Colour – an ornament or a backdrop?

In More Depth
Colour.
A backdrop? An ornament? A working foil?

THE CLAMOR OF ORNAMENT It is an ongoing debate. Is colour an ornament or a foil? Katie Fontana, Creative Director and Co-Founder of Plain English explains her point of view, “I have always felt that our designs provide the backdrop. When we started the company, my goal was that the cupboards should lie back and not be centre stage. I couldn’t understand the ethos of all the other kitchen designs on the market then. They were fussy and overly decorative and seemed to say ‘look at me!’ We wanted to be understated, functional, beautiful, providing a working backdrop to the character and style of the owner via the introduction of their choice of colour and of the other furniture and decoration in the room.”

At this New York City exhibition, designed by Studio Frith, The Drawing Center dug deeply into how to define ornament – be it embellishment, surface or structural. Can it be lifted from its context, reworked, reproduced, and redeployed? Plain English paints (normally reserved for our own projects) were the working foil for the ornamented pieces, providing the colourful backgrounds on which the ornaments and ornamented pieces hung. As suggested in the review by Ariella Budick in the Financial Times, “we decorate to soar and to survive”.

THE CLAMOR OF ORNAMENT: EXCHANGE, POWER, AND JOY FROM THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY TO THE PRESENT
THE DRAWING CENTER NYC
15 JUNE – 18 SEPTEMBER 2022

PHOTOGRAPHY BY DANIEL TERNA

BLANCMANGE AND BOILED EGG

SCULLERY LATCH

Framed art pieces on a wall covered in a beige and blue patterned wallpaper.

The intersection of a blue and orange wall with framed art pieces along both.

BOILED EGG AND SCULLERY LATCH

Framed art pieces covering a tan colored wall.

RICE PUDDING

Large art pieces hanging along a red wall.

JAM

Close up of a white drawing table with yellow surface, covered in books.

JAM AND COTTON PINNY

Drawing center with a white and yellow table in the center, wood staircase, and white and green walls.

COTTON PINNY AND PRETTY PICKLE

Wooden drawing table with a yellow top covered in books, with simple art hanging on the wall behind it.

JAM AND COTTON PINNY PHOTOGRAPHY BY DANIEL TERNA

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