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ANTICLOCKWISE FROM TOP Aluminium and
steel ‘Director’s Girlfriend’ light by Erwin Wurm.
‘Daybed’ by Rachel Whiteread for SCP covered
in ‘Tiree’ by Bute. White marble, black Belgian
marble and blue agate ‘Iceberg Bench’ by
Marc Quinn (also bottom right)
NOVEMBER 2015 HOUSEANDGARDEN.CO.UK
hen it comes to interiors, most people
believe art belongs on a wall. Or
perhaps a well-placed shelf or cabinet.
Yet artists are getting impatient with
such a straightforward approach.
W These days a rug, table, chair, kitchen-
ware, shelves and wallpaper can all be considered artworks.
‘If you want a golden rule that will fit to everybody, this is
it: have nothing in your house that you do not know to be use-
ful, or believe to be beautiful.’ This well-known quote was
uttered by William Morris in 1880 during a lecture at the
Royal Birmingham Society of Artists on ‘The Beauty of Life’.
This artist, writer, designer, and socialist believed that art
was a human necessity rather than a luxury. His philosophy
was rooted in the interior of his Red House in Kent.
In the decades that have followed Morris’s proclamation,
artists have continued to explore the intersection of art and
homes. From the Bloomsbury Group to constructivists,
Futurists to Pop art, artists have been drawn to realise their
ideas in interior design. Donald Judd’s handmade wooden
furniture manifested the precise minimalism he applied to
his sculpture and installation in the Nineties. The brightly
patterned and woven chairs created in the early 2000s
by Austrian artist Franz West (1947–2012) had the playful
interaction found in his sculptures. Today is no different. The
past decade has seen a rising enthusiasm from contemporary
artists to create for interiors.
The Young British Artists, in particular, seem to have a soft
spot for homeware. Some results have been more successful
than others. The brutality of Rachel Whiteread’s cast sculp-
tures were translated into a daybed for SCP. Although in
pastel colours, there is something tomb-like about these
reclining monoliths. Entering a room covered in Sarah
Morris’s graphic wallpaper collection for Artware feels like
stepping into an Eighties sci-fi fantasy. Not very restful.
For Carpenters Workshop Gallery, Marc Quinn applied his
work into a range of garden furniture in the form of carved
marble chairs and tables inlaid with ming, blue agate, green
malachite and red diaspro. Anish Kapoor even designed a
rather odd tear-shape table lamp for Homebase.
Interior artworks function best when they resonate with an
artist’s wider practise. Erwin Wurm translated his Fat sculp-
tures into a brilliant series of lamps for Carpenters Workshop
Gallery with long metal blobs forming out of the lighting
stands. Sarah Lucas, who is representing Britain at this year’s
Venice Biennale, makes geometric seats and tables in concrete
that perfectly echo the grey plinths of her Nud sculptures.
CARPENTERS WORKSHOP GALLERY