN
CHAI, HONG KONG ART BASEL HONG KONG. Details: artbasel.com.
DENMARK 26-28 AUGUST BELLA CENTER, CENTER BOULEVARD, COPENHAGEN ART
COPENHAGEN To celebrate its 20th anniversary, this year the fair presents a
new wing dedicated to showcasing contemporary works from around the
world. Called Code, it aims to foster an open and international dialogue
about art. Details: artcopenhagen.dk.
FRANCE 20-23 OCTOBER GRAND PALAIS, AVE DU GENERAL EISENHOWER, PARIS FIAC.
Make sure to download the Fiac smartphone app to stay up-to-date with
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20-23 OCTOBER HOTEL DU DUC, RUE DE LA MICHODIERE, PARIS OUTSIDER ART FAIR.
A fair commited to Art Brut and its focus on impulse and raw creativity. If
you enjoyed our article on the Dubuffet-inspired installation on page 126,
FASANO then this is the fair for you. Details: outsiderartfair.com.
10-13 NOVEMBER GRAND PALAIS, AVE WINSTON CHURCHILL, PARIS PARIS PHOTO.
The fair celebrates its 20th anniversary with a glossy programme of events.
Details: 00 33 1 47 56 64 69; parisphoto.com.
GERMANY 13-18 SEPTEMBER BERLIN BERLIN ART WEEK. Details: 00 49 30 24
749 849; berlinartweek.de.
GREECE 26-29 MAY FALIRON PAVILION, MORAITINI ST, ATHENS ART ATHINA Running
since 1993, this contemporary fair is the largest visual arts event in the
country. Details: art-athina.gr.
ITALY 27-30 JANUARY 2017 EXHIBITION CENTRE, VIA DELLA FIERA, BOLOGNA ARTE
FIERA BOLOGNA. Details: artefiera.it.
NETHERLANDS 10-19 MARCH 2017 MAASTRICHT EXHIBITION AND CONGRESS CENTRE,
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PORTUGAL 26-29 MAY FABRICA NACIONAL DA CORDOARIA, RUA DA JUNQUEIRA, LISBON
IFEMA ARCO LISBOA. Details: ifema.es.
BEAUMONT SPAIN 23-26 FEBRUARY 2017 FERIA DE MADRID, AVE PARTENON, MADRID IFEMA
ARCO MADRID. Details: ifema.es.
SWITZERLAND 13-18 JUNE MARKTHALLE, VIADUKTSTRASSE, BASEL VOLTA. One of
the most important shows of Basel’s art week. Set in the fabulous space of
the city’s Markthalle, its layout is specifically designed to encourage visi-
tors to explore individual artists in depth. Details: voltashow.com.
14-19 JUNE BURGWEG, BASEL LISTE. Since its foundation in 1996, Liste has
been developing its reputation as one of the most important fairs wholly
dedicated to promoting new artists and gallerists. Details: liste.ch.
16-19 JUNE MESSEPLATZ, BASEL ART BASEL. Setting standards since 1970, the
largest event of Basel Art Week is now so popular that it’s given rise to fairs
in Miami and Hong Kong too. Details: artbasel.com.
USA 23-26 JUNE LUMBER LANE RESERVE, BRIDGEHAMPTON, NEW YORK, NY ART
HAMPTONS. Details: arthamptons.com.
22-27 OCTOBER THE PARK AVENUE ARMORY, PARK AVE, NEW YORK, NY TEFAF NEW
YORK. The established Dutch enterprise this year launches two new annual
GALLIARD fairs in New York; this is the first and will focus on artworks dating from
antiquity right up to the 20th century. Details: tefaf.com.
1-4 DECEMBER W. 41ST ST, MIAMI BEACH, FL ART BASEL MIAMI BEACH. The Swiss
original’s Stateside sister. Details: artbasel.com.
4-9 MAY 2017 THE PARK AVENUE ARMORY, PARK AVE, NEW YORK, NY TEFAF NEW
YORK. The second New York instalment of the famous Netherlands fair
places emphasis on modern and contemporary design. Details: tefaf.com.
2-5 MARCH 2017 PIERS 92 AND 94, 12TH AVE, NEW YORK, NY THE ARMORY SHOW.
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136
DAY OF RECKONING
In the Paris apartment he shared with his wife and daugh-
ters, Avigdor Arikha set himself a simple rule: any canvas
begun in the morning had to be finished by nightfall. It’s
perfectly in keeping with the artist’s fevered approach to
work – ‘like a panting animal’, said one observer. Beholding
his intense pictures of everyday objects, Charlotte Edwards
hands down her final judgement. Photography: Eric Morin
Opposite: before his Damascene moment at a Caravaggio exhibition in 1965, Arikha was an abstract painter. Two large canvases dating from his
early career are displayed above and below the staircase leading up to storage on a mezzanine. Top: Arikha worked from this double-height studio
in his Paris apartment, on the top floor of a 1929 block. On the easel is his last painting, a portrait of his pregnant daughter Noga in a Marian-blue robe
Top: in the entrance hall, Arikha’s painting Anne in Summer, Jerusalem, 20 July 1980 hangs above a silverpoint double portrait of his friend
Samuel Beckett. Arikha was a scholar of east Asian art – the Japanese print is attributed to Utamaro. Above left: Tomatoes in a Glass Bowl and
Chopping Board, 1998, oil on canvas. Above right: A Spoon, a 1975 sugar-lift aquatint. Later, in mourning for the death of Samuel Beckett, Arikha
would paint the writer’s christening spoon, which he had presented to the Arikhas’ daughter Alba – named after Beckett’s poem – at her birth
Top: Arikha made many drawings of this view through the double doors of the studio into the library, which is lined with books on art and ancient
civilisations. Above left: Paintbrush and Sketchbooks, a pastel drawing of 1988. Arikha often depicted the tools of his trade – a 1985 pastel, Tubes
of Paint in their Drawer, is in Tate’s collection. He loved all kinds of paper, and soon after his arrival in Paris made a point of befriending printers,
suppliers and purveyors of artists’ materials, such as Sennelier and Maison Gattegno. Above right: The Old Armchair, a sugar-lift aquatint of 1973
140
Opposite: in the oil-on-canvas Morning Toast, 1996, Arikha captured his own intense gaze in reflection just above the oven dials. Bread is a recur-
ring subject of his still lifes. This page: according to Arikha’s wife, Anne, Orange Tie Folded, a watercolour of 1975, recalls the abiding influence of
east Asian art on his work. Arikha was six years old when his father took him to see an exhibition of Chinese painting – ‘he never forgot it’, says Anne
AVIGDOR ARIKHA painted what he saw and he painted himself in the act of
looking: in raw self-portraits, stripped to the waist, brow furrowed, mouth agape. In Morning
Toast of 1996, his grimacing face is reflected in the polished surface of the cooker. The sky-blue
pot holder and the slice of toast, its crust just a little charred by the grill, hold their own against
the dark void of the open oven, but the artist’s image is a memento mori, a ghost at the feast. It
is a painting about a routine, about beginnings and inescapable endings: the stuff of life.
Arikha’s intimately scaled oils, watercolours, drawings and prints of everyday subjects – a
cheap black umbrella; a half-eaten baguette; two odd rubber gloves; a box of pastels – have a
deceptive power. These are things he has known and loved, used and worn and worn out. They
are matter-of-fact, but they are what matters; encountering his quiet study of a casually folded
tie at the Maastricht art fair feels like a moment of truth. He could get at the essence of a teaspoon
as well as of the people he loved. His silverpoint portraits of Samuel Beckett, a friend for over 30
years and his companion on nocturnal walks around Paris, are little more than a tangle of lines.
He painted furiously, in agitation – ‘like a panting animal’, the art historian Jean Clair has
ALL WORKS © MARLBOROUGH FINE ART. COURTESY OF THE ESTATE OF AVIGDOR ARIKHA
written – and insisted on finishing whatever he started in the light of a single day. The need to
work as if in one great exhalation was in part born out of his artistic training and influences:
the irreversibility of mark-making in east Asian ink painting, which he much admired; and the
rapid execution of fresco, a technique he had studied at the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris. But
it was also a result of his experiences of war. Arikha had learned that there was no time like
the present. Born into a German-speaking Jewish family in Romania in 1929, he grew up in
Czernowitz (now Chernivtsi, Ukraine), and at the age of 12 was deported to the Transnistria
concentration camps with his family, where his father was murdered in 1942. His response was
to draw the horrors around him, with scavenged materials and remarkable coolness, in sketches
that were eventually shown to Red Cross officials. Their intervention secured him and his sister
passage to a Palestinian kibbutz, and alongside his duties there and on military service Arikha
began to study at the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design in Jerusalem. Gravely wounded in
the 1948 Arab-Israeli War – in which he had done lightning-quick sketches, between explo-
sions, of soldiers changing positions in the trenches – he was presumed dead, taken to a morgue
and rescued only when a doctor noticed he was still breathing.
A new life in Paris began in 1949, when he took up a scholarship at art school. His wife, the
American poet Anne Atik, takes up the story: ‘It’s like a fable, or something from the Bible; but
then his entire life was like something from the Bible.’ There simply wasn’t a moment to lose.
Clouds, a comparatively large oil on canvas of 1997, records the sky through the huge arched window in his studio. Arikha later whitewashed these
panes with titanium-oxide pigment to filter UV rays. He imposed the constraint that a work, once begun, must be finished by the light of a single day
Arriving in the city at seven in the morning, he ran straight to the Louvre, desperate to see the
old masters he knew only from reproductions; it was closed, of course, so he lay down on a
bench at the entrance and went to sleep. When the museum opened, he was frantic, not know-
ing where to look first. ‘It was terrible for him,’ says Anne. ‘After that, he was there every day,
from morning to night.’ Arikha went on to become an eminent art historian, writing, lecturing
overseas, and curating major exhibitions of Poussin and Ingres for the Louvre.
As a young artist, he made large, richly coloured abstract paintings in keeping with the then-
dominant tendencies of Art Informel, although he was a great admirer of Mondrian. His talent as
a draughtsman was known to friends such as Giacometti, who often exhorted him to draw from life
(one time, delighted to pose for him, Giacometti urged Arikha to choose any of his own drawings
in exchange). A 1965 exhibition of Caravaggio, again at the Louvre, was the turning point. ‘Avigdor
saw the dirty feet in the painting of the Raising of Lazarus, and that was it,’ says Anne. ‘He was get-
ting tired of abstract work. He said: “I know all my forms, I can’t continue doing them.” And he
started to go back to nature. He called it “a hunger in the eye”.’ He made Anne sit for him for an
entire day, feverishly producing some 30 drawings in brush and sumi ink. ‘And then he wanted to
tell Giacometti, he wanted to tell him he was right. But Giacometti died not long afterwards.’
For over 40 years, Arikha worked unstintingly in his Paris studio in the seventh-floor apart-
ment he shared with Anne and their two daughters; his many depictions of his family are some-
how both overwhelmingly tender and dispassionate. His first action on waking every morning
was to read a chapter of the Bible in Hebrew (he spoke five languages fluently). ‘If it was a good
chapter, he was happy, we were all happy,’ remembers Anne. ‘But if he had a chapter he couldn’t
stand – and there are many bad people in the Bible – then he was in a bad mood all day long,
and we would all tremble.’ His was an inescapable presence. His daughter Noga remembers
lingering outside the closed studio door under orders to be quiet, the smell of turpentine signal-
ling ‘he’s working’. ‘When the door opened, we would be called in for our judgement.’
