At The Luss House transforms a mid-century architect’s New York home into an immersive art exhibition
Matt Hickman
Over 65 years after architect, sculptor, and furniture designer Gerald Luss completed his family home in the Hudson River town of Ossining, New York, that modernist glass-and-steel house will enjoy a late-in-life moment in the spotlight as the backdrop of a new exhibition showing the work of 18 international artists and designers.
Opening May 7 and on view through July 24, the show, At The Luss House: Blum & Poe, Mendes Wood DM and Object & Thing, is the second in a series of group exhibitions staged at—and responding to—a significant mid-century dwelling (formerly) inhabited by its own architect following last fall’s At The Noyes House. That show, also organized by the galleries Blum & Poe, Mendes Wood DM, and Object & Thing, saw the iconic New Canaan, Connecticut, residence of Eliot Noyes, a noted industrial designer, architect, and member of the Harvard 5, open to the public for the first time.
As was the case with the Noyes House and its architect/inhabitant, Gerald Luss no longer resides in his namesake home, which was built when he was 25 as his first residential project. However, unlike Noyes, who passed away in 1977, Luss is very much alive at 94 and living in Manhattan. He served as a collaborative partner in the exhibition with several of his original designs showing as part At The Luss House including a glass coffee table and chaise lounge along with recently designed timepieces. A permanent fixture of the home, a 12-foot-long sofa that inspired the designs of the sofas at the Time-Life Building in Midtown Manhattan, is also on display.
Luss lived at the suburban Westchester County home and commuted into the city while designing the interiors for the Mad Men-famous mid-century skyscraper at Rockefeller Center. According to an exhibition press statement, the home and its bucolic grounds served as a backdrop for countless meetings between Luss and Time-Life staff while the project was underway.
“It is satisfying to have this exhibition infuse new life in the home I designed and built for my family at the onset of my career and to see new generations of artists and designers bring their contemporary perspective into the space,” said Luss. “In my own life, I find it is essential not only to create new work, but to also live among the objects and work of other artists, expanding my vision of the world. I look forward to experiencing how this exhibition casts new light on my former home and sharing in the inspirations for us all.
Joining Luss’s designs—former home included—are new works by artists including Alma Allen, Lucas Arruda, Cecily Brown, Daniel Steegmann Mangrané, Eddie Martinez, Johnny Ortiz, Frances Palmer, Paulo Nazareth, Matt Connors, Tony Lewis, Mimi Lauter, and Paulo Monteiro. Paintings, sculptures, site-specific installations, and a sizable number of ceramics are all on view as part of an exhibition that, per the organizing galleries, “explores the possibilities of connecting today’s artistic ideas with those of past eras through the presentation of contemporary art and design within an architect’s own domestic environment.”
Select works on view also include new paintings created by Brazil’s Marina Perez Simão while in quarantine during the pandemic; five new works by fiber artist Kiva Motnyk created specifically for the Luss House; a site-specific outdoor installation by Japanese sculptor Kishio Suga; Luss-inspired aluminum furnishings by the Brooklyn-based Green River Project LLC; glass sculptures by Ritsue Mishima; and works from Japanese abstract ceramicist Yoichi Shiraishi in his first U.S. showing.
In addition to in-person visits held on Fridays and Saturdays through June 27 (reservations were fully booked after becoming available yesterday but prospective visitors can add their names to the waitlist through each of three organizing galleries’ websites), At The Luss House also includes a virtual component in the form of an “atmospheric video tour” filmed by Michael Biondo and featuring comments from Luss along with curator and writer Glenn Adamson.