Chris Bogia’s Candle Sculpture Illuminates Fishers Island, New York

Shag carpet, Atari, floral wallpaper, West German pottery, embroidery. These are among the varied influences that have shaped Chris Bogia’s mixed-media sculptures, which masterfully meld the approachable and homespun with a Scandinavian-esque sleekness. Bogia, who recently proclaimed, “I love interiors!” and worked for Todd Oldham during college, is also the cofounder of Fire Island Artist Residency, off Long Island’s southern shore, an experience that may have contributed to his latest installation on another islet—and his first outdoors: Candle on Fishers Island, about 5 miles east of the Connecticut coast.

Bogia was awarded the annual public-art commission from Lighthouse Works, a nonprofit organization celebrating its 10th anniversary that’s devoted to encouraging artist development and Fishers’s year-round cultural enrichment. “In my research, I thought about mid-Atlantic summer communities and their homes clad in shingles and shutters. One of the shutters I discovered had a small cut-out of a candle, which inspired me to think of the candle as a sculpture,” explains the artist. He scaled that motif way up, chose a palette that evokes “the faded colors of well-loved beachwear,” and had it fabricated in aluminum. He then fitted the shaft with an LED so the “flame” is illuminated at night, like a lighthouse.

Bogia grew up in Wilmington, DE, and earned his MFA from Yale in New Haven, CT, but has otherwise spent his adulthood in New York City. He graduated from NYU, where he currently teaches sculpture, has his studio in the South Bronx, and is represented by Mrs., the Queens gallery that just hosted his second solo show. A few blocks north, he’s part of a group exhibition at Sugar Hill Children’s Museum of Art & Storytelling through August 20. Farther afield, his work is on display at Wasserman Projects in Detroit, also through August 20, and he is currently preparing for a show opening September 3 at Perrotin gallery in Paris.

Wyatt Kahn’s Mammoth Cor-Ten Sculptures Debut in Downtown Manhattan

Prior to this summer, Wyatt Kahn was perhaps best known as a painter, specifically his monochromatic multi-panel artworks. But that perception may change for anyone walking through City Hall Park in New York. It’s there that his seven sculptures compose “Wyatt Kahn: Life in the Abstract,” representing not only his first public-art exhibition but also his first pieces in Cor-Ten steel. And he really goes big with it, each piece monumental—the largest clocking in at 3,300 pounds.

They’re the outcome of Kahn’s examination of the spatial relationship between painting and sculpture, two and three dimensions, and developing a language that integrates abstract forms with everyday-life items, like a comb or sunglasses. “The figures have their own narrative, and I hope visitors will find their own meaning based on their experiences,” Kahn says. “To me, the potted plant in Morning represents nurturing an idea, while someone else may be reminded of the plant they raised during the pandemic.”

Each sculpture is constructed of numerous steel sections welded together into blocklike forms, their front and back mirroring each other to create an illusion of drawing in space, their rusted-red tone resulting from Cor-Ten’s natural weathering process. The sculptures also evoke the steel structures of the city’s architecture, which, as a native New Yorker with an MFA from Hunter College, Kahn knows well.

10 Questions With… Katharina Kaminski and Rodrigo García

The sculptor and model Katharina Kaminski created her light sculptures, which also function as candle holders, during a life-changing discovery. The Uruguay- and Paris-based ceramicist received her genetic test results that confirm she was born intersex while working on a series of bulbous bodily forms. In the meantime, Kaminski continued to hand-pour clay for her sculptures at a foundry in France’s perfume capital Grasse. “I try to follow the clay with an authentic clear energetic intention that transforms itself as the work begins to come alive—I feel the clay, I feel myself, and creation happens,” she tells Interior Design.

The series, aptly titled Luminous Beings, came out of a collaboration with Kaminski’s life partner and Amen Candles founder Rodrigo García to bring the element of light into her work. “The series has empowered me to tap into my truth, to connect with a vision of self that is not adopted from others, but one that is mine and more compassionate with myself,” she adds. Referencing the body in gentle poetic ways, the light sculptures “opened a new chapter in my life,” Kaminski says. In the last year, they’ve been on view at Design Miami/ fair, Bergdorf Goodman, and Dover Street Market in Paris. 