Diagnosed with a rare form of cancer in his late seventies, Arikha knew he didn’t have much
longer. ‘Of course he used the time the way he always did,’ says Anne. ‘He was so intense. Someone
once asked him: “What do you do when you’re not intense?” And Avigdor said: “When I’m not
intense, I go crazy!” That’s how he was’ $
‘Arikha, Auerbach, Kitaj’ is on show at Galería Marlborough, 68 Carrer d’Enric Granados, 08008 Barcelona,
until 2 July. For opening times, ring 00 34 934 67 44 54, or visit galeriamarlborough.com. For information about
the artist, contact Marlborough Fine Art, 6 Albemarle St, London W1 (020 7629 5161; marlboroughfineart.com)
A small self-portrait rests on the studio mantelpiece. In a 2015 catalogue essay, Jean Clair describes the artist painting with ‘body thrown forward, eyes
bulging from their sockets, mouth half-open’, accompanied by ‘a strange concert of little cries, hisses, puffs, the noise of the forge, the boiler room’
PARIS / SEPTEMBER 2-6, 2016
PARIS NORD VILLEPINTE
BE
HIGHLY
INSPIRED IN
PARIS
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JAMES G RAHAM- S TEWART
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A Roman bronze
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JUXTAPOSING ANTIQUITIES WITH THE WORK OF ALBERTO GIACOMETTI, A NEW SHOW AT ANCIENT WONDER
THE SAINSBURY CENTRE REVEALS HOW HIS ADMIRATION OF THE DISTANT PAST LED HIM TO DEVELOP A VERY MODERN WAY OF LOOKING
Top left: Alberto Giacometti, Bust of Isabel Rawsthorne (Tête Egyptienne), 1938-39. Top right: Egyptian sistrum fragment with Hathor heads, c650BC. Above left: Cycladic preg-
nant figure with folded arms, c2700-2400BC Above right: Giacometti, Spoon Woman, 1926-27. Centre: Henri Cartier-Bresson, detail of Alberto Giacometti, Rue d’Alésia, 1961
JAMES G RAHAM- S TEWART
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One of a pair of George III painted bookcases in the manner of James Wyatt, c.1775
110 x 85 x 18 inches · 279 x 216 x 46 cm
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tor Jill Platner, the collection is the luxury bath- ing and furniture spanning the 17th century
room company’s first collaboration with someone to the early 20th. The aim of the company is
outside the interior-design industry. ‘Isla’, whose to provide interesting and unusual pieces that
sculptural taps, shower and tub fittings, wall- can fit into any interior, whether modern or
mounted accessories and hardware are inspired traditional. Shown here is a selection of its
by rock, stone and organic other forms, makes 18th-century faience. Usually blue and white,
use of state-of-the-art processes, including 3D these pieces were typically produced in fac-
scanning, and has been two years in the pipeline. tories in Rouen, Delft and Nevers. Julia Boston
Waterworks, 579 King’s Rd, London SW6 (020 Antiques, 588 King’s Rd, London SW6 (020
7384 4000; waterworks.com). 7610 6783; juliaboston.com).
$ British furniture maker George Smith has $ Mallorca’s Iberostar Grand Hotel Portals Nous is
‘Isla’ tap by collaborated with the LA-based design studio set just outside Puerto Portals, one of the island’s
Jill Platner from
Commune to put together a collection of ex- beautiful marinas. The adults-only hotel was de-
Waterworks;
quisite handmade items. Both companies signed by Marcel Wanders, who conceived five
table from
Nicolas
are dedicated to using traditional craft tech- different themes for its exclusive rooms. Suites
Aubagnac; niques to produce their timeless pieces. The include ‘The Heritage’, inspired by art, antiques
‘Wing’ sofa in range comprises classic English designs with and the elegance of bygone eras; ‘The Spa’,
green mohair a contemporary twist, including a club chair, ideal for guests seeking a calmer experience;
fabric by a side chair, a dining chair, the ‘Wing’ sofa and ‘The Stargazer’, the ideal spot for those in
Commune for (pictured) and the ‘Channelled’ sofa – a rein- search of a romantic getaway. Iberostar Grand
George Smith
terpretation of the classic chesterfield. George Hotel Portals Nous, 19 Calle Falconer, Portals
Smith, 587-589 King’s Rd, London SW6 (020 Nous 07181, Calvia, Mallorca (00 34 971 99 80
7384 1004; georgesmith.co.uk). 60; grandhotelportalsnous.com).
$ Established more than 18 years ago, interior $ Fiona McDonald has been sourcing an-
designer Nicolas Aubagnac has become an estab- tiques for more than 20 years. Inspired by
lished name in the world of decorative arts. Each Italian design, Fiona also works with a small
of its pieces is designed with expert knowledge team of skilled craftsmen to create Italian-
and created by the finest French craftsmen. The made mirrors and British-made furniture
company’s bespoke furniture and contemporary and lighting. Beautifully designed, each piece
lighting, designed to complement both antiques has been created with homes, office spaces,
and modern art, are made of rare and beautiful restaurants and bars in mind. Her company
materials, such as solid steel, chiselled bronze, also provides a bespoke service, offering cli-
gold leaf, precious woods, straw marquetry, lac- ents custom-made pieces. Fiona McDonald,
quer, leather, parchment and shagreen. Ring 00 323 Fulham Palace Rd, London SW6 (020
33 1 42 46 69 45, or visit nicolas-aubagnac.com. 7731 3234; fionamcdonald.com). r
Made in England since 1860
$ Each of the colourful pieces in Cartier’s enchant- $ Known as the ‘city of gold’, Vicenza is widely
ing new ‘Amulette de Cartier’ collection symbol- regarded as the centre of Italy’s jewellery-
ises a lucky charm, the padlock detail represent- making tradition. That’s why Bottega Veneta
ing a secret wish. Precious materials, including picked the city’s small ateliers for its own jew-
guilloche gold and snakewood, as well as gem- ellery production. The brand’s latest col-
stones such as opal, lapis lazuli, malachite, car- lection features pieces made of hand-woven
nelian, crysoprase, mother-of-pearl and onyx, bring strands of sterling silver. Simple and elegant,
sparkling magic to this timeless collection. Cartier, each is a marvel of meticulous craftsmanship.
175-177 New Bond St, London W1 (020 7408 Bottega Veneta, 33 Sloane St, London SW1
5700; cartier.co.uk). (020 7838 9394; bottegaveneta.com) $
154
Matki EauZone Plus Bespoke
Tailor-made to your requirements, beautifully engineered in the UK
F O R A B R O C H U R E A N D N E A R E S T B AT H R O O M S P E C I A L I S T C A L L 01 4 5 4 3 2 8 811 | W W W. M AT K I . C O. U K | M AT K I P L C , B R I S TO L B S 3 7 5 P L
ADDRESS book
1
2
1 ‘Chinese Toile LW90153’, £84, Lewis & Wood. 2 ‘Chinese Leopard Toile
BR-79227-0’, by Brunschwig & Fils, £102, GP&J Baker. Oversized round
sunglasses, by Miu Miu, £205, Liberty. Fabric prices are per m; all prices include VAT
3
2
Sadie Coles HQ, 62 Kingly St, London W1 (020 7493 8611; sadiecoles.
com). Sanderson, Design Centre Chelsea Harbour, London SW10
(020 7351 4269; sanderson-uk.com). Selfridges, 400 Oxford St, London
W1 (0800 123400; selfridges.com). Série Rare, 6 Rue de l’Odéon,
75006 Paris (00 33 1 55 42 92 10; serierare.com). Simon Playle, 1 The
Engineering Offices, The Gas Works, 2 Michael Rd, London SW6
(020 7371 0131; simonplayle.com). Skandium, 245-249 Brompton Rd,
London SW3 (020 7935 2077; skandium.com). Solid Wooden Doors,
Design Centre Chelsea Harbour, London SW10 (020 7376 7000;
solidwoodendoors.com). South London Gallery, 65-67 Peckham Rd,
London SE5 (020 7703 6120; southlondongallery.org). Steve Harrison.
Ring 020 8482 4169, or visit steveharrison.co.uk. Strada London. Ring
0808 178 6007, or visit strada.uk.com. Summerill & Bishop, 100 Portland
Rd, London W11 (020 7221 4566; summerillandbishop.com). Surface
View. Ring 0118 922 1327, or visit surfaceview.co.uk. Tissus d’Hélène,
Design Centre Chelsea Harbour, London SW10 (020 7352 9977;
tissusdhelene.co.uk). Toiletpaper Shop. Visit shoptoiletpaper.com.
Turnell & Gigon, Design Centre Chelsea Harbour, London SW10 (020
7259 7280; turnellandgigon.com). Turnstyle Designs, Design Centre
Chelsea Harbour, London SW10 (020 3489 1040; turnstyledesigns.
com). Wedgwood. Ring 01782 204141, or visit wedgwood.co.uk. The
White Company. Ring 020 3758 9222, or visit thewhitecompany.com.
White Cube, 144-152 Bermondsey St, London SE1 (020 7930 5373;
whitecube.com). Willer, 12 Holland St, London W8 (020 7937 3518;
willer.co.uk). William & Son, 34-36 Bruton St, London W1 (020 7493
8385; williamandson.com). William Yeoward, 270 King’s Rd, London
SW3 (020 7349 7828; williamyeoward.com). Yorkshire Sculpture Park,
West Bretton, Wakefield, S. Yorks WF4 4LG (01924 832631; ysp.
co.uk). Zimmer & Rohde, Design Centre Chelsea Harbour, London
SW10 (020 7351 7115; zimmer-rohde.com). Zoffany, Design Centre
Chelsea Harbour, London SW10 (020 7351 4269; zoffany.com) $
www.indian-ocean.co.uk London 0208 675 4808
LONDON’S BEST KEPT SECRET
LIVING . DINING . BEDROOM . LIGHTING . HOME ACCESSORIES
162
POMPADOUR’S
PROTEGES
Antoinette Poisson is not merely the maiden name of Louis XV’s mistress
but a Parisian design firm steeped in the 18th century – in particular the so-
called ‘domino papers’ that predate modern wall coverings. In a flat near Père
Lachaise cemetery owned by two of the co-founders, the motifs cover
bedheads, line cupboards and form lampshades – a tribute in part, says Valérie
Lapierre, to the company’s muse and namesake. Photography: Bruno Suet
Top: above the living room’s dado, walls are lined with a copy of a domino paper designed by Sevestre Leblond, a renowned Parisian craftsman in
the 18th century. Above left: a marble mantel tops the 19th-century stove. Above right: on the sideboard stands a child’s cardboard miniature theatre
from the early 20th century. Antoinette Poisson’s co-founder Vincent Farelly, a restorer of 3D paper objects, prefers to keep it in its original condition.
Opposite: samples of domino papers, block-printed and hand-painted by the firm, made from rag paper by master craftsman Jacques Bréjoux
165
‘WE LOVE hunting down things made of paper,
especially wallpaper. It’s our obsession,’ confide Jean-
Baptiste Martin and Vincent Farelly. Along with Julie
Stordiau, they formed an interior-design business that
prints decorative papers, known by the intriguingly fishy
name Antoinette Poisson. Since 2012, these three thirty-
somethings have been busy bringing decorative ‘dom-
ino papers’ back into fashion. The ancestors of wallpaper,
they were highly popular in 18th-century France. ‘As we
really like that period, and have a peculiar affection for
Madame de Pompadour, that great lover of interior dec-
oration, we had fun with her maiden name, Jeanne-
Antoinette Poisson,’ Vincent explains.
Their fondness for paper dates back to childhood. As
a youngster, Vincent used to make scale models; these
days, he restores three-dimensional works in his favour-
ite medium. Jean-Baptiste, who used to take great delight
in scribbling on the walls of his childhood bedroom, now
makes a living restoring wallpapers. As conservators spe-
cialising in paper, one day you might find them hard at
work on small mock-ups of the stage sets of the Ballets
Russes for the New National Museum of Monaco; on an-
other it might be the first panoramic wallpaper, which is
now kept at the Musée Carnavalet.
The idea of creating their own brand came about when
they were tackling the restoration of a room decorated
with 18th-century domino papers. ‘We were not able to
find material with the same rudimentary quality for print-
ing, so we asked the extraordinary papermaker Jacques
Bréjoux to make us rag papers of the kind used in the
past. We block-printed them, painted them by hand and
stuck them to the wall sheet by sheet. The result was a rev-
elation.’ Ever since, Jean-Baptiste, Vincent and their friend
Julie have been making these sheets measuring 33 × 42cm
exactly the same way they used to be.
