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I post my daily inspiration & musings on art, beauty, color, design, fashion & anything visually arresting
derica cole washington
Art Designs Lifestyle
Sunday, January 20, 2013
Tuesday, January 15, 2013
Solange Knowles At Home
Photo: Paul Costello
Solange Knowles shared her home with Elle Magazine in August 2012. The trend-setting style darling is known for wearing bold prints, patterns and color. I was looking forward to seeing how her personal style transition into her personal space. Her Brooklyn home has a fresh and is surprisingly more neutral than I expected. White walls, wood floors and accents, pops of textures. But she makes up for her white walls with art work by Malick Sidibé. Sidibé's photograph titled Nuit de Noel hangs in the dining room. The artist is also a fan favorite of actress Hilary Swank, whose Manhattan home was featured in Elle Decor with Sidibé's Nuit de Noel hanging in her entry way.
(Hilary Swank's Home via Elle Decor) Photo: Simon Upton
Solange's home also includes artwork from local art fair finds. I'm glad to she her showcasing and support emerging artists. But I do wish we could have had a peak into her fabulous closet, maybe next time!
Photo: Paul Costello
I look forward to more accounts on her home as she builds her art collection and interior space.
Art Designs Lifestyle
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Material
"Material" Installation View
London-based fashion designer Duro Olowu's pop-up shop of fashion and art at Salon 94's Freeman Alley Gallery (February 08, 2012–March 31, 2012).
"Material" Installation View
Painting by Katherine Bernhardt
The exhibition presented a group of limited edition fashion and accessory designs from Duro's Spring 2012 collection as well as a selection of vintage and contemporary photography, textiles, contemporary art, furniture, music, books and objets trouvés.
"Material" Installation View
Alongside commissioned pieces by Paris-based jeweler Taher Chemirik, are paintings by Katherine Bernhardt and mirrors by renowned architect David Adjaye. For a full list of artists featured in show click here.
"Material" Installation View
"My work, like my eye, is certainly international in its aesthetic, offbeat yet focused. As such, I am always open to the surprise of the new, the technique and skill of the past and the ability of fashion and art to challenge preconceived ideas of taste and culture." - Duro Olowu
The combination of his Jamaican-Nigerian heritage and London upbringing contribute to his eclectic look that ignores preset boundaries of culture, geography and taste. Duro is also married to Thelma Golden, Director and Chief Curator at The Studio Museum in Harlem.
Interior Watercolors, 2011, watercolor on paper Bella Foster
I loved this show! The colors, textures, and prints of his designs against the backdrop of an assemblage of objects was like an amazing real-life inspiration board! Duro's collection of "material" culture highlights how much the world of art and design depend on each other.
Art Designs Lifestyle
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Sunday, January 13, 2013
“How to Organize a Room Around a Striking Piece of Art”
Interior: Monet's Blue Foyer, 2012 rhinestones, acrylic, oil, and enamel on wood panel
One of my favorite Brooklyn-based artists Mickalene Thomas recently had exhibition at Lehmann Maupin New York locations. The show explored interior views of personal narratives to domestic spaces. The work on view at 201 Chrystie Street gallery are inspired by various art historical sources ranging from 19th-century Hudson River School to artists like Romare Bearden, Henri Matisse, Édouard Manet and Claude Monet. Thomas specifically captured Monet’s gardens and home. She sourced images from the popular interior design anthology The Practical Encyclopedia of Good Decorating and Home Improvement. It was published in the early 1970s, a decade that has largely influenced her visual aesthetic. The anthology yielded stylish reproductions of brightly painted foyers, tiled kitchens, and wood-paneled living rooms which Thomas coupled and collaged with her own photographs, swathes of patterned textiles and blocks of pure color, and at times, glimpses of the landscape to render kaleidoscopic shifts in perspective. 
Interior: Blue Couch with Green Owl, 2012
rhinestones, acrylic, oil, and enamel on wood panel.
Thomas's exploration of interior design, art history and lifestyle in her new series paintings and installations are juxtaposed multi-layered planes almost Cubist in style, thick impasto paint for texture, dashes of her signature rhinestones on the canvas to produce a semi-three dimensional space. I was particularly drawn to this show because of the title of the exhibition and her show at the Brooklyn Museum (see before it closes January 20th!). The installations reminded me of set designs or period rooms I'd see at museums. Mickalene designed these "room" installations with collected possessions, decorated with personal emblems and props, shared books, photographs, records and textiles and best of all used original art works. I felt very connected to Mickalene through this show and wanted to experience more. I looked at this exhibit as a way of understanding complexity of personal identity and constructed environments. Our personalities and personal spaces tell a story of who we are, where we have been, and where we would like to be. They are a marker of our identities.rhinestones, acrylic, oil, and enamel on wood panel.
How to Organize a Room Around a Striking Piece of Art
Installation view
When I saw this show I immediately knew this would be me first post. Many industries, including the art world influence interior design, in turn these industries shape the individual and lifestyle. Installation view
Art Designs Lifestyle - Derica Cole Washington
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