The four curators of the “Women and Speed” show: Maria Sukkar, Mollie Dent-Brocklehurst, Maryam Eisler and Angeliki Kim Perfetti

When Richard Mille, the super-luxury watch brand, asked LUX magazine to create an exhibition in their Mayfair boutique during London’s Frieze Art Fair, we engaged four female collectors-curators to create an original narrative around the topic of “Women and Speed”. But why does the subject feel like an unconventional – even contradictory – pairing? Woman have often been depicted as slow, pensive, gentle subjects in art. Meanwhile, the male subject has raced from the oil-painted battle scene to the quick flash of the photograph as they drive past in fast cars, with women the ever-bystander.

Our curators, Maria Sukkar, Maryam Eisler, Angeliki Kim Perfetti and Mollie Dent-Brocklehurst, challenged that narrative.

The result was a stunning and original show featuring works by artists including Tracey Emin, Marina Abramović and Mary McCartney, and including iconic works such as Warhol‘s polaroid of Blondie’s Debbie Harry and American artist Jordan Watson‘s depiction of a female racing driver. There were also celebrated works by the likes of Helmut Newton, Nassia Inglessis, Fernand Fonssagrives, Maryam Eisler, and a stunning digital artwork by Six N. Five.

Guests of the opening included the crème de la crème of the London and international collecting world.

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Linda Bassatne, Maria Sukkar, Jo Glynn-Smith, Dina Nasser Khadivi and Alice Harvey

Francesca Ariani and Chloë Lopez

Samantha Welsh, Angeliki Kim Perfetti, Maria Sukkar, Darius Sanai and Maryam Eisler in the Richard Mille flagship store on Old Bond Street where the art curation took place

Tim Jeffries and Maryam Eisler

Jordan Watson with his artwork “Fast and Futurist” and Mollie Dent-Brocklehurst, enjoying the George Condo issue of LUX

Megan Reynolds and Chloë Lopez

Maryam Eisler, Tim Jeffries, Rachel Verghis and Darius Sanai in front of the Mary McCartney work “Kate, Kate, Kate”

Jordan Watson and Tarka Russell

Darius Sanai, Maryam Eisler, Maria Sukkar and Katy Wickremesinghe

Jonathan Glynn Smith and Nick Sullivan

Nassia Inglessis, Margot Mottaz and Mollie Dent-Brocklehurst

Alexander James and Marcello Polito

Maryam Eisler, Michele Codoni, and Angeliki Kim Perfetti

Angeliki Kim Perfetti and Annabelle Scholar

The curators: Maria Sukkar, Maryam Eisler, Angeliki Kim Perfetti and Mollie Dent-Brocklehurst – with special thanks to Michael Hoppen, Tim Jeffries, Mary McCartney and Superblue.

Director: Darius Sanai, Editor-in-chief, LUX magazine

Some of Spirit Now’s London members during a meeting to decide the shortlist for the 2024 Prize, ahead of Frieze

An art prize awarded by some of London’s leading art collectors, in collaboration with Frieze Art Fair and the University of Cambridge, has announced Bambou Gili, Asemahle and Shafei Xia as its 2024 winners. Taya Suleyman reports

Bambou Gili, Asemahle Ntlonti, and Shafei Xia are the winners of the Spirit Now London Acquisition Prize announced at Frieze London. The prize, which celebrates emerging female artists of the age of 40 or below in collaboration with The Women’s Art Collection, was awarded by sixteen members from the Spirit of Giving Committee chaired by Marie-Laurie de Clermont-Tonnerre, founder and director of Spirit Now London, alongside Harriet Loffler, curator of The Women’s Art Collection.

Bambou Gili, announced as one of the winners, is known for her surreal, figurative oil paintings that reference art historical compositions but through a contemporaneous lens that employs esoteric tonal palettes. Reflecting on contemporary life, friendships, and interiority, Gili creates an imagined community of affection and care. With a palette of blues, greens, and turquoise, Legally Stev (2024) reflects Gili’s interest in observing intimate moments from afar.

Gili’s latest oil painting for Frieze, Legally Stev (2024), portrays a close confidante of the artist in a moment of quiet repose, capturing an intimate sense of rest and reflection

Asemahle Ntlonti took home the prize for her deeply expressive paintings, which emerge from building up and stripping away material. Her ancestral homeland in the Eastern Cape of South Africa is a source of inspiration as her work is filled with nostalgia and longing, painting cracked, mud-veined surfaces that evoke the land’s deep emotional resonance. Her paintings become a poignant inquiry into ancestry, history, and the search for belonging.

