Tag Archives: Maurizio Cattelan

Design and Innovation

Eye On Design: Snake Upholstered Sofa and Chair By Maurizio Cattelan and Pierpaolo Ferrari

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Snake Sofa Installation View
Toiletpaper Paradise Installation View (All Photos By Gail)

Toiletpaper Paradise was an amazing, interactive art exhibit that was installed in the gallery at Cadillac House in Soho, NYC from February 9th to April 12th, 2017. The brains behind this fab happening are artist Maurizio Cattelan (whom you have read about previously on this rad blog) and his photographer partner Pierpaolo Ferrari. The exhibit, which was a surrealist wet dream of an apartment comprised of four rooms, was sponsored by creative media agency Visionaire and based on the duo’s image-heavy art publication, Toiletpaper Magazine.

Toiletpaper Paradise Signage

Because the exhibit — which was dubbed as being comparable to “Mad Men on Acid” — was so insanely Instagramable, it was always packed with Asian Millennials and, thus, virtually impossible to get any photos that didn’t include people literally crawling all over the various design items. Annoying!

Snake Chair 3

Through endless patience, I did manage to get decent shots of the crazy cool Midcentury sofa and armchair, both upholstered in fabric covered in lifelike images of many different writhing and colorful snakes. Fun!

Snake Sofa

The Spaghetti-patterned floors and wallpapers definitely detracted from the upholstery design, but that was obviously intentional.

Snake Chair 1

Really beautiful and comfortable as well!

Snake Chair 2

See photos of the full Toiletpaper Paradise Installation at Cadillac House at This Link!

Design and Innovation

Eye On Design: Maurizio Cattelan, America

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America 1
All Photos By Gail

Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan’s bold, irreverent work, America, skewers social complacencies and re-imagines cultural icons. On the occasion of the artist’s 2011 – 2012 retrospective at the Guggenhiem, which featured virtually every work he had ever made suspended from the oculus of the rotunda, Cattelan announced his retirements from art making. Continue reading Eye On Design: Maurizio Cattelan, America →

Arts and Culture

Maurizio Cattelan, Daddy, Daddy

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Daddy Daddy
All Photos By Gail

Daddy, Daddy (2008) by Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan, is a sculpture of Walt Disney’s Pinocchio that was originally conceived for the  Guggenheim Museum’s group exhibition, theanyspacewhatever (2008 – 2009). Cattelan installed the work in the fountain at the base of the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed rotunda, suggesting that hapless puppet has plummeted to his death from the ramps above and drowned.

Daddy Daddy Close Up

Though Disney’s Pinocchio eventually finds a happy ending through moral redemption, Cattelan’s puppet is titled with a filial cry for approval or protection that has apparently gone unanswered.

Daddy Daddy with Reflection

Photographed in the Guggenheim Museum on the final day of their Storylines Exhibit.

Storylines

Arts and Culture

Maurizio Cattelan’s All Retrospective at the Guggenheim

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It was a few weeks ago now, back on November 11, 2011, that I had my first in person experience with Italian-born artist Maurizio Cattelan’s most unusual retrospective exhibit, All, when I visited the Guggenheim that Friday evening for a live performance by the very excellent pop band, MGMT. The band performed a tight, 45 minutes set of mostly instrumental new material specifically inspired by the 128 separate works now suspended from the ceiling oculus of the museum’s rotunda. The songs fell very much within the surf-psychedelia vein of MGMT’s well-loved sound with a bit of a soundtrack vibe befitting the evening’s experiencing in general. Also, gee whiz, but what a spectacularly hallucination-inducing light show they had! I’m still having flashbacks. Music! Art!

The following week I had to pay another visit to the museum to take in All once again, because when I was there for the MGMT show I had a beer in my hand and the Art Nazis (guards) wouldn’t let me go up past the second ramp with a beer. And you really do need to trek all the way to the top of the ramp to fully experience the innumerable subtle nuances of this exhibit, which literally reveals itself further and further at every turn. The time lapse video above shows the installation process by the museum staff, which will answer your most pressing questions about “just how they got that stuff up there.” See it while you can.

Maurizio Cattelan’s All is on Exhibit until January 22, 2012 at the Guggenheim, Located at Fifth Avenue and 89th Street. Museum hours are extended to 7:45 PM on Monday and Tuesday nights (from 5:45 PM on other days) from December 6, 2011 to January 17, 2012. More information is available at This Link.

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