“They encourage forward thinking, authenticity, innocence, pride, a sensuality much rooted in the earth and a high directed spirit,” Kaminski adds. “They brought to surface a version of myself that was deep inside and hopefully they can inspire others on their journey.” While the artist is currently working on large versions of the series as well as experimenting with bronze, marble, and stone, Amen Candles is expanding the light sculptures and their Luz candles in July with new scents, such as eucalyptus, vetiver and ginger, in addition to existing rose and sandalwood. In the fall, new sculptural forms will be added to the series, as well.  

Interior Design talked to Kaminski and García about activating sculptures with scents and light, as well as creating with a mission to stand up for an under-represented community in the design world. 

Interior Design: Could you talk about the journey of your personal and professional unities? How do both relationships feed each other?

Katharina Kaminski: When we first met we would always connect through dreams, goals and visions, and as a couple those got intersected to create a life together. Creating together is a big part of our relationship. We understand each other beyond words and our qualities complement each other very well. We have that creative chemistry—and to me, that’s a huge turn on!

Rodrigo García: The answer to the question in one word would be: organic. For example, the very initial spark idea of light sculptures started by us having outdoor dinners in nature and seeing that classic candles would turn off by the wind, and it was just an idea. Then Katharina started creating a concept which became a challenge of making the empty space the soul of the sculpture instead of the classical approach of the external form. Like holes in Lucio Fontana’s paintings or silence in music compositions, Katharina dominated the empty space. The empty space becomes alive with inner light, becomes a luminous being.

ID: A candle and design object tap into different sensual experiences, smelling and seeing respectively. What type of connections do you see between scents and a design aesthetic?

RG: It is not about a scent, a visual aesthetic or a sound, it is about the feeling that those stimulus generate on us. Whether by smelling a scented candle or by contemplating the light of a light sculpture, the idea is bring us to now, to be present. That is my philosophy of design, it is about designing experiences, instead of just products of design.

It is about bringing harmony, calm, and being present in the moment. I feel candles’ fire light brings us peace. And specially with scent, when we are smelling an aroma, we are not thinking of something else. Luminous Beings connects this in a synesthetic new experience of sculpture, which is the visual art that operates in three dimensions, into a new dimension of light sculptures with scents—they become a fourth dimension experienced when the observer lights the scented candle. Changing at every instant with the observer’s perspective, they become Luminous Beings. It is a meditative experience of time, light, and space, and of course, fragrance.

ID: Intersex community has been underrepresented in the art and design world. Has this been changing? Could you talk about your experience?

KK: Intersex community has been underrepresented in not just the art and design world—it has been underrepresented, stigmatized and forbidden subject by parents, doctors and the whole system. I am optimistic that we are in a much more open-minded place as society and it is generally more welcome to talk about it. In my experience, I still feel not everyone is comfortable with this topic but I feel happy that I can help a little by opening the conversation on intersexuality and that many people are happy to learn about it. Many are surprised to first find about a condition present in same percentage of humans as redheads that they never heard about before. 

Silence creates taboo, taboo creates trauma and nobody deserves none of that! Expressing, sharing, coming together can be very healing. I dream of a future where kids that are born intersex are not stigmatized and parents are properly educated, guided, and supported.

ID: How does modeling and the fashion world inspire your design practice? Do you find yourself connecting the two worlds?

KK: I feel that connection of worlds in this context would be me, Katharina Kaminski, my spiritual path and the balance of energies that both professions give me. Modeling has been the greatest university of life for me. I find it very enriching and exciting to have a profession that requires me to be open to unexpected adventures and meet new creative people all the time. I find inspiration and growth in all the people, places, and new situations along the journey. In modeling I have learned to embody an energy, to use my physicality to express something, which connects with being a sculptor who models clay. The big difference with modeling and making art is that modeling jobs choose me, while I get to choose myself when I create. I find that very powerful because I get to explore the depths of being myself as it comes and express myself more profoundly. It’s a journey that feels more natural to my most authentic self. At this point of my life, I feel very grateful to be able to explore both facets of mine and evolve in them and through each other. 