First produced in the Middle Ages, with images that
were initially religious then decorative, domino papers
were block-printed, then painted by hand or with a sten-
cil, and bore a cartouche with the name of the town and
the maker, the dominotier. The repeating and geometric
patterns – including lozenges, squares, stars, circles,
checks or stripes – were arranged in strips or clusters,
and as the technique is much the same as for Indian-
printed cottons, designs for textile printing were also
produced, such as fruit, flowers, leaf patterns and chi-
noiserie. For a dark-printed outline on a white back-
ground, up to three colours (including indigo, umber and
ochre) would be applied, then mixed or shaded into one
another depending on the desired colour. The irregu-
larity of the process meant that each domino paper was
unique. They were used to line the insides of furniture:
cabinets, chests, drawers and boxes. Because they were
difficult to align, they were rarely used on walls, except
over small areas, where they were applied one after an-
other, or joined together to make a roll – a fashion initi-
ated by Madame de Pompadour in the 1750s, when she
used them to decorate her dressing room in Versailles.
Top: an ostrich egg balances on scales in the kitchen. Above: in the past, domino papers were used mainly to line the interior of pieces of furniture,
a custom perpetuated by Jean-Baptiste and Vincent – this one is no. 20 in their catalogue. Opposite: a large dresser contains a whole collection
of Creil-Montereau earthenware, put together patiently over a long time. It is all in the same ‘Japon’ design that Claude Monet used daily at
Giverny. This model, very popular in the early 20th century, was copied widely, notably by the potteries of Sarreguemines with their ‘Damas’ design
167
In the spare room, a series of 80 old prints under glass of ancient
Roman monuments occupies the entire wall behind the
Louis XVI bed. A rare folding screen is decorated on the facing
side with Boucher engravings surrounded by a printed-
paper frieze. The lampshade comes from Antoinette Poisson
169
In the 19th century, mechanisation signalled the begin-
ning of the end for domino papers, which continued to
be used for a while to make bindings for books, but then
disappeared altogether.
Jean-Baptiste and Vincent live in a three-roomed flat
of around 60sq m overlooking a courtyard in an ordi-
nary Haussmann-style building not far from the Père
Lachaise cemetery, a few minutes from their workshop-
cum-showroom. It is a far cry from the sumptuous sur-
roundings occupied by Antoinette Poisson’s namesake.
But the preponderance of paper pays tribute to their
muse, whether in old works of art found in the flea mar-
ket; specialist sales, such as a children’s cardboard thea-
tre from the early 20th century; or their own creations:
lamps, boxes, notebooks and other objects lined with
their designs. Here paper is king, even in the kitchen,
where the fridge is covered with vintage publicity flyers
and where the inside of a large dresser, housing a collec-
tion of Creil-Montereau faience in the ‘Japon’ motif used
by Monet, is lined with domino papers.
The occupants have the air of dreamers. The slightest
thing reminds them of Proust, whose books are to be
found in every room. The roughly painted trompe-l’oeil
décor in the loos recalls Christian Bérard, while the bam-
boo chairs and leopard-skin-pattern rug suggest Mad-
eleine Castaing. In the living room, the wood panelling
and walls are painted saffron yellow, except for two sec-
tions framing the fireplace, hung with their paper. The
pattern is a garland of flowers, based on an 18th-century
original signed ‘A Orléans chez Sevestre Leblond’, of
which they found a rare intact sheet. They have also used
the pattern, copyright free and now in their catalogue, to
cover a copy of Madame de Sévigné’s Selected Letters dis-
played on a plaster console on the wall.
In the master bedroom, the window’s white muslin
curtains and cotton in front of the cupboard create a tex-
tural effect, enhanced by the red cashmere coverings on
the black metal bed. A toreador’s suit and a Louis XV
period costume decorate the walls. In front of the fire-
place, a screen with an 18th-century-style bird design
is one of the duo’s own creations. Meanwhile, the large
screen in the guest-room is vintage, covered with prints
by François Boucher on the front and around 20 domino
papers on the back. On the wall, 80 small clip-frames
depict ancient Roman monuments in paper cut-outs.
And as Jean-Baptiste and Vincent now also produce
dominoes as block-printed fabrics, they have covered the
Louis XVI headboard, cushions and quilt with them.
The colourful designs, handcrafted charm and ir-
regularities of their delightfully fresh papiers dominotés
represent a rare and fragile heritage. The team is bring-
ing new life to these once-popular products – products
that were destined for places where they would not be
flaunted, such as the insides of furniture, or humble set-
tings not deemed worthy of preservation $
Antoinette Poisson, 12 Rue Saint Sabin, 75011 Paris (00 33 1 77
17 13 11; antoinettepoisson.com)
Opposite: with its metal Belle Epoque bed covered with a paisley shawl, and La Prisonnière as nocturnal reading, the main bedroom has a
Proustian air, a sign of the admiration in which the writer is held by the masters of the house. Top: above a 19th-century black-lacquer chair hangs a
bullfighter’s costume that Jean-Baptiste restored – and which he is quick to don whenever there’s a fancy-dress party. On the chest of drawers sit
antique perfume bottles. Above: a lampshade covered with dominoes sits on a bedside table fashioned from three items of vintage luggage
171
This page, clockwise from top: Hagia Sophia, here seen from the southeast, was built in the mid-13th century by Manuel I Megas Komnenos,
the emperor of the city then known as Trebizond; the western porch is one of three preceding each of the entrances; one of the remarkable
features of Hagia Sophia is its array of low-relief carvings. This one is similar to those found on Seljuk mosques. Opposite: the monastic
complex overlooks the Black Sea. It must have been one of the very first landmarks that sailors encountered as they arrived from the west
VISIONS OF BYZANTIUM
Motorbiking across Europe in 1951, David Winfield dreamed of working among the scattered ruins of the Eastern
Roman realm. Six years later, he was back, cleaning the 13th-century murals of Trabzon’s church of Hagia Sophia
in Turkey. Here, alongside the restorer’s own photographs, Antony Eastmond recalls how this eccentric Englishman,
armed with little more than a camera and a straw hat, discovered the hitherto unseen majesty of an empire in exile
This page, clockwise from top: a vibrant vision of the Word of God in the central vault of the narthex. In its middle, the hand of God, sur-
rounded by the symbols of the Evangelists, bursts out in a blast of coloured light; this fine portrait of St Peter in the apse shows that despite
the city’s position far from Constantinople, Trebizond had access to the finest craftsmen; in the north porch, the stories of the Virgin birth
and the Burning Bush are conflated – suggesting a parallel between Mary’s purity and that of God’s message, which left the bush undamaged
This page, clockwise from top: a choir of angels flies around the base of the dome, beneath what was once an image of Christ, since lost.
Just visible is the rickety 14m-high scaffolding that Winfield would have worked upon; when the building was reinstated as a mosque in
the late 19th century the Ottomans carved pits into the walls to help their plaster to stick. When it was removed, these spots of damage were
left behind; dressed like a Byzantine courtier, with pearl cuffs and jewelled hems, an angel on the dome suggests the splendour of heaven
IN 1951 David Winfield, a young history student at
Merton College, Oxford, set out on a motorbike ride. His aim was
The decision proved him right. The church was full of images of
the highest quality: lively compositions full of incidental detail,
to cross Europe through Tito’s embattled Yugoslavia (it had just painted in vibrant colours. These transformed art historians’ un-
fallen out with Stalin’s USSR) to visit the Orthodox monasteries of derstanding of how Byzantine art developed in the 13th century.
Mount Athos. The route and the final destination established the Talbot Rice’s permit also allowed Winfield to work in two other
pattern of his life: a desire to live and work on the very edges of churches in the city. However, these were now the city’s most im-
Europe, and a lifelong passion for the art of the Byzantine world. portant mosques, and the resulting local sensitivities meant that
He combined the two by becoming a conservator of Byzantine investigations were impossible: 19th-century reports suggest more
wall paintings. His first project, begun in 1957, was to clean the paintings and even golden mosaics may still be hidden.
paintings in the church of Hagia Sophia in Trabzon (the city for- The restoration of Hagia Sophia is important because it filled a
merly known as Trebizond), a remote, sleepy town on the Black hole in history. In 1204, Constantinople (Istanbul today) was
Sea coast in northeastern Turkey. The paintings he uncovered sieged and conquered by Western knights on the Fourth Crusade.
and cleaned there were a revelation, showing the world the splen- The city’s inhabitants fled to establish rival strongholds in the shat-
dours of a long-forgotten outpost of the tered ruins of the empire while they plotted
Byzantine world: the Empire of Trebizond. to recapture their capital, but little evidence
The restorations at Trabzon took him survived to show what these outposts had
five years (after each six-month season he been like. One branch of the imperial family
drove back home in his trusty Land Rover). escaped to Trabzon to re-establish their ju-
The cleaning established Winfield’s reputa- risdiction there, and they survived for more
tion, and he spent the next 15 years working than 250 years, finally yielding to Mehmet
first in the cave churches of Cappadocia in II the Conquerer in 1461, eight years after
central Turkey, and then in the remote Byz- Constantinople itself had fallen. The paint-
antine churches in the Troodos mountains ings in Hagia Sophia show that they did not
on Cyprus. There he toiled at some of the live in poverty, but recreated the majesty of
island’s most famous sites, all the while ne- the empire in exile. Other discoveries were
gotiating his way around the conflicts that even more surprising: the exterior of the
erupted in the 1960s. The advice in case of church was full of carvings, some made by
emergency was to ring the church bell to at- Christian craftsmen from the Caucasus,
tract attention from the nearest village. He others by Muslims from Anatolia. Treb-
returned to Britain to become surveyor of izond, with its trade links to the Silk Road,
conservation at the National Trust, but the was always a cosmopolitan city, despite its
spirit of adventure never left him, and when isolated location on the coast.
he retired he moved to the north coast of What caught David Winfield’s eye the
the Isle of Mull to become a crofter, where most were the details, and he devoted his
he died in 2013. Throughout his life Win- career as much to establishing how Medi-
field worked closely with his wife, June, who eval artists had worked as to the images
played a key role in the restoration work and acted as the main re- they produced. His archive is filled with photographs, like the
corder of the paintings, making beautiful line drawings of them and ones you see here, housed at the Courtauld Institute of Art in
watercolours of the decorative details. London, of the host of angels crowding the dome of the church,
As an Englishman in Trabzon, David stood out. In the words bowing down to praise God. He looked for the initial incisions
of Robert Thomson, one of the volunteers who worked with him: the artists had made in the plaster to plan their work, for the lay-
‘He was a well-known figure in Trabzon, notable for his reddish ers of paint they used to build up the figures, for the mistakes
beard and the smart straw boater and blazer he wore on festive they made and how they corrected them, and for the other changes
occasions when we processed to the Italian consulate. Hence a they introduced as they developed new, better ideas.
letter addressed simply to “that bearded Englishman, Trabzon” If the cleaning of the paintings was a triumph, so too were David
reached him promptly.’ The work began to attract tourists: Win- Winfield’s powers of persuasion, which convinced the city to
field guided visitors from one of the first Swan Hellenic cruises open the church as a museum by building another mosque near-
round the city in 1958, including Rose Macaulay, author of The by. The paintings put Trabzon firmly on the tourist map, but the
Towers of Trebizond, a semi-autobiographical novel about love, decision by the Turkish government to reopen the museum as a
faith and camels, which begins with a journey to the city. mosque once more has hidden much of his work behind a textile
In the 1950s, the church of Hagia Sophia – then still in use as a tent erected inside the building to screen the paintings from wor-
mosque – stood in tobacco fields to the west of the city. Like its em- shippers. So the church has now entered the latest chapter in its
pire it was slightly remote and mysterious. In the 1920s the entre- long history – over the centuries it has been, variously, a mosque,
preneurial art historian David Talbot Rice had seen hints of the a ruin, a stable, a military storehouse, a cholera hospital, a mu-
church’s promise. Looking between the bullet holes, possibly seum, and now a mosque once again. It has proved to be a re-
inflicted by the Russians in 1916 during their brief occupation of markably adaptable but resilient building $
the city, and the places where the Ottoman plaster that covered the ‘Byzantium’s Other Empire: Trebizond’ runs at the Koç University,
interior had fallen off, he saw shadows of lively figures and bright Research Center for Anatolian Civilizations, 181 Istiklal Caddesi, Merkez
colours waiting to be revealed. It took him nearly 30 years to secure Han, 34433 Beyoglu, Istanbul (00 90 212 393 6000; rcac.ku.edu.tr/en)
the permissions, and he entrusted the work to David Winfield. from 23 June to 14 July
176
This page, clockwise from top: most of the paintings in the main part of the church have been lost, but a fragment of one can be seen on the
far pier. The columns and their extraordinary capitals probably came from Constantinople; in the apse, the Apostles discuss Christ’s resur-
rection after his appearance to Doubting Thomas; John the Baptist, and Kings David and Solomon, the latter wearing crowns, watch as
Jesus destroys the gates of Hell in the dome’s Anastasis scene. Opposite: Winfield, shot in front of one of the paintings he restored in Cyrpus
178
COMMON
THREADS
While restoring a west London terrace, textile lover
Helen Magowan and her husband, Andrew, found out
that they shared more than just space with some for-
mer residents, a family of turn-of-the-century drapers.
