Most houses need art – pieces that catch the eye, create a focal point and add a layer of personality: some that are more decorative, and others that are by a favourite artist or have a personal meaning for their owner. As Fiona McKenzie Johnston suggests in her column on buying art on page 176 of this November issue, ‘Art does not just decorate.’ It also ‘grounds’ and ‘elevates’. This special art issue is a celebration of all that art can do, and the people who create it.
The Kent home of artist Robert Montgomery and Greta Bellamacina
The Kent home of artist Robert Montgomery and poet and actress Greta Bellamacina is a jewel box of candy colours, distinctive antiques and original artworks. The effect is irreverent and original, and provides the perfect setting for their family life and work. Arriving at the house is a bit like emerging from the back of the wardrobe into Narnia. At the end of a cul-de-sac, behind a wooden gate tucked between two 1960s semi-detached houses and a short walk down a lane that looks like it goes nowhere, the lawn of a perfect Georgian house unspools, obscured from the surrounding roads by trees. It is like coming across a wedding cake in the middle of a conference centre.
Michael Craig-Martin's Barbican tower black flat
On the 21st floor of a Barbican tower block, the flat of Royal Academician Michael Craig-Martin mirrors his artistic aesthetic, with clean lines, blocks of colour and careful placement of artworks and the design classics that feature in his work. Artists' homes have long held a fascination for the parallels that might exist between the domestic space and the artist's creative output. In the case of the Barbican flat owned by the conceptual artist and painter Michael Craig-Martin, the link seems to be particularly strong.
A curator and photographer's west London house
It is no surprise that art dominates the west London house of photographer and curator Steve Lazarides. But this is no austere, gallery-like space: it is a characterful, comfortable family home, thanks to Maria Speake of Retrouvius and her skilful use of bold colours and salvaged materials. Steve and his wife Fay were driven by an ambition to conjure a warm, workable home for their clan of six children (ranging in age from three to 19) and carve out space for their other brood: a wildly colourful assemblage of art. This has been gathered throughout Steve's wide-ranging career, notably as a successful gallerist in the UK and US and as erstwhile manager to graffiti artist Banksy for over a decade.
A Menorcan house in the island's artistic capital
Holidaying on Menorca, antique dealer Dorian Caffot de Fawes and his interior designer husband Thomas Daviet felt an immediate affinity for the capital Mahón and its burgeoning art scene. It led them to make the unexpected decision to create a beautiful home for themselves, and a base for their business, on the Spanish island. There was a voice in my head saying, “You have to be a part of this,”’ says the London-based French antique dealer Dorian Caffot de Fawes, describing his first visit to Menorca with his husband, Thomas Daviet, an interior designer. They had just arrived in Mahón, the capital of the Spanish island, for a week’s break. ‘It was an immediate attraction, like an energy rising up from the tectonic plates,’ says Dorian.
