Large Chandelier (Red Stag and Anemones, Reversed)

Large Chandelier (Red Stag and Anemones, Reversed) by Virgil Marti, 2004

Hanging curiously above the reception desk in the Philadelphia Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA), Virgil Marti’s work Large Chandelier (Red Stag and Anemones, Reversed) hints to the liminality of this space. While walking in from the busy college campus, the average ICA’s visitor is transitioning from the mundane every day to the transformed gallery space. Marti received his Bachelor of Fine Arts from Washington University in Saint Louis and his Master of Fine Arts from Philadelphia’s own Tyler University (Temple’s art school). He is currently a fine arts lecturer at Penn Design and his work is featured in many public collections in Philadelphia including the Fabric Workshop and Museum, Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Marti’s work plays with the elements found in classical Baroque and Rococo design and mingles them with contemporary materials and themes. In Marti’s own words, “A lot of my work is thinking of something from a very high art form and something similar from my middle-class background. They’re sculptures, but in another way, they’re just lamps. The distinction between art and design has bugged me, and I’d just as soon straddle it.” This hybridization is especially prominent within Marti’s chandelier series. Utilizing macramé cord, electrical wiring, cable, and polymer resin, forms and colors reminiscent of a Doctor Seuss illustration emerge. The functionality found in Large Chandelier is an added layer to this complexity. Virgil Marti’s chandeliers do not deny their role as grand objects for illumination but they do attempt to transform the chandelier’s identity as one found in gold leaf and crystal. Fittingly, a very similar Large Chandelier found an owner in Tony Podesta, an art collector and lobbyist. In 2005 Podesta remarked in New York Magazine, “We paid a studio visit, and decided it would be fun to commission a chandelier for our apartment in Venice. Venice is to some extent a fantasyland, and we thought his fantastic visions would go well there.” It’s worthy to note that Podesta paid an impactful $35,000 for the commissioned chandelier. Unlike The chandelier’s role within Podesta’s Venice villa, its role within the ICA is not of pretention. Large Chandelier has practically become a stand-in representation for the ICA, or to use a design term, logo. As a foreshadowing to the array of similar artistic experiments to be found within the space, the chandelier is a greeting to all that visit the ICA.

Virgil Marti's Website

Penn Design Page of Virgil Marti

New York Magazine 2005 Article on Marti's Chandelier 

Philadelphia ICA