Today, bespoke ribbons connect up the rooms and
pay tribute to that lineage. Dominic Bradbury unravels
the wraparound story. Photography: Rachael A. Smith
189
In rectangular panels in the antechamber, Diana and Minerva,
the goddesses of hunting and war, evoke the rights of the
aristocracy and the duties nobles owe their king. On the lowest
section, sheaves of wheat (blé) are a visual pun evoking the
family name, elsewhere highlighted in crown-topped initials
Opposite: the gilded cabinet of St Cecilia, filled with symbolic iconography, was intended as a study for male contemplation.
This page, clockwise from top left: a face peers out of a ‘wooden’ cartouche; Venus, one of three goddesses represented in the room – the
others are Minerva and Juno; this little panel showing roses tied up by a ribbon can be read as art subduing nature; on one of the
bookcase doors either side of the fireplace, flowers evoke spiritual perfection and indicate Jacques du Blé’s awareness of botanical discoveries
193
Top: in the marchioness’s chamber, the painting above the mantelpiece is Venus Asking Vulcan for Arms for Her Son Aeneas, attributed
to Quentin Varin, and represents maternal solicitude. Above left: Claude du Blé’s portrait was altered after her husband’s death – with
green dress rendered black, décolleté covered in tulle and a pearl necklace erased. Above right: papier-mâché ornaments covered in gold
leaf stud the coffered ceiling à la française. Opposite: in the lofty space (5.3m high), a four-poster’s velvet curtains help to retain warmth
195
Opposite: adjoining both the antechamber and the gilded room is this cabinet of curiosities, to which mirrors were added by a
descendant in the 18th century to brighten things up. Beneath a ceiling inspired by Gentileschi’s in the Luxembourg Palace, a cornice
shelf between two rows of paintings allows for the display of objects. This page: topped with marine wonders, a skull and a porphyry
globe, this store chest, made in Antwerp in 1630, is enlivened by 12 reverse-glass paintings depicting scenes from Classical mythology
197
ENTERING THIS forbidding building rights and duties of the nobility – namely hunting and
in the south of Burgundy, built in the time of Louis war – while Solomon denotes wisdom. Sheaves of blé
XIII, causes some trepidation. But the painted interior (wheat) illustrate the family name, along with their mot-
décor by the Du Blé d’Huxelles family is as enchanting to, ‘En tout temps Du Blé’ (Always Du Blé), an allusion
as it is surprising for its sophistication, freshness and both to the family’s longevity and the bread of the eucha-
mystery. It demands further inspection. rist. Elsewhere is a painted fly, too close to a candle, along-
Situated deep in the countryside, the Château de side the words, ‘It consumes the unwary’, referring to the
Cormatin is the result of the union of two families: one king’s recent victory over the rebels at La Rochelle.
provincial and bellicose, whose name was already regis- A small door hidden in the decoration leads to the
tered in the charter of the nearby Cluny Abbey; the other marquise’s bedchamber, a good deal larger with a 5.3m-
Parisian and intellectual. Antoine du Blé had just dis- high ceiling. The walls are covered with hangings that
tinguished himself at war and taken on the D’Huxelles match the bed’s. A ‘chapel’ stands in an alcove. In front
lands when in 1607 he began to build his château on the of the fireplace, a table could be set up for a meal when
ruins of a family fortress. The idea was to assert his status required. The painted decoration is focused on the blue
and to respond to the king’s desire for members of the ceiling, its colour – synonymous with fidelity – made
nobility to occupy rural areas. fashionable by Madame de Rambouillet, and costly to
His son Jacques married Claude Phélypeaux, the produce using ground lapis lazuli. The ‘lower panel-
daughter of a senior official, and finished the building ling’ is painted with flowers and fruit symbolising femi-
work; but he had only just begun the decoration when he ninity, while the depiction of Venus and Vulcan over
left again on campaign in 1627, leaving the remaining the fireplace is an ode to maternity as the Du Blés had
tasks to his wife. Claude, who would become Marquise several children. It is possible to return discreetly to
d’Huxelles, came from a cultured background: her fa- the antechamber through the adjacent dressing room.
ther’s town house had been decorated by Eustache Le The cabinet of curiosities on the other side was deco-
Sueur, her brother collected paintings and owned several rated with mirrors in the 18th century by a descendant
by Nicolas Poussin and Pietro da Cortona. She had been of Jacques and Claude who spent several months living
a frequent visitor to the home of Madame de Rambouillet, here in disgrace. Featuring shells, stuffed animals and
who was the first to introduce a particular hierarchy of other natural wonders, it was no doubt inspired by the
spaces and an unusual form of circulation in her man- Medicis’ Studiolo in Florence.
sion. In the past all rooms would have been intercon- In the gilded cabinet of St Cecilia, literary and phil-
nected, but at this time public and private space began osophical themes are supposed to be deciphered like
to be differentiated. This period, when La Princesse de riddles. At shoulder height, for instance, the idea of
Clèves was written, was also the age of gallantry. moderation is illustrated by Paris’s choice between the
With her husband, Claude had also visited the re- Three Graces. This alternates with vases of flowers rep-
gent Marie de’ Medici, mother of Louis XIII, and her resenting both spiritual values and botanical know-
newly finished Luxembourg Palace, in the middle of ledge, which was then fashionable. Even the placement
what is now the gardens of the same name. Marie viewed of figures is significant – over the fireplace St Cecilia
art as an instrument of power and she commissioned faces towards the North Star, considered the centre of
paintings from Rubens, took her inspiration from the the universe. The man of the house was supposed to
Palazzo Pitti in Florence, and brought a whole team of withdraw into this small room, as secluded as it is sump-
Italian artists, craftsmen and workmen to Paris. The tuous, to think alone or with a few peers capable of match-
marquise was much inspired by this and brought the ing him. But, as in all châteaux, he would especially look
same groups of craftsmen to Cormatin. forward to the king’s visit in order to dazzle him with
Decoration of this kind barely existed in France be- his knowledge. Although Louis XIII never made it, Rich-
fore 1650, and the work lasted two years, from 1627 to elieu, his chief minister, did stop by one evening in 1629,
1628. On the upper floor, the marchioness devised a the year Jacques du Blé died.
40m-long gallery, few traces of which remain, decorated So the show was over. Nothing was finished when the
with portraits of the 13 Louis, designed for contempla- marchioness went into mourning and left Burgundy.
tion as one strolled along, since ‘ideas come as you walk’. Cormatin would remain empty for many years: sold by
She herself moved into the north wing. An antechamber the Du Blé family in 1766, it changed hands forlornly
opens into two sets of rooms: on the right, the marquise’s for years until, in 1980, three art-historian friends, Anne-
bedchamber and dressing room; on the left the rooms Marie Joly, Marc Simonet-Lenglart and Pierre-Albert
belonging to Jacques (whose planned private apartments Almendros, succumbed to its Sleeping Beauty charms.
remained unfinished at the time of his death in 1629). Together, they took great pains to restore this wonder,
The antechamber is the public room, with ‘high whose décor, though already quite outmoded in the time
panelling’ (walls painted from top to bottom) replac- of Louis XIV, beguiles us once more today $
ing the usual tapestries. Red, the colour of power, is the Château de Cormatin, 71460 Cormatin, France. For opening
dominant hue. Here Diana and Minerva represent the times, ring 00 33 3 85 50 16 55, or visit chateaudecormatin.com
Opposite: the jib door leads from the cabinet of curiosities, with its floor of terracotta tomettes, to the gilded chamber. Its panel painting of
a thieving woodpecker is freighted with obscure symbols – the fruit likely represents the holy trinity, while the bird is associated with heresy
199
THIS PAGE © THE ESTATE OF FRANCIS BACON. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, DACS 2016. PRIVATE COLLECTION, ON LOAN TO TATE. PHOTOGRAPHY: COURTESY TATE, LONDON. OPPOSITE, FROM TOP: © ESTATE HELMAR LERSKI, MUSEUM FOLKWANG, ESSEN; © THE ESTATE OF FRANCIS BACON. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, DACS 2016
Above: this painted wooden screen of c1929 might be considered Bacon’s first triptych. Opposite, from top: avant-garde cinematographer Helmar Lerski
took this dramatic portrait of the artist during his wanderings in Berlin in the late 1920s; the invitation card to Bacon’s first show, with its geometric letterhead
THE MAKING
O F B AC O N
Aged 21, Francis Bacon was an unknown decorator when
a magazine ran a piece on his Bauhaus-style chairs and
geometric rugs. By 1933, he had abandoned design for
painting, but his early works – such as a screen foreshad-
owing his celebrated triptychs – reveal an abiding fascina-
tion with interiors and, as Rebecca Daniels reveals, paint
a portrait of the artist this young man was to become
Left: Roy de Maistre’s Interior, 1930, shows Bacon’s designs in the latter’s
London studio. The central stool, described at the time as blue-green, is
in fact closer to eau de Nil (below). Bottom left: Bacon’s wool rugs, c1929,
were likely to have been made by Wilton Carpets. Bottom right: De Maistre’s
patron Gladys MacDermot bought a rug of this design when she commis-
sioned Bacon to decorate her apartment in 1932. Opposite: Bacon’s Queens-
berry Mews West atelier, photographed for The Studio magazine in 1930
TOP LEFT: © CAROLINE DE MESTRE WALKER. PRIVATE COLLECTION. TOP RIGHT: © THE ESTATE OF FRANCIS BACON. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, DACS 2016. MB ART COLLECTION, MONACO.