Working directly on the floor to fully engage her body in the process, Ntlonti gradually builds her pieces by instinctively layering and removing material as seen in this painting Uhambo (2024)

Multi-media artist, Shafei Xia was also named a winner. Drawing from the bold, sensual style of Japanese shunga and 19th-century Chinese erotic paintings, Xia explores the complex dimensions of love—its passion, jealousy, and even violence—through a lens of elegance and refinement. Her work celebrates female creativity, championing its diversity in all its forms.

Xia’s Fight and the Party (2024), watercolour on sandal paper, evokes a delicate balance between tension and harmony, capturing the intricacies of power dynamics, playfulness, and emotional intensity

A new chapter unfolds for the winners, whose works will soon be acquired and donated to The Women’s Art Collection at Murray Edwards College at The University of Cambridge, which aims to provide a platform for female artists in response to the ongoing underrepresentation of women in museums. Their work will join a collection of over 600 works, including those by notable artists such as Barbara Hepworth, Tracey Emin, and Lubaina Himid.

Within the realm of art and philanthropy, Spirit Now London is an exclusive international community comprised of art patrons, collectors, and friends. The organisation aims to support cultural institutions, promote women and emerging artists, as well as providing financial support for art exhibitions.

Members gain private access to exhibitions, intimate art events, and discussions that encourage thoughtful explorations of contemporary creativity. By facilitating connections among art lovers and cultural visionaries, Spirit Now London seeks to foster a vibrant community that champions emerging talent, enriches the cultural dialogue, and reshapes the narratives of contemporary art.

spiritnowlondon.com

Winner of Claridge’s first Royal Academy Schools Art Prize, the young performance artist Daria Blum has taken to their ArtSpace to point fingers at you – no, me – no, her. 

LUX Magazine: What is the significance of the pointed finger?

Daria Blum: The gesture of the pointed finger has appeared repeatedly within my work, and in this performance I was interested in investigating its multiple meanings through subtle changes in direction and tension, using it to claim attention, cast a spell, blame, or ‘point the finger’. The sculptural works in the show also reference this act of deflection through the use of the pop filters, which are used to deflect air from reaching the microphone when speaking or singing into it. The mic stand sculptures emphasise the absence of the voice, which is an important aspect within the exhibition — I’ve been thinking about the demand for (live) performance, within my own practice as a ‘performance artist’ but also within the arts more broadly, and even though I ultimately ‘give in’ by performing this piece, there is a reluctance to speak, to sing, to be perceived.

In her performance for the exhibition ‘Daria Blum: Drip Drip Point Warp Spin Buckle Rot’, Blum stares down the audience, slowly directing her pointed finger to each member.

After her live performance, Blum makes her way through the audience and slips out the door at the back. The performance then takes on a digital aspect, transporting the audience into new worlds.

Blum appears on screen, continuing to point her finger as she makes her way through an abandoned 1970s office building.

Blum’s performance takes place amongst her ‘Redeflect’ installations that combine microphones, stands, and digital prints.

Gilles Dyan, Chairman and Founder of the Opera Gallery Group, appointed Isabelle de La Bruyère as the Chief Executive Officer of Opera Gallery Group

Former Christie’s big shot Isabelle de la Bruyere recently joined global gallery behemoth Opera Gallery as Group CEO. From her swanky offices above London’s Bond Street, she speaks with LUX about her mission to take Opera Gallery, whose reputation has been carved from selling big-ticket secondary market works to the wealthy from its luxury retail locations, to another level

LUX: What made you take on this challenge?

Isabelle de la Bruyère: I have been following Opera Gallery and its expansion for the last twenty years and have always admired the Chairman’s vision for the group.

When I first moved to the Middle East for Christie’s, I realised how intimidating the art world was for clients who didn’t know it well. Gilles Dyan, who founded Opera Gallery in Singapore in 1994, understood this and built a business that was welcoming and accessible to art enthusiasts and collectors, with artworks of all price points. He always placed his galleries in the most luxurious shopping districts, and had a very personal, hands-on approach that clients truly appreciated. He made the art buying process easy and personable, and he has built a very loyal clientele who appreciate this approach.