ID: Your forms defy any gender connotation while paying homage to bodily curves. How do you balance this duality of capturing an alternative corporeality?

KK: The balance of the duality is my inner process and an alternative corporeality was an unconscious seek for new perspectives and to celebrate the infinite human experience. The only way to capture this is to be in that meditative creative space that allows my truth to be expressed. That is the beauty of art to me.

ID: Luminous Beings is about the immaterial through the material experiences of scents and sculpture. Could you talk about encapsulating ephemerality through sculpture?

KK: I see my creative process as a physical manifestation of whats going on inside me, that takes form in space, translating what I can not express in no other way than with art.

ID: The light sculptures are also about discovery. They invite the viewer to look inside their hollow parts and notice different curves. What do you think about crafting this ritual for viewer through your work?

KK: If you look around you will never find angles in nature: in nature everything is curved. Angles are men-made and so is the binary norm. Not everyone is born in this norm, nature is infinite. I hope curves inspire for a world with more openness, understanding, harmony and love.

A luminous being for me means someone that enlightens you with their presence. The collection of lit clay sculptures embodies a universe free of limits, where life is celebrated for its infinite unique forms of expression.

ID: What about the element of light? The sculptures gain a new depth with light stemming from their bellies. How critical was the presence of light in your design?

KK: I love the challenge of shaping the way the light comes out of my sculptures, specially a candle light which is the element of fire—it has life and it moves, giving the light a form. I personally love the ritual of turning the candle light on in the sculpture. I invite the observer to become a participant of the creative process when lighting the fire and changing the form of the light with each perspective.

ID: Could you talk about your studio life in Uruguay?

KK: In Uruguay is where I have my studio and where I am creating everyday, being in nature helps me to be peaceful to create with intention. When I am in Paris, it’s more a balance of modeling work, creating and planning where the work is going to be shared—the more “yang” part of being an artist. But the truth is, I travel with my tools everywhere and I create from anywhere. I have lots of experience in the nomad life.

RG: Both of us spending a long time in nature in Uruguay allow us to connect with nature and express that in our philosophy of design. My philosophy of design is to think always more than sustainable design, to think on how nature would do it on every aspect of it from the scents—[to make] the eucalyptus scent just like eucalyptus is in nature—or when it comes to packing, we wouldn’t use a plastic styrofoam packaging, so lets look for a biodegradable mushrooms mycelium packaging. Being in Uruguay also helps to remain authentic, and instead of being influenced by trends or what others are doing, it allows to create unique and authentic design with purpose.

ID: How about Paris? After the isolation of Uruguay, does the city’s chaos and energy inspire you?

RG: Paris is great for launching and sharing new collections to our community of creative friends, feel the feedback, and share our purpose. Since the beginning of Amen Candles in 2020, I love to launch new concepts at Dover Street Parfums Market because there is a great community of designers and creatives that are very open minded to share the purpose behind our concepts. For example, when we were about to launch our mushrooms packaging some buyers would say we need to add a gold or a ribbon on it, while at DSPM we had carte blanche to creativity. Same goes for sharing our Luminous Beings collaboration with Katharina and to be speaking about intersex awareness and celebrating the infinite human experience, Paris is now the right moment and right place to share our purpose, to start a conversation, which is our intention, is not about product, but is about objects of design that begin conversations.

An Exhibition Showcasing Works by Jaroslava Brychtová and Stanislav Libenský Opens at Heller Gallery in New York

They were the power couple of the studio glass movement: Jaroslava Brychtová and Stanislav Libenský. Innovators of the mold-melting technique, which casts the material into three-dimensional objects, sculptor Brychtová and painter Libenský met in 1954 in what’s now the Czech Republic, a center of glass manufacturing and craftmanship for centuries. Together, with him sketching designs and her producing clay sculptures of those designs, they were able to translate abstract concepts into pioneering colorful and light-capturing works that nod to Czech Cubism and metaphysical philosophy; their trio of large-scale sculptures at Expo ’67 are said to have influenced such American studio glass artists as Dale Chihuly. They and their work certainly influenced Dr. Dudley and Lisa Anderson, who, with the help of Katya and Doug Heller, have amassed a sizeable Brychtová-Libenský collection, several pieces of which are on display for the first time in “Inner Light” this spring at Heller Gallery in New York. The exhibition encompasses 19 sculptures from 1958 to 2002, the year of Libenský’s death, plus four of his drawings made while he and Brychtová, who died in 2020, were teaching at Washington’s Pilchuck Glass School in 1987.