BOTTOM LEFT AND BOTTOM RIGHT: © THE ESTATE OF FRANCIS BACON. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, DACS 2016. PRIVATE COLLECTION, ON LOAN TO TATE. PHOTOGRAPHY: COURTESY TATE, LONDON
WHEN Francis Bacon posed for his portrait at the Berlin relating for the first time. On 9 December 1983 Bacon wrote on
studio of photographer Helmar Lerski, he was about to launch the back of a photograph of it: ‘this is a rug designed by me in
his career as an interior designer. It is not known whether this 1929 and made up by Wiltons,’ proving the long-held belief that
ambitious young man had received any formal training in that the Wilton Carpets factory had produced these pieces.
field, but if he did it is likely to have been during his sojourns in Bacon and De Maistre laid out their 1930 exhibition as a har-
Europe. In the early spring of 1927, he had travelled from London monious scheme, perhaps recalling the colour-coordinated mises-
to Berlin and then on to Paris. Here he stayed with a family near en-scène James McNeill Whistler designed for his own exhibitions
Chantilly, before moving in the autumn of 1928 to the Hôtel (WoI Dec 2008). A contemporary review noted that ‘the pictures
Delambre in Montparnasse, a well-known destination for artists continue on the dead-white walls the shapes and designs of the
that was just round the corner from the vibrant and bohemian metal furniture and of the rugs. Mr de Mestre [later changed to de
brasserie La Coupole. Bacon was already working in the design Maistre] often makes use of these objects in his paintings, a fact
world at this point, but there is no record of his earliest projects. which in the present surrounding makes them appear like mirrors
He returned to London in around spring 1929. Information reflecting the room in different angles.’ This is a reference to De
about this period is scarce, since he was reluctant to be drawn into Maistre’s painting Interior of 1930, which depicts the same furni-
detail later in life, telling David Sylvester during a 1973 interview ture that Bacon was displaying, such as the painted screen – argu-
only that his work ‘was awfully influenced by French design of that ably his first triptych – visible folded on the stairs. The screen’s
time. I don’t think anything was very original.’ The post-Cubist palette included orange and grey – colours that would later be-
motifs that emerged in his design practice come pivotal to Bacon when he abandoned
certainly owed something to Picasso, Léger decoration to focus on painting.
and Jean Lurçat, as well as to Le Corbusier Bacon bravely embarked on a career as
(indeed, Bacon’s ongoing dialogue with a decorator during the Depression. Much
France is the subject of an exhibition this of his furniture was designed to be afford-
summer in Monaco, where he lived from the able and, as a cost-saving device, was in-
mid-1940s to the early 1950s). The Bauhaus tended to have multiple uses. A desk could
was an inspiration too – witness his simpli- also function as a dressing-table, and a ply-
fied metal-framed furniture. But Bacon’s wood stool could be used as a dining or
self-deprecating remarks to Sylvester down- desk chair. In 1930 plywood was still only
play the originality of his work. From the available in England from a few highly spe-
outset, his individuality and artistic flair as a cialised importers, suggesting how mod-
designer received critical attention. ern Bacon aimed to make his furniture. His
In August 1930 an article in The Studio stool was described contemporaneously
THIS PAGE: PHOTOGRAPH BY SIMON WITHAM. OPPOSITE: © THE ESTATE OF FRANCIS BACON. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, DACS 2016. MB ART COLLECTION, MONACO
magazine featured Bacon’s furniture and as blue-green, although it is, in fact, more
rugs. ‘Francis Bacon’, it read, ‘is a young like eau de Nil. The screen was painted with
English decorator who has worked in Paris the same ground colour, so that together
and Germany for some years and is now they would form part of the room’s scheme.
established in London.’ Bacon’s interior ap- The metal furniture was more vibrant than
peared alongside a room designed by Van- the surviving photograph suggests; the
essa Bell and Duncan Grant, and the sitting room of the prestigious circular table had pink legs and was fitted with a glass top, half-
designer Serge Chermayeff, in a section called ‘The 1930 Look’. To clear and half-frosted. His seemingly plain upholstered chairs
have his work featured in this company seems extraordinary, not had extraordinarily deep seats.
least since Bacon was just 21 years old and completely unknown. Bacon’s career in design lasted only a few years. He contin-
The furniture had been photographed for The Studio at 17 ued to undertake the odd commission, but from 1933 he was
Queensberry Mews West in South Kensington, where from 4 to 22 almost entirely devoted to painting. The legacy of that stage in
November 1930 Bacon held his first exhibition, consisting of four his career is felt strongly in his art, however – a point made (al-
paintings, a print and four rugs. No mention is made of the furni- though only obliquely illustrated) by an exhibition at Tate Liver-
ture in the accompanying catalogue, although reviews prove that pool this summer. Metal rails and space frames, used as a struc-
it was on display. The invitation card, almost certainly designed tural device in his compositions, closely relate to his interior
by Bacon, was printed with geometric patterns and advertised pieces, in some cases echoing specific tables that he designed.
that he sold ‘modern decoration’ and made ‘furniture in metal, Bacon often placed his painted figures in an enclosed room with
glass and wood; rugs and lights’. Although organised by Bacon, it furniture and objects: mirrors, naked bulbs hanging from cords,
was a group show that also featured drawings by Jean Shepeard and blind pulls with tassels are repeated motifs. The use of white
and paintings by Roy de Maistre. De Maistre, an Australian Mod- rubber curtains was a noted aspect of his interior design, and
ernist artist, had himself previously worked as an interior designer curtaining likewise features heavily as a background in his paint-
in Sydney and organised an important exhibition there at Bur- ings. Bacon did keep one of the circular mirrors from the 1930
dekin House in 1929. One of the lenders to that show was Gladys exhibition in his Reece Mews studio (WoI June 2001). It broke, but
MacDermot, who then in 1932, having moved back to England, he left it there, as he said he enjoyed the fractured reflections it
commissioned Bacon to furnish her apartment in Ridgmount emitted. His design influenced his painting in much the same way $
Gardens, Bloomsbury. The rug she bought for her apartment sur- ‘Francis Bacon: Invisible Rooms’ is at Tate Liverpool (0151 702 7400; tate.
vives and is Bacon’s most cohesive geometric design. Although the org.uk), 18 May-18 Sept; ‘Francis Bacon: Monaco and French Culture’ is
family used the rest of the furniture for decades, none has survived. at the Grimaldi Forum Monaco (00 377 99 99 30 00; grimaldiforum.com),
Another extant rug designed by Bacon depicts a stylised vio- 2 July-4 Sept; ‘Francis Bacon: Catalogue Raisonné’, ed. Martin Harrison,
lin and a brick wall; he used the same subject in his first painting, will be published by Heni on 30 June. Rebecca Daniels’s book on Bacon’s
‘Gouache’, of 1929, which shows his design and painting inter- interior designs will be published in 2017
Opposite: the August 1930 issue of The Studio, which praised Bacon’s ‘individualistic variations’ on the use of steel and glass, and called his rugs ‘particularly
representative of to-day’. This page: the forms in Rug/Composition of 1929 are repeated in his first painting, ‘Gouache’, which he created in the same year
Francisco’s ‘Loft’.
In contrast to the
rough Brazilian
walnut table and
benches, bought
in Montevideo at
an auction, the
beams and pillars
are made of pine
and eucalyptus
from the estate
BACK AT THE RANCH
Antique dealer Francisco Garrido had been living in Europe for 25 years when, fancying a change of tack, he bought an
old farmstead in his native Uruguay. Having redone the existing house, he began building new ones for family and friends
in timber and corrugated iron, rounding up the objects and furniture to fill them. Now that hens, horses and his beloved
donkeys roam its woods, this rural retreat’s got the whole caboodle. Text: Lee Marshall. Photography: Ricardo Labougle
Top and bottom:
Francisco designed
the Loft himself,
inspired by an
Australian house
he once saw in a
magazine. ‘The
main thing I took
from it was the
curve of the sheet
metal between roof
and walls, and the
jut of the roof
above the façade,
which helps to
protect the wood
from rain.’ Middle
left: inside, beneath
the mezzanine
floor, are a chair
and footstool he
picked up in a junk
shop. The tree trunk
behind is a bonsai
experiment gone
wrong. Middle
right: Francisco
himself, on the
porch of Casa
Torre, one of the
houses on the estate
Top: the Loft’s
bedroom, kitted
out with Danish
armchairs, is
situated on the
mezzanine level.
Middle left: the
brass lamp beside
the bed used to sit in
an old government
office in the 1930s.
Middle right: the
floor downstairs is
made of polished
concrete. Francisco
thinks that the sink
to the left originated
in a ship, as it’s
made of tin rather
than zinc, and
is painted with a
durable varnish. The
cabinet opposite it
used to belonged to
an optician. An eye
chart would have
once hung on the
bare panel. Bottom:
a 1980s Plexiglas
lamp lights the
other side of the bed
Top: the exterior of
Casa Torre. Middle
left: the dining
room was meant to
house the estate
custodian’s tractor
until Francisco
decided the house
was to be his
sister’s. The cow
horns are intended
as lasso or coat
hooks (in the kitchen
they’re cupboard-
door handles).
Middle right: stable
doors open on to
the veranda, letting
the breeze in but
keeping animals
out. Of Francisco’s
ten woven chairs
(opposite), six are
1960s originals. He
had four replicas
made. Bottom: in
the sitting room
a 19th-century
Japanese screen
crowns a 1950s
faux-leather sofa
211
212
Casa Torre’s bedroom
is fitted with a huge
polished-concrete
fireplace, either side
of which are windows
hung with slats. The
blinds can be pulled
up, giving a view
into the sitting room
A FEW MILES back from the chic Uruguayan spirit that he later realised he must have inherited from his
beach resorts of Punta del Este and José Ignacio lies another father, ‘who also converted a house without having any ar-
world, more pampas than pampering. Long, lazy country chitectural qualifications’. As he was based in Milan for much
roads, edged by eucalyptus and pine, connect small chacras of the year, he would send the builder cardboard profiles of
– rural farmsteads – and larger estancias (not unlike ranches), key structural elements for him to copy.
most of them given over to raising cattle. One such, Route The proliferation of buildings on the estate followed a
104, links the increasingly hip seaside enclave of Manantiales certain logic. ‘The casero [custodian] needed a house,’ he ex-
with the workaday inland town of San Carlos, passing in plains, ‘but his, Casa Torre, turned out too nice – so I decided
front of the sculpture park and artistic foundation set up in to use that for guests and build him and his wife another one,
2007 by Italy-based Uruguayan sculptor Pablo Atchugarry. which is still very cute.’ There was also the issue of Garrido’s
And although Francisco Garrido also spends most of sister, who had bought a minority stake in the property. Not
the year in northern Italy, and although he began his career, wanting her and her friends under his feet (‘I like to breakfast
in his teens, as a wood carver, the fact that he found his ideal alone,’ he says diplomatically), he built her a lake-view house
country retreat just a mile away from the fundación is pure with a pool at some distance from his own. Then it was time
coincidence – or perhaps it’s a case of elective affinities. to plant the kitchen garden and to fill in the gaps in an or-
Francisco got there first, in 2004, after an offer he’d put chard that consisted of some venerable orange and peach
in for a house in the Spanish countryside was bested. By this trees. Only when this was finished did he move on to the final
time he had spent most of his adult life in Europe, having and most adventurous construction – a corrugated-iron-
left Montevideo in 1979 because, he says, ‘I was curious clad studio pavilion in the woods that he refers to as ‘the Loft’.
about life.’ After a short sojourn in Ibiza, he spent 13 years Francisco’s houses have the playful air of being built by
in Barcelona, selling antiques – especially 18th-century jew- a kid with a construction kit – a kit he assembled as he went
ellery – and restoring pieces in wood. In the early 1990s, he along. A ‘proper’ architect may have baulked at using cor-
moved to Bologna for seven years, where he studied paint- rugated metal to line walls inside as well as out, as he did in
ing restoration while continuing to ply the antique trade. the Loft and in the dining room of Casa Torre. In the latter,
Milan, Francisco’s current home, came next: as well as sat- he also carries a line of slatted wooden roll-up blinds from
isfying his curiosity about life, it also provided a good logis- the windows on two sides to the windowless wall beyond,
tical base for his frequent trips to antique fairs in Parma, where they become fixed elements, an elegantly neutral
London, Paris and further afield. background for an orange 1920s dentist’s cabinet or a series
It was while on a trip back to Uruguay, still smarting from of cow-horn clothes hooks. As for the movables, with the
his Spanish gazumping, that a thought came to Francisco: exception of a few pieces he came across in the course of his
‘This isn’t bad – I could actually live here.’ So he began to antique-fair peregrinations, they’re mostly locally sourced,
scout round for a property with a bit of land. He soon came from cowhide rugs to a stunted plane-tree trunk – a bonsai
across a dusty, unkempt chacra southeast of San Carlos, experiment gone wrong – that a local nursery owner in Punta
which he describes as ‘a typical Uruguayan rural town: calm, del Este was keen to get rid of, and which now brings a touch
colourful and ordinary’. The 25-hectare estate, known as of Macbeth’s blasted heath to a corner of the Loft.