The company has grown in the last fifteen years and the identity of the group has changed tremendously, but the engagement and commitment we have to our clients, and to anyone walking into the gallery, has not.

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LUX: How do you envision shaping Opera Gallery’s future, and what strategies do you plan to implement to distinguish it in the contemporary art landscape?

IB: I think Opera is already very well placed, but I’m focussed on organising more curated, museum-quality shows across our various galleries. I think it is very important to work with curators, critics and historians who can bring a different perspective and audience.

We recently organised a fantastic show in London entitled ‘The Whole World Smiles With You’, which was curated Alayo Akinkugbe, writer, curator, and founder of the Instagram account: @Ablackhistoryofart, and host of the “A Shared Gaze” podcast, which facilitates conversations with Black contemporary artists from across the globe.

The exhibition featured works by well-known artists such as Amoako Boafo, Chris Ofili, and Deborah Roberts, along emerging artists such as Jazz Grant, Thelonious Stokes, and Noel Anderson. Through her vision, the exhibition interrogated various modes of figuration by contemporary Black artists, and challenged the Western canon by overtly reconfiguring renowned paintings and portraying figures in poses reminiscent of pre-twentieth-century European portraiture.

This exhibition was an opportunity for us to engage with a contemporary dialogue in a more academic way and facilitate a dialogue between an incredible group of artists working in a range of mediums. In partnership with London Gallery Weekend, we hosted the recording of Alayo’s ‘A Shared Gaze’ podcast.

In addition to a more curated approach, Opera is championing its artists and Artist Estate Representation with its “Artist-Led Approach.” Our core mission is to champion each of Opera Gallery’s artists’ identities, capturing the attention of visitors, and encouraging a connection between the audience and the artworks.

We are working with and representing more contemporary artists than ever before, recently adding the likes of Anselm Reyle, Gustavo Nazareno, and the legendary London-based artist Ron Arad to our roster. It is a great honour for us to work with such talented creatives, and we want to continue to extend our family of artists with whom we work.

The Whole World Smiles With You – exhibition in London, cred. Eva Herzog

Contemporary artist Gustavo Nazareno in his studio

LUX: Opera Gallery interlinks household names in contemporary and near-contemporary art with very emerging and largely unknown artists. How do you navigate this dynamic interplay?

IB: Artists are influenced one way or another by the past and their predecessors. The masters we show, such as Picasso, Dubuffet, Warhol, Haring, or Soulages, have often been studied, admired or have impacted many of the contemporary artists we work with. Thus to me it makes sense to showcase some of the masters with appropriate contemporary artists who may have adapted some stylistic language or beliefs from their precursors. We do focus more than ever on curation, however, and it is important for us that our exhibitions are visually appealing, but also cater to our clients’ tastes and budgets.

An artwork by Jean Dubuffet

LUX: Do you have any ‘guilty pleasures’ in art?

IB: Having always worked in 19th & 20th-century art, I rarely got to meet artists and even less work with them. Since joining Opera, however, all that changed and I now get to learn about the artist’s process directly from them, and understand their work in a much more personal and passionate way, which isn’t necessarily a “guilty pleasure” but a pleasure nonetheless!

I recently travelled with Ron Arad to Washington, D.C. and revisited the Watergate Hotel, which he worked upon and created various works for, through his eyes. It was a marvellous experience and one that got me to understand the man, the creative, and his art more deeply.

The same can be said with Manolo Valdes or Gustavo Nazareno, who are two artists we work very closely with and who teach me about their work on a weekly, if not daily, basis. At the end, passion comes with knowledge and the more I learn, the more I appreciate!

Isabelle de la Bruyère with Israeli avant-garde designer and artist Ron Arad

LUX: Art and Purpose: do they come hand in hand?

IB: Absolutely. Of course the notion of ‘purpose’ can take many forms, but in the creative space, I believe that great artworks and artists lead with purpose and a strong point of view. To me, it’s this incisive approach to the expression of feeling, experience, and belief that is most impactful and intrinsically provides a space for dialogue and the exchange of ideas.

Read more: Art collector Andrea Morante talks on artist Sassan Behnam-Bakhtiar

I see creative expression as an essential part of human experience – seeing art that challenges us, or isn’t immediately obvious to us, makes us better empathisers, helps us think in different ways and in general enriches our lives and helps us keep an open mind to the world.

LUX: What is the biggest change the art world has seen since you joined Christie’s back in 1998?

