Currently, the coolest living room in the metro resides in a Downtown art gallery.
Through March 27, [Artspace] at Untitled is home to “Function and Design,” a collaborative exhibition depicting six rooms for the modern dwelling, including a bedroom, dining room, media room and outdoor living space.
Untitled founder Laura Warriner says the idea sprouted back in 1995, when she purchased the structure that would become her gallery: a historic Deep Deuce building that sat vacant for three decades.
“When I started restoring this building, it was just a wasteland around here,” Warriner says. “I saw all of these living spaces popping up around the neighborhood. I thought, ‘They have to furnish those, and they have no clue that there is a really talented arts community here that can design furniture and create a new urban living style.’”
A spin-off of 2008’s “Dinner in the Deuce” exhibition, in which 14 dining rooms were created, “Function and Design” utilized the talents of 53 local artisans in the yearlong process. The intent was not to repeat “Dinner,” Warriner says, “but expand it into more of a whole living environment.”
Just as with families living under one roof, the process was not without its disagreements.
“Visual artists usually are insular in their work. Some just don’t get collaboration, and that’s OK,” she says. “There’s nothing wrong with that.”
What matters is the end result, and Warriner says each room contains something that she loves – even the ones constructed with drama.
“There are some rooms where you can tell who really collaborated and constructed something that was cohesive between all of them. That’s what makes it really interesting,” she says. “The main focus from me was to get them thinking collectively to build something that stretched their capacity, so that they do not just repeat producing the same work.”
Artists were encouraged to use recycled or repurposed materials as much as possible, partly to keep their costs down and partly to reflect the greener, leaner attitudes of our changing nation. But Warriner says the show isn’t about environmental or economic politics; her intent is far different.
“I wanted to show the Oklahoma City community we have some really talented artists,” she says. “Sometimes the public thinks of an artist in terms of making a painting to hang on the wall, but they don’t think in terms of them having the ability to produce incredible furnishings. I think this show gives artists that avenue to expose their talents in different ways to the public.”
photo/Mark Hancock