KM7, had belonged to a local family who inherited what was The striking design of the latter, with its wraparound met-
then a working farm from an aunt, but they did little more allic roof, was suggested by a contemporary Australian house
than ‘camp out here each summer’. that had caught his eye in a magazine years before. The out-
Francisco had never seen himself as a farmer, but a farm back inspiration is not too much of a stretch: surrounded by
without animals is like a bicycle without wheels, so he began eucalyptus trees, which provided the material for its wooden
to buy livestock: cows, sheep, horses, donkeys (‘I love don- frame, the Loft could as easily be in the Blue Mountains as the
keys,’ he says), rabbits, hens and pheasants. They’re tended, Uruguayan pampas. But although he was committed to using
along with a large kitchen garden, by a local couple who live simple, natural materials inside and out – wood, iron, brick,
on the farm and who introduced the city-born Garrido to ‘a wicker, leather – Francisco had learned to tame what he jok-
peasant culture I’d never really known’. Wild animals – in- ingly calls his ‘WWF tendencies’ by the time the Loft was built.
cluding more than 140 different bird species – also make At first, he refused to use treated beams – until he was forced
the chacra their home. Some are enchanting, the owner says to tear down a whole house and start again when the wood
– among them the skunks that live under the house and come was infested by termites.
out at twilight. ‘The baby ones walk along with their tails en- Just before I left, he asked me if I’d heard of Uruguay’s for-
twined,’ he enthuses, ‘just to show off’. Others are less wel- mer president José ‘Pepe’ Mujica, a chrysanthemum-growing
come, like the wild dogs that killed eight of his 11 sheep farmer famous for his austere lifestyle and unusual views (for
before he had finished fencing in the property. a politician), such as his belief that progress is pointless
On arrival, he set about ‘beautifying what I found there… if it reduces the sum of human happiness. I realised at this
I wanted to reclaim nature, not distort it’. The animals need- point that I’d spent too much of our hour together quizzing
ed water and shade – so he made sure there was plenty of Francisco about building materials and provenance. What
both. A natural spring feeds a series of ponds on the prop- he really wanted to say about his rural retreat was summed
erty, which is well supplied with tree cover, including a two- up in a dreamy parting shot: ‘There’s a special light in this
hectare eucalyptus wood. place… And the sunsets are incredible’ $
There was a simple house on the estate from the 1920s. To rent one of the properties at KM7, ring 00 39 335 631917, or
Francisco set about fixing it up, in an experimental, can-do visit casadecampoyplaya.com.uy
214
A eucalyptus
trunk becomes
a bedside table,
while the glass
table – ‘a cheap
1950s thing’
Francisco found
in Rome – holds
a mirror. The
cowhide was
bought locally
A FINE BALANCE
Conceived by two European expats in India, Jaipur wining and dining spot Bar Palladio has an international air. Set
as Indian textiles, irreverently updated in flashing neons, find parity with Empire furniture, while Gothic doors and a
in the grounds of an Edwardian Rajput palace, it strikes a clever equilibrium between East and West,
chequered floor make graceful counterpoints to its Mogul-style motifs. Text and photography: Henry Wilson
Previous pages: the
jali lamps hanging
in the main bar are
replicas of those in
the Jama mosque of
Fatehpur Sikri.
This page, clockwise
from top: Empire-
style chairs and
a black-and-white
floor preserve
the building’s
European style; this
marble planter,
carved with rams’
heads and acanthus
leaves, was the
springboard for
Barbara Miolino’s
vision for the bar;
grand details – a
stone balustrade,
carved elephants’
heads and solid
buttresses – lend
the diminutive
bungalow’s façade a
heightened sense
of grandeur, which
is amplified by a
scallop-edged
awning referencing
the decorative
tenting used in
traditional palaces;
a sofa in the
conservatory is
covered with fabric
block-printed to
resemble ticking
This page, clockwise
from top: impost
blocks mounted on
the walls support a
proscenium-like
arch in the main
bar. The painted
white patterning,
executed by Vikas
Soni of Jeypur
Arts, is customary
in northwestern
India; above the
doors fanlights
fitted with pierced
jali screens allow
air to circulate
throughout the bar
and contribute
to the décor; a
detail of the fabric
used on the bar’s
ottomans, which is
block-printed by
hand. While its
small and compact
floral designs
are traditional,
the neon colour
scheme is not;
the main bar has
doorways leading
off it on all four
walls, allowing for
through-views from
every vantage point,
an effect further
enhanced by the
mirrors hung
in between them
This page, top:
symmetry plays
an important part
in Rajput and
Mogul architecture,
as is evident in
the salon. Middle
left: stairs lead to
a shallow balcony,
designed more
for decorative effect
than practicality.
In front hangs a
lantern, its bowl
collared with brass.
Known in India as
hundi, these lights
were popular in the
Georgian period
and became highly
fashionable in the
British Raj. Middle
right: a spectacular
(and symmetrical)
fountain of
flowers and leaves
adorns the centre
of the back wall.
To its right,
infinite reflections
give the illusion
of the coach-like
room being wider
than it is. Bottom:
a detail of the
jali balustrade.
Opposite: the
tented ceiling nods
to the nomadic
Rajput lifestyle
221
THERE’S A REGULAR hullabaloo and a fountain that decorates the bar counter. The piece enhances
beyond the seclusion of the Narain Niwas Palace compound in the air of masculinity as well as reminding visitors of that most
Jaipur. Modernity is relentlessly on the rise around its boundary royal of Indian pastimes, the great tiger hunt.
wall, and brash glass-fronted multistorey shopping complexes So much for the European influences. The Rajputs of Rajasthan,
and offices tower over an oasis of greenery. The palace, built in 1928 together with the Moguls, who originated from Turkic lands, had a
by General Amar Singh as his country retreat, retains a quality of passion for floral decorative motifs. Their love of miniature paint-
the past that is in fast retreat across many parts of the city. Tran- ing, particularly botanical studies, extended to the walls of their
quillity seems a spurious notion now that this location has be- palaces. So Marie-Anne commissioned local artist Vikas Soni to
come the heart of the new city. Narain Niwas has, at its centre, the paint the interiors with florals. He has been artful in avoiding
palace and an assortment of bungalows. These outbuildings are pastiche, however, giving the motifs that adorn the building’s
dispersed among beautiful mature trees in which cavalcades of interior – the arches, cornices and columns – a contemporary
peacocks and hens still roost at night. Their gorgeous plaintive feel. Soni’s curling arabesques and lively fountains of flowering
chorus reverberates at twilight through the umbrella of trees. shrubs are exuberant. Rather than using the traditional poly-
Italian expat Barbara Miolini is based chrome palate, they have gone for an
in Jaipur, where she runs a thriving busi- austere and graphic two-colour finish.
ness supplying the commercial fashion The consistent use of white on blue and
industry in Europe. She designed Bar blue on white harmonises the whole inte-
Palladio as somewhere she could take her rior and ensures a cool, refreshing mood
friends and clients for lunch or dinner. A to step into from the heat.
dream encouraged her to ask the current Each area of Bar Palladio has an ac-
incumbent of Narain Niwas Palace if she cent of its own. A spangled constellation
could take one of the bungalows. Having of brass jali lamps with perforated shades
begun her career in hospitality, Barbara enlivens the main area. The salon, a train-
had gained experience in various five- carriage-like room with a tented ceiling,
star establishments across Switzerland. acknowledges the historically nomad-
‘I wanted to bring my culinary heritage ic lifestyle of the Rajputs. Another room
in a pure form to Jaipur,’ she says. features a wall that cascades with bloom-
Having acquired one of the bunga- ing shrubs in bright blue on white, a clear
lows, with its mix of Edwardian and Raj- reference to the Mogul tradition of floral
put architectural elements, to create a patterning that emanated from the royal
social and food hub for both locals and court at Agra. The coup de maître, how-
visiting foreigners, Barbara approached ever, is Marie-Anne’s daring idea to com-
fellow European expatriate Marie-Anne mission botanical oil-painted canvases
Oudejans, an international jewellery like those by Audubon. They add to the
designer who works closely with Jaipur’s masculine aura that Barbara had envis-
renowned Gem Palace company, to be aged for the bar; undeniably quirky, they
her interior designer. ‘The project was are an unlikely pairing of the cerebral and
a pleasure from the start,’ says Marie- the exotic. The fluorescent cushions were
Anne. ‘Barbara gave me carte blanche, another masterstroke of counterintuitive
and I was comfortable with her concept inspiration. These neon flashes brilliant-
for the bar.’ Barbara had a definite idea of ly reinvigorate the floral block-printing
the ambience she wanted for the interior: ‘a gentleman’s club with tradition Jaipur has been famed for over the centuries. This irrever-
clear references to Rajasthan’s royal past, the regal era of the maha- ence is grounded by a counterpoint of functional blue-and-white
raja’. The words ‘grand’ and ‘masculine’ were both key. Further- ticking upholstery. For the hand-blocked fabrics Marie-Anne
more, Barbara expands, ‘Marie-Anne and I agreed that the interior commissioned the renowned Jaipur printer Gito, who is, appar-
must be decorative and reflect Rajasthan’s wall-painting heritage. ently, ‘meticulous in every way’.
The interior would have a dual purpose, to serve as a reminder of ‘I never intended to come to India and stay,’ explains Barbara,
the rich cultural language of the royal state, and to be enchanting.’ ‘but I fell in love with the country, particularly Rajasthan. It’s an
The huge marble planter on a table in the light-flooded en- intangible calling… Although I have no wish to push a feminist
trance, spotted in a marble workshop in the city, was a prime inspi- agenda, you do have to be courageous to build a business in India,
ration, says Barbara. Its grand scale lends the space gravitas, and especially as a woman and a foreigner.’ An infectious enthusiasm
the rams’ heads and acanthus leaves radiate Classical grandeur. masks her steely determination. We must be grateful that India,
Clearly the building already featured strong European architec- as only India can do, adopted her, and that she returned to her
tural elements, such as the balustrade, which marches along the roots in hospitality; she is soon to establish another Jaipur water-
roof at the front of the building. Additionally, the façade is made ing hole too: a café, due to open in July. Bar Palladio, meanwhile,
up of Gothic-flavoured glass-panelled doors crowned with dra- is proving hugely successful for her and Marie-Anne Oudejans
matic fanlights. To bolster the European look Marie-Anne intro- – an exuberantly contemporary celebration of tradition $
duced the chic floors of black-and-white-marble chequerboard, Bar Palladio, Narain Niwas Palace Hotel, Kanota Bagh, Narain Singh
a nod to Palladio. She also commissioned local carvers of that Rd, Jaipur, RJ 302004, India (00 91 141 256 5556; bar-palladio.com). ‘The
material to produce the dramatic panel of tigers, plantain trees Floral Patterns of India’, by Henry Wilson, is published by Thames & Hudson
222
An anteroom is (opposite), are
decorated with a painted in a
blue-on-white traditional Mogul
colour scheme, in style. Similar, more
contrast to the rest colourful examples
of the interiors. can be seen in
The riotous walls, the royal court at
reflected in a mirror the Red Fort in Agra
CREAM OF
CARAMEL
Bar requests for a cosy brown-and-ivory colour scheme,
a sumptuous four-poster and lots of storage, decorator
James McWhirter was given carte blanche when it came
to redesigning this tiny London bolthole. His resulting
confection – featuring biscuit-coloured walls of fine
parcel paper, choice chintzes and a fire grate that once
belonged to Syrie Maugham – really hits the sweet
spot, says Ruth Guilding. Photography: Tim Beddow
Opposite: in the tiny hallway hangs a collection of nine miniatures from India. In
an unusual deviation from the client’s brief for a brown-and-cream colour
scheme, the painted works have been mounted in dashing geranium-pink surrounds
232
233
inspiration
Some of the design effects in this issue, recreated by Augusta Pownall
234
7
11 12
235
inspiration
236
Interiors to include the contents of Pen Moel
Furniture, Paintings & Works of Art
Auction date: 1st & 2nd June 2016
info@dnfa.com | 020 3291 3539 | www.dreweatts.com
EXHIBITION diary
PHOTOGRAPHS: NOT VITAL (OPPOSITE); DAVID HRANKOVIC (THIS PAGE, TOP LEFT); KUNSTRAUM DORNBIRN (TOP RIGHT). ALL WORKS COURTESY NOT VITAL STUDIO
Opposite: House to Watch the Sunset, 2005, Aladab, Niger, mud and straw, 13m high. This page, top left: Big Stairs (39 steps with arrayan tree),
2008-14, on Not Vital’s island, NotOna, in Patagonia, Chile, marble and concrete. Top right: Let One Hundred Flowers Bloom, 2008, 100 stainless-steel lotus buds
Nicholas Herbert Ltd.