IB: The greatest change is in the number of art collectors that buy artworks in the million-dollar bracket. When I first started in Christie’s Impressionist & Modern department, we had a list of one thousand clients that could spend at least one million dollars on a painting.

This number now seems ridiculously low in today’s world, and the number of art collectors and enthusiasts has grown with the globalisation and growing economies of the world. Collectors are no longer limited to a few families, but rather an expansive global base from all continents, each with the power to buy works in the seven figure range.

The world’s millionaire population has more than doubled in the last decade, and so has their interest in art, which has also become so much more accessible. There are more galleries, auctions, fairs, and private museums than ever before, which has helped foster new clientele.

We go where clients are nowadays, and Opera Gallery was one of the first art galleries to open up in Hong Kong, Dubai, Monaco and Aspen, as our founder understood the importance of being close to our clients. Globalisation of the art market has dramatically changed the way we work today, as well as the accessibility that has allowed for a more inclusive art world.

Opera Gallery London will be presenting an exhibition by Brazilian artist Gustavo from October 8th to November 9th, 2024.

www.operagallery.com

Cora Sheibani has been designing jewellery for over 20 years. Her pieces are almost exclusively made in Switzerland, Germany, Italy and France, by goldsmiths of the highest calibre

In our latest print issue, Ina Sarikhani writes about jeweller Cora Sheibani whose whimsically beautiful creations are the go-to for aesthetes in London.

Cora Sheibani is the best advertisement for her bespoke, colour-saturated jewellery. Voluble, and a vision with her brilliant red hair, she is eager to discuss her work, art-history references, technical production and gemology, but the eye is drawn to her striking smoky quartz, bronze and red-gold cuff. “I wear a big bracelet instead of high heels,” she explains.

Cora Sheibani has had jewellery exhibitions in many cities including London, Zurich, Geneva, Basel, St. Moritz, Paris, Copenhagen, Miami, Milan and New York

Her brand of exclusive is for every day as well as high days. The designer’s background is steeped in art. Andy Warhol, Jean-Michel Basquiat and Ettore Sottsass were represented by her art-dealer father and were family friends. When she was just four years old, she painted a canvas with Basquiat. Today it hangs in her hallway.

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This deep aestheticism is evident in her work, which has been exhibited from Miami to Milan. The collections, including Copper Mould, Clouds and Colour & Contradiction, are bold and cast in wild colour combinations. Think pink against fire opal; black onyx beads with slices of turquoise; gold butterfly earrings of garnets, peridots and heliodors.

Read more: LUX’s Artist in Residence – Annie Morris

She is renowned for jewelry that balances whimsy and sophistication, her designs feature playful motifs like clouds, pastries, and plant pots, alongside pieces with architectural and surreal elements.

This play of shape, colour and light is backed by exceptional craftsmanship, with collections made in Germany, Switzerland, Italy and France, and each edition is unique. The pieces are intended to be of their time. They are also ageless – sitting as easily on Sheibani’s daughter, Aryana, as on herself. They are also, of course, enduring. As the designer says, “Jewellery just has a longer shelf life than other design.”

corasheibani.com

Mercedes-Benz is demonstrating their new Mercedes-Maybach SL with a diverse brand experience at Pebble Beach Automotive Week 2024

LUX travelled to Monterey and Pebble Beach, to join Mercedes-Benz for the worldwide launch of the new Mercedes-Maybach SL 680, a super-luxe open-topped touring car aimed at bringing 1960s St Tropez glamour to a new generation of wealthy consumers. Fabienne Amez-Droz joined them in her best Hermès headscarf and Ray-Bans

The annual Monterey Car Week and the famous Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance attracts many car enthusiasts and some of the biggest automotive brands of the world. On the western edge of California, lounges from the most renowned car brands were set up and displayed some of their best and newest car models.

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Among them was the Mercedes-Benz Star Lounge, where visitors could admire various historic Mercedes-Benz cars. But it didn’t stop at just looking at cars – you could even borrow a vintage Mercedes and test it along Highway 1 towards Carmel Valley.

Sunny California seems like a good place to launch the V8 convertible Maybach car. The Monogram Series is launched in either White Ambience or Red Ambience specification

Driving the 1971 Mercedes 280 SL convertible, surrounded by California’s scenery and the not-so-well-functioning radio music, it felt like a little time travel, making me feel like I was in an old school music video – so much I had almost lost track of time.