10 Questions With… Mac Collins

Interior Design: Did you have a passion and interest in making and designing as a child?

Mac Collins: When I was a kid I was known for making things. We had a lot of electrical stuff lying around the house and I would cannibalize it and take it apart. I was intrigued by the components. I’ve always had this thing for tactility, although I guess at the age of eight you don’t know why you like certain things. But I was always a collector of objects and I liked to hold things and compare the weight of them. Going into school, I got really into illustration, which transitioned into graffiti and street art. It always seemed like an interest or something that people told me I was good at. It wasn’t until college [editorial note: this refers to sixth form college, which is equivalent to to the last years of high school in the U.S.] when I was encouraged to do an art foundation course that I realized it was something I could pursue as a career.

ID: After the art foundation course you applied to do Three-Dimensional design at Northumbria University in Newcastle, England. What was the course like?

MC: During the art foundation course, I transitioned from 2D sketching, drawing, kind of neural inspired stuff into creating in 3D forms. I was into the idea of sculpture and drawn to the idea of things that could communicate more complex ideas, but through 3D forms. But I worked equally well to briefs and thought in a way that was slightly more mathematical. So this 3D course was a perfect bridge between those two things. The scope of the course was particularly broad and I think that’s what I appreciated. You could work on projects that ranged from highly functional and engineered to things that were more speculative, conceptual, and sculptural. 

ID: Can you tell me a bit about Nottingham, the city you grew up in? What is it like in terms of a design scene and a place for creativity?

MC: I was involved in the creative scene in Nottingham from quite a young age. I was definitely the youngest when I was doing street art and live events at 15. Events that I probably shouldn’t have been at! I think the scale, the intimacy of the communities, means you definitely feel that you can get to know people in a way that you might not be able to in bigger cities like London. There are some bigger substantial institutions and studios in Nottingham too but there is something about it that also feels quite underground.

ID: You are currently teaching on the same course you took at Northumbria University. What is that like and how does that feed into your own work?

MC: I’m currently teaching the first years and running my own module with them, taking them through certain processes and introducing them to the idea of making and communicating through making. Throughout the year I will be taking them though three key projects, where each one is an introduction into a set of processes. It’s exciting because they’re at a point where you can foster creativity and an excitement for the subject. They’re encouraged to experiment with materials as there’s space and machinery and workshops. The teaching itself doesn’t directly feed into my work as the narratives I’m exploring at the moment are quite specific to my own experiences and understanding of British society. But I enjoy engaging with different perspectives and encouraging discussion between students. And the days spent teaching also give some structure to my week.

ID: Can you elaborate on the focus of your work and how it relates to your experiences of British society?

MC: That’s kind of been the crux of the self directed projects that I’ve worked on over the past couple of years, which have been more conceptual or speculative by nature. I’ve been exploring ideas of identity and culture and heritage. I’m of dual heritage, British Jamaican, and I feel I want to respond to those things through the work that I create. My upbringing has definitely had a bearing on how I view the world and the forms that I create visually are in turn informed by my perspective of the world around me. I think I am continually interested in that idea of being British Jamaican and trying to understand my position within contemporary British society.

ID: Can you talk a little bit about specific projects in terms of these interests and concerns. For instance your Iklwa chair?

