Interior designer Rita St. Clair’s iconic collection, featuring high-end decorative arts and furniture, will be showcased in an upcoming Alex Cooper auction on June 3rd, 2017. Rita St. Clair Associates, a firm based in Baltimore, focuses on hospitality, restaurant, institutional, and residential interiors. The collection features pieces that St. Clair used as a source of inspiration for her professional design work, as well as various objects she collected while traveling.
Alex Cooper is thrilled to offer a work by notable German-American architect Miles Van Der Rohe, most famous for his Modernist style in the design of the Barcelona Pavilion in 1929. Alex Cooper is auctioning six of Van Der Rohe’s “Brno Chair’s,” (lot 162) renowned for their Modernist slim profile, sleek lines and careful attention to detail; the design was originally created for the bedroom of the Tugendhat House in Brno, Czech Republic. These chairs were designed in the mid 20th century, with stainless steel frames, and suede upholstery. The Brno chair developed to a modern furniture design classic, reflecting the revolutionary simplicity seen in the Modernist Movement.
Another highlight of the Rita St. Clair collection is a two volume French magazine series presenting works by Alexander Calder (1898-1976) created in the 1940’s (lot 338). Calder was an American sculptor most famous for his creation of the “mobile,” a moving sculpture made with precisely balanced and suspended shapes that rotate in response to touch or air. His work can be found in the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA).
Other treasures of the collection include a 1961 blue Picasso linocut titled “Madura” and signed by Picasso (lot 301); and a piece crafted by Louis Icart, an art deco artist from late 1800’s, early 1900’s France, will also be featured. The work “Leda and the Swan” is a signed original piece, etched and aquatinted (lot 300).
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