Read more: Electric dream: Mercedes-Benz EQS 450 review

After all the impressions of the Mercedes Benz star lounge, the highly anticipated evening launch event took place. Mercedes-Maybach introduced its SL 680 Monogram Series, a luxurious two-seater convertible defined by intricate patterning and striking two-tone finishes.

The Mercedes team notes that driving the SL Monogram Series is as smooth and quiet as can be expected from a Maybach. A noise-optimized exhaust system and top-notch insulation make sure of that

The spectacle was held in an ultra-modern private house in the middle of Pebble Beach. What immediately caught my eye was the huge “car runway” in the garden of the house. At the start of the runway was a car, covered with a giant cloth.

Read more: Mercedes-Benz On The Art Of Creating Desire

After a few glasses of champagne and canapés, all the guests were called to the runway, where Daniel Lesco (Head of Mercedes-Maybach) and Michael Schiebe (Mercedes‑AMG ) heightened our anticipation for the car’s unveiling. They shared their vision for the new design and explained “what makes a Maybach a Maybach.”

Inside the car, drivers can expect a luxurious interior – It is covered in crystal white nappa leather. Other unique touches include a Maybach-branded steering wheel, stainless-steel pedals, and custom door sill trims

Finally, the new Mercedes-Maybach SL was revealed, driving down the runway. Its two design concepts, “Red Ambience” and “White Ambience,” set the tone for Mercedes Maybachs new level of luxury. While many Maybach owners favor classic designs, others prefer a more flamboyant display of their wealth, as Daniel Lescow says, “Customers who buy this car know that it is a statement car and they want that. We wanted to combine top technology, comfort and luxury”.

The car’s designs took inspiration from high-end, logo-covered handbags. The goal was to achieve a similar aesthetic by offering an optional hand-painted logo pattern on the hood and rear of the Monogram Series.

The hood, featuring the Mercedes star, also comes with an optional hand painted Maybach pattern in graphite grey and the headlights are covered with rose gold accents

The car comes with a special illuminated Maybach grille, headlights with rose gold details and 21-inch wheels. Even though the Maybach is a sports car, it is quite comfortable and drives quietly. With the push of a button you can drive more dynamically up to 260 km/h.

The interior of the car is trimmed in Crystal White Nappa leather. It has a Maybach-specific 3-spoke steering wheel, stainless steel door sills and pedal set. The dashboard is dominated by a massive OLED touchscreen, blending luxury with futuristic digital control, which can seem complicated in the beginning but once you have figured it out, it can do nearly anything you want. The MBUX system allows for voice commands and some of the advanced driver-assistance tools make long roadtrip drives more relaxing.

The Maybach SL680 Monogram Series will arrive in Europe first ahead of other markets. That’ll be in spring 2025, in time for next year’s car week

All quite something, and all the car you’ll need for wafting between Pampelonne Beach and Portofino, or indeed Pebble Beach and Newport Beach, next summer. Just don’t forget the Hermès headscarf and Beach Boys cassette. Wait, there’s no cassette deck? Oh well, no car can be perfect.

www.mercedes-benz.co.uk

Each issue, LUX invites an artist to take up residence and create a work exclusively for us. London-based sculptor and multimedia artist, Annie Morris takes up the challenge

“Drawing helps me explain the things in my life that I find hard to talk about” – Annie Morris

www.anniemorris.com

Daniel Arsham sitting with a bottle of Moët & Chandon before his 280th anniversary monumental relief sculpture

American artist Daniel Arsham sculpts a monumental relief in celebration of the 280^th anniversary of Moët & Chandon, aligning the present-day champagne house with a classical history of prestige and grandeur.

French champagne house Moët & Chandon unveils Collection Impériale Création No. 1 through a monumental sculptural relief created by the New York based contemporary artist Daniel Arsham. Inspired by his personal tour of the Moët & Chandon estate in Épernay, France, Arsham drew from the neoclassical architecture, busts, and faux columns to reimagine the Moët & Chandon bottle.

One of the eighty exclusive bottles that Arsham designed for Moët & Chandon, inspired by their estate

Arsham’s final creation is quite a striking, wall-mounted plaster-cast sculpture, monumental in scale. It feels as if it were recovered from the ruins of an ancient civilization, evoking a sense of mystery and history akin to ancient spolia. Yet, ‘Moët & Chandon’ appears in the place of etched Latin. Interspersed throughout the piece are clusters of grapes, a nod to the vineyards surrounding the estate; a wooden wine barrel, referencing the craft of winemaking; and images of the estate, woven into the relief.