MC: It started out as my graduation piece, my final project for university. Up until that point I’d always been heavily inspired by Japanese, European and American designers but I hadn’t ever really considered my own heritage or identity as a starting point for my work or brought my own story into what I do. For my dissertation at university I wrote about the roles and responsibilities of Black artists during the civil rights movement and I came to the conclusion that perhaps I also had a responsibility to discuss my own lineage in my work. So this was a bit of a turning point in how I saw my practice. And that project became an opportunity to explore my heritage, to try to understand how my family as Jamaicans now live in Britain, to trace their migration during the Windrush era to Britain and then trace back even further to the transatlantic slave trade that had led to my ancestors being moved from West Africa to the Caribbean. I responded to the powerlessness these people must have felt with a project that I felt instead would empower, elevate and enhance whoever was to sit in that chair.

ID: How does the chair specifically reference these ideas in terms of shape and forms?

MC: Pretty much everything played into how I wanted to communicate these ideas. So the backrest is oversized and abnormally large for what you’d expect in a lounge chair. The idea was that you’d be able to feel the presence of this thing in your peripheral vision, that you’d feel it over your shoulders and almost feel that presence and protection from behind. I had observed and looked at a lot of artists working right now. There’s a British-Liberian painter called Lina Iris Viktor and it feels to me as though she is working to elevate and enhance the person at the centre of her paintings. So that’s how I started to see this this chair. It also had these spear-like forms—the chair is named after the short spear used in colonial wars in South Africa. The idea is they are protecting the person sat within this object. 

ID: What about the brilliant blue colour of the chair you made for your graduation? 

MC: There were kind of quite a few things that linked to the blue. It is quite a celestial blue, which tuned into some of the things I was reading at the time around Afrocentrism and Afrofuturism, and some of the research I had done for my dissertation about the Black Arts Movement in the 60s and 70s. There was this idea of seeing African identity or the identity of the wider African diaspora in a way that hadn’t happened before and in a way that elevated them and celebrated the future of black identity. So Afrofuturism as a movement developed as a way of celebrating an identity that wasn’t present in mainstream media music, film and TV before then. I also got this blue from stories that my grandma told me about when my granddad first moved to the U.K. People expected new arrivals to be scruffy or roughly dressed when actually they arrived and were really sharp. My granddad was wearing this blue suit, which was really sharp and smart. And that has come to symbolize something for me. Just this idea of people expecting less and yet you arrive with more and how—in the face of the racism they experienced—having this ultra marine bright blue suit was an act of resilience. That to me was so significant.

ID: What materials do you most like to work with and why?

MC: Up to now, I have mostly used timber, particularly on all of my bigger projects. And it’s a material that I’m continually impressed by and that has a significance in the human story. It is also particularly tactile and warm to the touch. I think as a material it is also kind of understated but yet can still have such an impact when it’s manipulated. For a lot of the narratives that I want to communicate, timber has just been the right choice for me but I intend to explore new materials. I want to learn new processes and the processes needed to work those materials. I want to get into the metals. So for a project at the moment, I’m sand casting aluminium.

ID: Do you plan to focus on furniture in the future or also venture into other areas of design? 

MC: Furniture has worked for me to communicate the ideas I wanted to communicate. But I don’t see my practice as being defined by that and I think I’m ready to allow it to evolve. I’m interested in exploring ideas through maybe more substantial installations of objects. Currently a lot of the stuff I do is standalone objects. But I’d like to investigate how people might experience and interact with a number of components within an installation. I think that’d be really exciting.

Conrad Architects Reimagines the Palladian Villa Typology in Melbourne

Referencing the typology of classic Palladian villas with manicured lawns, layered greenery, and symmetric forms, Conrad Architects designed a new build in Melbourne, Australia, which appears at home among the area’s historic residences. Thick, masonry walls, expansive patio doors, and a sculptural façade marked by a grid of windows, ground the home, instilling a sense of “quiet permanence,” the architects note, citing the connection between interior and exterior spaces.

With a symmetrical layout designed around a central axis, the home offers a primary sightline throughout, furthering the relationship between the garden and the interiors. Whimsical features, from a private entry court with a reflection pond to a spiral staircase that offers views of the garden, pool, and cityscape, ensure every detail enriches the space with depth and character. The exterior frame even forms a pergola-type structure with retractable awnings to further extend the living space into the outdoors similar to a traditional Italian-style terrace, capturing the spirit of a Palladian villa.

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