Fabrics & Wallpapers
faction of her clothes.’ Van Dyck’s sessions with the sitter lasted painted women who bought happily into this formula. Lely was
no more than one hour. Attention to clothing was paramount. very slick with the silks. (‘O how that glittering taketh me!’)
In the Bowes Museum – an ebullient French château posed sur- William Powell Frith’s The Fair Toxophilites of 1872 challenges
really, like a petticoat, in rugged County Durham photography with its overlapping figures, and
– there is a portrait by Van Dyck of Olivia, Mrs my goodness, these girls look dangerous. Their
Endymion Porter, lady-in-waiting to Queen silks and hats are as taut as the bow being flexed:
Henrietta Maria (1630). Set conventionally in Diana again, this time her predation a barely
an oval, her style is clearly dictated by her boss. contained hobby. What a relief to meet Luke
A newly acquired painting of c1637 is much Fildes’s warm, vibrant Annie Winifred Marsden-
bolder, the clothing daringly minimal. Our Smedley of 1900. In a return to the oval, Annie
well-connected heroine is set against a rocky has learned the skill of expensive simplicity; her
landscape, dressed in only a choker of pearls slight row of pearls the smallest imaginable, her
and a shift, with a length of black silk as its amor- bodice a modest but minimal flourish of lace
phous envelope. She looks away while moving and chiffon, clasped with a brief spray of roses.
at speed through her wilderness, this Diana of For those who might tire of this visual rus-
the Stuart court, relieved of her bow, quiver and tling, there is a neat conceptual inversion in
errant voyeur as prey. (That, indeed, is our role.) Rose English’s (yes) installation at the Harley
In The English Rose, fashion and showbiz are Gallery near Worksop (until 5 June). Inspired
centre stage. Gainsborough’s Mrs Sarah Sid- by Country Life beauties, young women in a uni-
dons sits in imperious profile, elaborately par- form of aprons, tails, bridles and hoof-heels
celled up in bands of silk and lace with a drift ‘perform’ an inseparable relation between fe-
of fur. Elizabeth and Mary Linley, disarmingly male beauty and equestrian choreography; sex
slight in their wispy lace frocks, were profes- and provocation decorously held in check. The
sional singers, and Elizabeth married Richard English rose has many petals. THE ENGLISH ROSE:
Brinsley Sheridan, who fought a duel for her FEMININE BEAUTY FROM VAN DYCK TO SARGENT runs 14
hand. Romney’s Emma Hart as Miranda contin- May-25 Sept, Mon-Sun 10-5 $ LINDSEY SHAW-
ues this trend in close-up. MILLER is a writer living in the Mendips
Top left: George Romney, Emma Hart as Miranda, 1785-86, oil on canvas. Top right: Anthony van Dyck, Portrait
of Olivia, Mrs Endymion Porter, c1637, oil on canvas. Above: John Laver y, Hazel in Black and Gold, 1916, oil on canvas
12 PRINT + 12 FREE DIGITAL EDITIONS + FREE GIFT*
True and Pure: Frank Dobson and Eric Gill Drawing From Life
DANIEL KATZ GALLERY Hill St, London W1
British sculptor Frank Dobson (1886-1963) is hardly a household Reclining Nude with Mediterranean Window is one of the finest
name, one all too easily confused with the Royalist painter William British drawings of the 1920s. It’s a variation on Velázquez’s
Dobson (1611-46). But he was a rising star of the 1920s and highly Rokeby Venus, with the lithely pneumatic nude seen from behind,
praised by the Bloomsbury critics Roger Fry and Clive Bell. This buttocks looming largest, and with an enigmatically rippling
exhibition at Daniel Katz invites us to look again at his sculp- window substituting for Venus’s misty mirror. What makes the
tures and especially at his revelatory life drawings of the female drawing so compelling is the way Dobson has selectively dap-
nude. The show has been devised as a face-off (or, rather, bottom- pled her with dirty green shadows, as though this were a stone
off) with Dobson’s more famous contemporary Eric Gill, and the garden sculpture caressed by lichens and moss. These polarities
former emerges as a more substantial figure – in every sense. – flesh or stone? warm or cold? – are explored in his
It comes with a good catalogue, including an essay by Gill sculptures too, and they give his reclining figures
scholar Judith Collins. an independent life of their own.
Dobson was born in London, the son of a commer- These are rare survivals. After Dobson’s death
cial artist who designed greetings cards. At art school his widow embarked on a holocaust that was wit-
he studied painting and drawing, and was heavily nessed by the late Brian Sewell: ‘I was appalled
influenced by French art, both the old masters and the at the destruction that she wrought, smashing
avant-garde. He was a devotee of life drawing, and to smithereens small clay and terracotta mod-
adored the line works of Ingres as well as the red- els, tearing fine drawings in red and black chalk,
chalk compositions of French Rococo artists, while hundreds of them, burying the fragments in a
his early paintings were much influenced by Cézanne dustbin, all because the subjects were erotic.’ She
and Gauguin. Dobson began carving before World also burned drawings, ‘as explicit as any by his old friend
War I, and in the 1920s responded to the Neoclassicism Eric Gill’, accepting ‘no argument that they were fired
of the French sculptor Maillol, who became a friend. by a quality not to be found in the “pure essence” of the
Roger Fry believed his work to be ‘true and pure’ torsos that survive’. Now at least we can judge for
but seriously underestimated its eroticism. ourselves. TRUE AND PURE: FRANK DOBSON AND ERIC GILL
Many of the drawings incorporate water- DRAWING FROM LIFE runs 24 May-24 June, Mon-Fri
colour and gouache, and Collins rightly ad- 9-6 $ JAMES HALL is the author of ‘The Self-Portrait:
mires their chromatic richness. In this group, A Cultural History’ (Thames & Hudson)
243
EXHIBITION diary
1
1 Uncanny valley – LONDON OSBORNE SAMUEL BRUTON ST, W1 Until 4 June. Mon-
Stephen Shore, ANNELY JUDA FINE ART DERING ST, W1 Until 24 June. Fri 10-6, Sat 10-2. British prints 1914-64, includ-
Bellevue, Alberta, Mon-Fri 10-6, Sat 11-5. Table-top artwork by ing Grosvenor School linocuts and early lith-
August 21, 1974, Anthony Caro: little bronzes and stoneware ographs by Moore and Lanyon.
at Parasol Unit. ‘book’ sculptures. Plus, François Morellet’s PANGOLIN LONDON YORK WAY, N1 13 May-9 July.
2 Red planet – neons and geometric canvases. Mon-Sat 10-6. Exterior angle: an indoor garden
Mona Hatoum, BARBICAN ART GALLERY SILK ST, EC2 Until 19 June. displays outdoor sculpture by Lynn Chad-
Hot Spot III, 2009, Mon-Wed, Sat, Sun 10-6, Thurs, Fri 10-9, bank hols wick, Ann Christopher and others.
at Tate Modern. 12-6. Pictures of Britain by international pho- PARASOL UNIT WHARF RD, N1 Until 19 June. Tues-Sat
3 No oil painting – tographers. See April issue. Until 10 July. Mon- 10-6, Sun 12-5. Seven photographers who cap-
Minna Keene, Wed, Sat, Sun 11-8, Thurs, Fri 11-9, bank hols 12-8. ture or create (by manipulating or computer-
Decorative Study No.1, Imran Qureshi’s exquisite miniatures glow in generating) a peculiar atmosphere.
Pomegranates, the darkness of the Curve Gallery. SARAH MYERSCOUGH BRICK LANE, E1 10-30 June.
c1906, at Tate Britain. BRUNEI GALLERY AT SOAS THORNHAUGH ST, WC1 Tues-Sat 10-6. Strings of pearls form nooses or
2 Until 25 June. Tues, Wed, Fri, Sat 10.30-5, Thurs chains in Maisie Broadhead’s (WoI June 2009)
10.30-8. Tie-dyed and time: live demonstra- photographic constructions that delve into
tions by master weavers animate a 200-piece the codes of 17th-century portraiture.
exhibition of ikat textiles new and old. SIMON LEE GALLERY BERKELEY ST, W1 13 May-18
CAMDEN ARTS CENTRE ARKWRIGHT RD, NW3 Until 5 June. Mon-Sat 10-6. Brooklyn-based Sarah Crow-
June. Tues, Thurs-Sun 10-6, Wed 10-9. Films, books ner covers the walls and floor with a celadon-
and stage design by avant-garde Polish poly- green mural and glazed white pentagonal tiles
maths Franciszka and Stefan Themerson. as settings for her stitched canvases.
Plus, Karl Holmqvist’s text-based art. TATE BRITAIN MILLBANK, SW1 Until 29 Aug. Mon-
CONNAUGHT BROWN ALBEMARLE ST, W1 Until 3 July. Sun 10-6. British conceptual art in a nutshell.
Mon-Fri 10-6, Sat 10-12.30. European postwar 11 May-25 Sept, the relationship between the
abstraction inspired by organic forms and first photographers and the painters of the
the landscape, featuring Jean Arp, Roger time, from a shared admiration for certain
Bissière, Roger Hilton and Serge Poliakoff. models to stereographic restagings of pop-
FLOWERS KINGSLAND RD, E2 18 May-25 June. Tues- ular pictures such as The Death of Chatterton.
Sat 10-6. South Korean artist Boomoon’s pho- TATE MODERN BANKSIDE, SE1 Until 12 June. Mon-
tographs of Skógafoss in Iceland are closely Thurs, Sun 10-6, Fri, Sat 10-10. Curtain call for a
3 4 cropped and horizontal in format, defying show connecting performance art and pho-
the scale and height of the waterfall. tography. Until 21 Aug, the body and the home
FOUNDRY GALLERY OLD CHURCH ST, SW3 1-10 June. as prisons or conflict zones are key concerns
Mon-Fri 10-5. Cuts both ways: exploring mul- of Palestinian artist Mona Hatoum. 1 June-6
ticultural exchange and identity, London- Nov, Bhupen Khakhar’s lyrical, often fantasti-
based artist Hormazd Narielwalla assembles cal landscapes, sketchbooks of erotic water-
his collages using French dress patterns and colours and misshapen ceramics.
motifs from traditional Indian printmaking. V&A CROMWELL RD, SW7 Until 3 July. Mon-Thurs, Sat,
HAMPTON COURT PALACE HAMPTON COURT WAY, Sun 10-5.45, Fri 10-10. Imitation game: Botticelli
KT8 Until 4 Sept. Mon-Sun 10-6. Long forgotten paintings reinterpreted by artists, film-makers
in the stores of the State Hermitage Museum and designers. Plus, Paul Strand. See feature,
in St Petersburg, John Spyers’s watercolours page 106. Until 12 March, smalls-minded: a
of the palace gardens in Capability Brown’s revealing history of underwear.
day go on public display for the first time. WELLCOME COLLECTION EUSTON RD, NW1 Until 31
JEWISH MUSEUM ALBERT ST, NW1 Until 19 June. July. Tues, Wed, Fri, Sat 10-6, Thurs 10-10, Sun 11-6.