In a rather grandiose gesture, the goddess Pheme, the personification of fame and renown, blasts her trumpet. Arsham cleverly intertwines the brand’s present-day prestige amongst fashion-house-drinkers with the grandeur of antiquity, creating an emblem of the enduring reputation of Moët & Chandon.

Cleo Scott

Douglas Abdell has emerged from obscurity in a striking exhibition at Ab-Anbar Gallery, London. In conversation with LUX, Abdell, a prominent artist of the 1970s and 80s, meditates on medium and language as he makes his comeback.

An intriguing new exhibition in London brings together two decades of work by Douglas Abdell, an American sculptor and painter with Lebanese and Italian roots. Abdell was a prominent artist in the 1970s and 80s before moving to Spain, where he continued to work in relative obscurity for the next thirty years. The Ab-Anbar Gallery in Fitzrovia weaves together his calligraphic signs, symbols, and alphabets through space and time. This interplay of sculpture and painting from the Málaga-based artist creates a mesmerising field of deconstruction and reconstruction of languages, cultures, and imagination. He speaks to LUX about his past, present and future.

View of Douglas Abdell: Intervalism and Other Mathematics
Left to right: 8 to 9 Key Interval Of Oscillation, 1986; 5 Window, 1984; Intervalists Pitch Fork, 1985

LUX: This exhibition features your work from the 1970s until today. How has your work developed thematically, visually, and intentionally over the last few decades?

Douglas Abdell: The main floor of the exhibition shows work from 1968 until 1989. This includes work from my Yad, Kryad, Phoenaes, and Intervalist painting and sculpture. You can also see a bronze sculpture from my Fourth Punic War period, and a bronze sculpture from 1968, which can be broke down to a surrealistic biomorphic with motoristic construct.

On the basement floor there is a room with an Aekyadic Wall Work, several Aekyadic Drawing works, and a fantastic collage wall made by Salman, dealing with my life from childhood to the present. The exhibition features films from different periods of my work, and in another room, there is a documentary of my work being played continually.

LUX: How does your sculptural work relate to your painting, both in this exhibition and your broader practice?

DA: The basis of my sculpture comes from drawing, and sometimes the drawing leads to a painting. The Intervalist paintings in the exhibition came before the Intervalist Sculpture. In making the paintings I realized that some of the forms and structures that I was painting would be more dynamic as sculpture.

From left to right: Bitia vs. Pergamon, Hannibal, 1987; Beirut Phoenaes, 1985

LUX: Why was it important for you to exhibit within Ab-Anbar Gallery?

DA: Ab-Anbar presented me with a concept of an exhibit which showed a profound study of different periods of my work and that impressed me.

LUX: Does your work relate to your American, Lebanese, and Italian identity?

DA: Growing up in a family with ancestors from Lebanon and Italy has had a substantial influence on my person. Both families were proud of their heritage and would teach me about their histories. Italian, Arabic and English were being continually spoken in our household.

Douglas Abdell, Phoenaes Drawings PHRAENN-FHRAEN-FRAE, 1981

LUX: What is the relationship of language to the social and political issues that you explore in your work?

DA: I would say that growing up in a family with different languages spoken has automatically put me in a linguistic position which has transformed into what I best know, and what I feel compelled to do: my natural calling as a Sculptor. This is sometimes manifested in a conscious activity to analyse and reconstruct a political reality.

LUX: Why do you choose visual media to explore language? Why do you prefer it over, say, spoken word?

DA: I would say that I have a profound need to visually realise my thinking. It’s like I have a tremendous need to fill a profound void – a type of black space which haunts me. I must activate structures, phonetic activities manifested, for example, in my Phoenaes Paintings and Intervalist sculptures. I am now consumed and totally dominated with my Aekyadic work, which can be seen a bit in the basement room. Aekyadism is a Language, read it…

Cleo Scott 

View of recreated Douglas Abdell studio, with collage by Salman Matinfar

The Director of London’s Design Museum, Tim Marlow is a celebrated figure in both design and art and an often outspoken authority on both. Samantha Welsh brings Marlow together with South Asian art flag bearer and philanthropist Durjoy Rahman, whose commercial business focusses on textile design and production, for an insightful and sometimes feisty exchange

LUX: What is the relationship between design and art?

