6:50am Thursday 29th July 2010
By Theresa Thompson
Once upon a time there were stately homes and there were contemporary art galleries. You chose which to see on a given day. Things have changed not least ideas of curatorship. Mixing the contemporary with the traditional is no longer the surprise it once was.
Even so, wandering through the grand rooms at Waddesdon Manor, near Aylesbury, absorbing the plethora of art, the French furniture and fittings in this château built for pleasure by Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild from 1874, it was a surprise to come across a thoroughly modern sculpture — a giant cracked egg the colour of aquamarine lying on the floor of the conservatory.
It was hard to imagine it better placed. The sparkling mirror finish of Jeff Koons’s Cracked Egg (Blue) picked up on the veiled light of this airy space and threw the plants into delightfully recherché reflections.
Originally the sculpture, on loan to Waddesdon from a private collection, was destined for the Aviary, clearly a suitable setting, but I loved it as it was: simplicity surrounded by extravagance.
American artist Koons has made five versions of this sculpture in five different colours. The two-part stainless steel sculpture is part of his Celebration series, begun in 1994 with Balloon Dog, which mimics those balloons twisted into shape to make toys, inspired by Koons’s preoccupation with childhood and child-like consciousness.
The controversial Koons, eschewing typical standards of ‘good taste’ in art, commonly uses the most unexpected items as models for his sculptures, veering from vacuum cleaners to inflatable flowers, to giant red hearts, rabbits, or aluminium models of children’s pool toys.
The toy theme continues, though with a different root, in the chandelier hanging in the nearby Blue Dining Room. Neither traditional chandelier, nor the contemporary one you usually see hanging in this room, German lighting designer Ingo Maurer’s spectacular chandelier specially commissioned for Waddesdon in 2003, but instead, temporarily, the Esperança Lamp from cutting edge Brazilian designers Fernando and Humberto Campana.
The Brazilian duo’s working with Maurer in New York’s Museum of Modern Art originally sparked off their collaboration with Waddesdon.
Esperança means hope in Portuguese. The Esperança Lamp, made 2010, consisting of blown glass toy figures, top and bottom halves poking out from a white globe like a Sputnik, expresses a key theme of the brothers’ work, that of recycling and the resourcefulness of Brazilian daily life.
The Esperança figures are based on the fabric toys made by Brazilian women for sale on street stalls.
Humberto and Fernando live and work in Sao Paolo — “the largest informal recycling centre in the world,” says Fernando. Working together since 1983, they have an international reputation for innovative, lively designs inspired by their city’s colourful culture, not least the carnival. They also design for leading manufacturers, such as Edra and Alessi.
An immediate air of fun and excitement accompanies their work. Take the chairs around the dining table, for example. Flamboyant, technicolored (possibly uncomfortable), part of the ‘Sushi series’ of furniture designs, they are made out of slices of rolled up recycled lino, rubber and carpet over stainless steel frames — and looked improbably at home in this oh-so traditional room.
Over in the Coach House, Waddesdon’s contemporary art space opened last year, were more new Campana designs: chandeliers; amazing wall lights made of recycled pieces of broken glass from the Venini glass manufacturers in Murano, Venice (the brothers have a close working relationship with the Venini studio; the Campana family emigrated from near Venice to Brazil generations ago); and some extraordinary rattan furniture and hanging pod-like lights.
Both exhibitions run until October 31. Part of Waddesdon’s annual programme of contemporary art and design, they tie in with the National Trust’s new three-year-long partnership with Arts Council England, Trust New Art that aims to build links between the Trust and the contemporary arts and craft sector.
Mixing the old and the new worked well for me. But also well worth the 45-minute drive from Oxford to Waddesdon were the other exhibitions in the house: 300 Years of Meissen; Sèvres; Book and Bindings; and Buttons and Braids, the collections of Baroness Edmond de Rothschild.
For details and events go to waddesdon.org.uk
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