Mon-Thurs, Sat, Sun 10-5, Fri 10-2. A history The Wellcome has got its cerebral cross-
of London tailoring, charting the suc- disciplinary exhibitions down to a fine art
5 cesses of Jewish immigrants such as – so much so that they’re staging two at
4 Old soul – Jain Montague Burton and Moses Moss. once. An ‘acoustic journey’ into the
painted textile, at Until 29 Aug, Dorothy Bohm’s pho- human voice features audio elements,
the Wellcome. tographs of 1960s London. manuscripts, medical illustrations
5 Bowled over – MARIAN GOODMAN LOWER JOHN ST, and ethnographic objects. Until 16 Oct,
Edith Lawrence, The W1 Until 4 June. Tues-Sat 10-6. Ettore explore the outer reachers of con-
Cricket Match, Spalletti’s installations of multi-panel, sciousness, via Francis Crick’s Plasticine
1929, at Osborne single-colour paintings, hung flush with brain, floating souls and lurking night-
Samuel. 6 Capable the walls or jutting into space. mares by Blake and Fuseli, and excerpts
hands – a John NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY ST MARTIN’S from The Cabinet of Dr Caligari.
Spyers watercolour, PLACE, WC2 Until 26 June. Mon-Wed, Sat, WHITE RAINBOW MORTIMER ST, W1 18 May-
1778, at Hampton Sun 10-6, Thurs, Fri 10-9. Russia’s cultural 18 June. Tues-Fri 12-6, Sat 12-5. Photographs
Court. 7 Fancy pants colossi loom large in late 19th-century by Shigeo Anzaï of fellow artists and art
– 1950s display portraits on loan from Moscow’s State performances during travels in Europe
figure, at the V&A Tretyakov Gallery. and the USA in the 1980s and 90s.
6
7
244
EXHIBITION diary
1
OUTSIDE LONDON EXETER ROYAL ALBERT MEMORIAL MUSEUM 14 May- 1 Meissen easy –
BATH AMERICAN MUSEUM Until 1 July. Tues-Sun 2 July. Tues-Sun 10-5. Sean Lynch’s latest video detail of porcelain
12-5. Jeremiah Goodman’s deliriously roman- works, commissioned by Spacex, excavate brush handle, c1745-
tic room paintings, commissioned by the likes truths and half-truths about museum arte- 47, in New York.
of Rose Cumming and Carlos de Beistegui. facts. One film follows the recent proces- 2 Word of honour
THE HOLBURNE MUSEUM Until 5 June. Mon-Sat 10-5, sion of a choir screen to the site of the friary – a Willem Sandberg
Sun, bank hols 11-5. Impressionist masterpieces whence it came – now a Debenhams. design for a library
from British public collections. HARROGATE 108 FINE ART 14 May-4 June. Mon-Fri catalogue cover,
BEXHILL ON SEA DE LA WARR PAVILION Until 4 Sept. 1-4, Sat 10-5. Kenneth Wood, who died this 1957, in Bexhill.
Mon-Sun 10-5. Willem Sandberg (1897-1984) March aged 95, did everything from carving 3 Uncommon curtsy
was a hands-on director of the Stedelijk Mu- marionettes to house-sharing with Edward – Edgar Degas’s
seum in Amsterdam – to the extent that he Bawden on the banks of the Tigris. The focus pastel over monotype
painted the whole place white. He also trans- here is on his irrepressible landscapes and Dancer Onstage
formed the collections, curated major shows, designs for the British Embassy in Baghdad. with a Bouquet,
designed the posters and catalogues –and his HENLEY-ON-THAMES BOHUN GALLERY Until 4 June. c1876, in New York.
wartime activities attest that he was also a bit Tues-Sat 10-1.15 & 2.15-5, Sat 10-5. Pieces of Piper: 2
of a hero. His work, surveyed here, was char- ‘Eye and Camera’ collages, ‘Foliate Head’ tap-
acterised by torn-paper shapes, blurring, lay- estries and collaborations with potter Geoff-
ering and a De Stijl palette. rey Eastop are juxtaposed with English ar-
CANTERBURY THE BEANEY Until 19 June. Mon-Wed, chitecture subjects. See Chichester.
Fri, Sat 9-5. Thurs 9-7, Sun 10-5. Flicker tag: eight NOTTINGHAM NEW ART EXCHANGE Until 19 June.
artists respond to the magic lantern. Mon, Thurs, Sat, Sun 11-6, Tues, Wed 11-7, Fri 11-9.
CHICHESTER PALLANT HOUSE Until 5 June. Tues, Wed, Fore! Play a round of mini-golf on a course
Fri, Sat 10-5, Thurs 10-8, Sun, bank hols 11-5. Clare designed by ten contemporary artists.
Woods’s paintings paired with plaster sculp- PADDOCK WOOD MASCALLS GALLERY Until 25 June.
tures by Des Hughes. Until 12 June, John Piper Tues-Thurs 10-5, Fri, Sat 11-4. Leon Morrocco’s
textiles. See Henley. Plus, a Craftspace/Outside big impasto paintings of Thames waterways.
In touring show of craft by makers margin- WALSALL NEW ART GALLERY Until 24 July. Tues-Sat
alised by their circumstances – or by choice. 10-5, Sun 12-4. A less romantic, more nuanced
No doubt, you’ll all be wanting one of Erkki picture of the sea emerges from a group show
Pekkarinen’s woven birch-bark suits. (Gilman, Ravilious, William Scott and Bob & 3
CHIPPING CAMPDEN COURT BARN MUSEUM Until Roberta Smith, among others) exploring the
5 June. Tues-Sun 10-5. A private collection of ocean as a site of conflict and loss. Until 11 Feb
Winchcombe pottery by Michael Cardew. 2017, Tate loans are teamed with related works
COMPTON WATTS GALLERY Until 5 June. Tues-Sun from the collection of Epstein’s wife Kathleen
11-5. Paintings by Pre-Raphaelite model- Garman and her friend Sally Ryan.
turned-artist Marie Spartali Stillman, includ- FRANCE PARIS MUSEE D’ORSAY Until 17 July. Tues,
ing some charming views of Kelmscott. Plus, Wed, Fri-Sun 9.30-6, Thurs 9.30-9.45. How Henri
Watts landscapes: Surrey, Egypt, the Alps. Rousseau’s interpretation of academy paint-
DERBY DERBY MUSEUM & ART GALLERY Until 12 ing came to be hailed as the height of mod-
June. Tues-Sat 10-5, Sun 12-4. Follow Joseph ernity. Picasso was especially taken with Le
Wright on his jolly to Italy in 1773-75 as part Douanier’s portraits of nasty children. Until
of the ‘Grand Tour’ season of exhibitions 11 Sept, neglected Romantic Charles Gleyre.
across Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire. ITALY MILAN MOSHE TABIBNIA Until 2 July. Tues-Sat
EAST WINTERSLOW NEW ART CENTRE, ROCHE COURT 10-7. Admire an array of 15th- to 19th-century
14 May-24 July. Mon-Sun 11-4. How to explain the carpets, in paintings and in person. 4
soaring popularity of clay as medium, espe- JAPAN TOKYO 5-1-3 KOJIMACHI, KIOICHO Until 19 5
cially given the closure of so many of the rel- June. Tues-Sun 10-8. Case study: a pop-up stop 4 Pencil pusher
evant art-school courses? This show unites for this travelling show of Louis Vuitton’s – work by Dalton
seasoned producers of ceramic works with trunk and bag archive (WoI March 2016). M. Ghetti, in
younger artists such as Jesse Wine, a sculptor USA NEW YORK THE FRICK Until 5 June. Tues-Sat Chichester. 5 Tiny
at the RCA who ‘discovered’ clay while study- 10-6, Sun 11-5. One hundred Van Dyck por- terror – Henri
ing in New York. traits. 24 May-28 May 2017, a Rousseau, Child
EDINBURGH SCOTTISH NATIONAL jaw-dropping collection of with Doll, 1892, in
GALLERY Until 12 June. Mon-Wed, Meissen porcelain is accom- Paris. 6 Blue
Fri-Sun 10-5, Thurs 10-7. Rare panied by new work in the supporter – Amedeo
lithographs of a ‘beautiful medium by Arlene Shechet. Modigliani,
dream’ nurtured by Prussian MOMA Until 24 July. Mon-Thurs, Caryatid, c1912-14,
architect and planner Karl Sat, Sun 10.30-5.30, Fri 10.30-8. in Walsall. 7 Paws
Friedrich Schinkel: unreal- Degas’s radical use of mono- for thought –
ised designs for two stupidly type printing to capture eve- James Rigler, Blue
lavish royal palaces in Athens rything from weather effects Feet, 2015, in
and the Crimea. to the play of electric light $ East Winterslow
6
7
245
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259
JOURNAL OF AN UNDERWATER SCULPTOR
For over ten years I have been submerging permanent works of art
beneath the surface of our oceans. The sculptures themselves range
from huge crowds of life-size figures to botanical gardens and build-
ings; immortalised snapshots of mundane life in a new alchemic
surrounding. The installations are designed with both a practical
agenda – to help revitalise marine life; and an artistic one – to con-
vey a sense of hope in the regenerative power of our oceans.
Today I am documenting white calcareous tubular worms. Hav-
ing recently installed a museum on Lanzarote’s seabed, I am inter-
ested to see how each sculpture has been colonised, and whether
the aim of the art museum/conservation project is being fulfilled.
The day looks promising, though the water is cold. I dive alone;
it’s not the recommended practice but I concentrate better that way
and I carry a spare air tank in case of emergencies. I use an enriched
type of oxygen, which also helps cure the odd hangover.
The site was barren three months ago; I want to see how quickly
the sea has assimilated the artworks. On my last visit I found an
octopus living on a sculpture’s leg, an angel shark buried in the
silt, and thousands of juvenile glassfish in the branches of a ‘tree’,
but today it’s the worms that have got me fired up. This particular
species builds a protective skeleton round its fragile body, encrust-
ing other surfaces (in this case, those of my sculptures) with a veil of
white lace as it goes. It’s a patina no sculptor could ever dream up.
My job can be quite surreal. While one day is spent checking
worms, the next may involve making plaster casts of members of
the public, filling the empty spaces they leave behind with marine
cement before then crossing over to the parallel world beneath
the waves to install and document them. Just as this variation has
afforded me some incredibly rich experiences, I have also been
faced with my fair share of challenges. My current task, for in-
stance, is working out how to move over 200 tons of grey concrete
stone from a second-storey studio across one mile of open ocean
and then 14 metres down to the seabed – safely.
Each sculpture can take a few years to finish, so I feel sad when
they finally leave the studio. But though they will never be quite
the same again, they will hopefully be enriched, inundated with
sea life. I imagine it feels quite like when one’s children leave home.
However, just like a proud father, I get to visit them and watch
them change, although having completed over 800 sculptures in
various parts of the world it’s hard for me to get quality time with
them these days. Some of my favourites are the first pieces I ever
made, in Grenada in 2006. Here, a nutrient-rich current passes
close by, which has led to a barrage of tropical sponges attaching
to the sculptures’ heads. They are of the deepest colours I have ever
seen; the reds are so bright they confuse the sensor on my camera,
and the flesh of the sponges is integrated with a network of translu-
cent capillaries, which somehow makes them look even more alive.
Seeing a community of statues in the middle of the vast blue
ocean makes me realise how fragile humanity really is. As we urban-
ILLUSTRATION: HARRY TENNANT
260
JET SET WALLCOVERINGS
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