Tim Marlow: Designers can make art, and artists can design, but art should be produced without responsibility for anything other than the motivation of the person creating it. Design is a response to something, about problem solving, involving critical design and speculative design, and seeks to find a solution functionally.

Durjoy Rahman: Yes, design and art are interrelated but art is self-responsive and inspirational and can happen consciously or subconsciously, whereas design is purpose-oriented. Of course much design involves art and a lot of artworks include design elements.

TM: Design has existed since humans had consciousness and needed to provide structures to survive, evolve and thrive. We also have this compulsion to express ourselves, to make sense of things, to express our consciousness. The notion of a designer as we understand it now in the West originates in the Industrial Revolution and before that there was no categorisation.

Tim Marlow explored the relationship between art and design in the 2024 exhibition Barbie at the Design Museum, London

LUX: So there are blurred boundaries?

TM: Leonardo Da Vinci was a scientist, an artist, a designer, a composite creative human being. Hussein Chalayan is talented fashion designer who makes sculpture, his fashion designs are informed by sculpture, and his sculpture is informed by the language of fashion that he has evolved. Art often reaches the language of boundary blurring, but I have encountered quite a lot of resistance to people from design or architecture moving in on that world. With architects, if you have gone through seven years of professional training and then somebody comes along from a completely different background to design the building you might baulk at them being called an architect but one has to stop being too insecure about these things. Some of the greatest twentieth century starchitects like Carlo Scarpa, Le Corbusier, Frank Lloyd Wright were not fully-qualified architects.

LUX: How can good design attract new art audiences?

TM: Creative input from different disciplines into other disciplines is something to celebrate. Rachel Whiteread once designed a daybed. Charles and Ray Eames explored the functionality of plywood to design furniture, a prosthetic leg support, and to make sculpture. How we categorize art or design is a national cultural obsession and we should kick it about a bit!

DR: I have seen a resentment among the artist community where a product designer can claim they are both designer and an artist but an artist cannot call himself a designer. The designer can call their product an installation, a sculpture, a movable artwork but a watercolorist cannot make something and call themselves a designer. When I saw the Eames’ first plywood chair I thought it was a sculpture! And Philiippe Starck is designer, an architect, and an artist.

Latest images from Durjoy Rahman’s 3/22 display space, featuring his collection of art and design

LUX: What can be an approach to collecting functional designed works?

TM: As Director of the Design Museum I salute the collecting of design but also love the fact that design is a growing area for collectors.

LUX: What about design involving an iterative technological function?

TM: There is no question that design is often iterative and it does evolve. It is not always a progression to greater efficacy but tech tends to move us in that direction. A chair produced two hundred years ago can be as comfortable as one that is produced now. However, devices to communicate between human has absolutely evolved over hundreds, if not thousands, even millions of miles. Our collections are displayed around three themes: designer, maker, user; and at the very end is the final piece, the wall. As a series of objects it resembles a diagram interlinking TVs, typewriters, calendars, phones, pens, calculators. Right in the middle is an iPhone, showing all of those functions of those designed objects have been distilled into this one object. But it’s not actually saying that this object is better! […] So design is evolutionary and iterative, whereas art is not like that.

DR: I was recently introduced by LUX to the largest collector of video art in the world right now, whose collection is based in Berlin and Frankfurt. Is technology influencing art or is art influencing technology? There, technology was inspired by art. […] At Venice Biennale, Durjoy Bangladesh Foundation sponsored an artist who created a work that involved photographing, scanning and reassembling tile by tile a heritage basilica reconfigured as an aluminium object.

LUX: How do you decide what design talent to mentor?

TM: For both, you look at the final degree shows, of course, and there are prizes and bursaries for emerging talent. When you see someone early on in their career who is doing interesting things the key is to try and just watch that talent and give it quiet support, not overburden it with exhibitions too early. It is nebulous, intuitive and sometimes self-evident but always about people who understand or give a sense of authenticity, that it is something that they have actually wrestled with and the work is the result of dealing with complexity rather than ease or facility.

DR: I am not a leader of an institution, or involved in programming, so I am not under pressure to identify the talent in the same way. I am a provider, an art collector. While we started our foundation, we had less pressure but our question is always to ask what has contemporary relevance.

Conservatory by Jamie Gatty Irving: a feature of the the Design Researchers in Residence Program, which supports young designers

TM: With western art, there are certain artists whose talent is self-evidently there and their reputations as major artists will not diminish. For example, Rembrandt and Caravaggio are just two we can name but the idea there is an innate talent that is always recognized is wrong. There are people who had no opportunity to exhibit, women, for example, and we now realize there is an extraordinary talent that was never showcased and we did not know about. Taste and talent change, they are not universal.

LUX: What is needed from the spaces in which projects happen? How can this work physically and metaphorically?

DR: Physically, it should be welcoming and inspiring environment that fosters creativity and collaboration metaphorically, a space where artists can express themselves freely. We had a photography exhibition by Magnum photographer Raghu Rai and converted a finance institute into an art space, with a video installation and a 3D context for photos taken during the Bangladeshi war of liberation in 1971 to offer a new generation a different perspective of the struggle and sacrifice. I especially enjoyed your Ai Wei Wei exhibition at the Design Museum last year, Tim, with the old Chinese columns installed to show the artist’s background.

An exploration of space in relationship to art design projects, from the 2023 Design Museum exhibition Ai Wei Wei: Making Sense

TM: Thank you, that show was interesting because we took out all the walls of the space to open it up completely. The best characteristic of space in which art design projects can happen is flexibility. Having historically loaded spaces where their history is evident can be a real joy for artists too. In the Royal Academy there are these beaux arts spaces with beautiful light and you could build on, play with, transform and subvert the history of those spaces but you take them as a given; whereas I think the idea of having flexible spaces where things can happen in different ways are really important. You need also to layer on interesting lighting, finishes, materials. Carpeting is an absolute killer if you are trying to show art or design. Think of a trade fair or art fair where the floors are carpeted as you walk around and how that gives a completely different feel for a kind of project.

LUX: What about curatorial autonomy, what is your message for Millennials and Gen Z philanthropists who want to see institutions that look like them and model their values?

TM: It is very difficult if you chase audiences too specifically. As an institution you have to program and you have to do it from a position of expertise. That is not being arrogant. At the RA and the Design Museum I have always worked with external experts in a subject.

We do not know everything about everything but we do know who the interesting people are to wrestle with and present it. I think if you start presenting things in interesting, incredible ways with authority and authenticity, you then have a chance to show audiences things that they did not know they would like. You also look at what is culturally resonant for people and think about attracting certain kinds of audience that wouldn’t necessarily come to the museum.

So, doing a Barbie show, will attract a very different audience to doing design and football which will attract a very different audience to Enzo Mari, who will attract a very different audience to Tim Burton just to give you the four shows that we have on. I always collaborated with living creative people and the best curators I work with are collaborators.

They can harness, empower, steer, let go and enable people make the kinds of exhibitions that can only be made in their lifetime. One of the roles of a contemporary Museum is to try and work creatively with people rather than curate living people as if they’re dead entities. But there are also ways of collaborating creatively with the dead! We did a Charlotte Perian exhibition, where Assemble, the Turner Prize-winning art, design and architecture collective, installed the exhibition made with extraordinary plants.

The importance of the marriage between art and design in Rahman’s curation

DR: That is interesting. One of DBF’s missions is to give recognition to artists who had none during their lifetime. A female artist, Novera Ahmed who died in 2014, is an example and we curated her work because she is the designer of our language movement Bhasha Andolan, leading our nation’s struggle to preserve Bangla and not have Urdu imposed upon us by Pakistan back in 1952.

Some of our new generation is forgetting about her contribution. Again, about the purpose behind curation, we collaborated on the Raghu Rai photography exhibition mentioned earlier with the Faculty of Fine Art, Dhaka University and, controversially, appointed a very young curator because he is next gen and had not witnessed the War of Liberation of 1971.

Our main objective was for a next gen curatorial lens, to bring into sharp focus the post-war geography of this subcontinent, to appeal directly to the next generation. My advisory team and I wanted to fuse this historical event with the current context and we knew a young curator could do a better job than a historian or an experienced curator of my generation. Next gen asks questions, has the potential to shape art philanthropy, and wants to create a more inclusive and equitable world.

Freya Spencer-Wood, Jamie Gatty Irving, April Barrett and Eliza Collin, as part of the 2023–2024 Design Researchers in Residence cohort

Find out more:

timmarlowdesignmuseum.com

durjoybangladesh.org