العربية
Much like the patrician Venetians of yore, Vincenzo brought in the finest materials from around the world (all by boat via canal!)—yellow marble from Siena for a bath; a 12-foot-long slab of green Malachite Challant for the dining table. But in typical De Cotiis fashion, the opulence of marble, precious metals, and Murano glass is contrasted with the intriguing patina of less-traditional materials. Hand-painted recycled fiberglass, which almost looks like precious stone, appears in many of his furnishings; a brutalist bed platform, set atop original terrazzo floors, is hand-painted to resemble weathered concrete.
These material conversations extend to the artworks. A colossal titanium-and-aluminum piece by Michail Pirgelis and textural paintings by Sterling Ruby and Jean Degottex stand in stark, minimalist contrast to the decorative flourish
of the interiors. Meanwhile, sculptures like Simone Fattal’s gestural Yellow Warrior, a vaguely anthropomorphic fiberglass piece by Vincenzo, and a pair of statues by Girolamo Campagna seem to speak to the fleshy figures in Jean Raoux’s paintings.
“There has to be a communication between art and life that happens within a house,” says Vincenzo, whose excavation of this property and others has long influenced his sculpture practice. His latest body of work focuses on arches—timeworn symbols of innovation—and will be unveiled this fall at Carpenters Workshop Gallery’s new Ladbroke Hall flagship in London, where he has also designed a restaurant and a boardroom. “The boundaries between historic categorizations, art, design, furniture, painting, all begin to blur with proximity to each other.”
At the time of our call, furniture and art installed, Vincenzo and Claudia Rose were just beginning to stir it all in with their life. “We need to spend time here,” Claudia Rose observes. “To invite people for cocktails, to open the windows, and to have a drink on the Grand Canal—to live in the Venetian style.”
This story appears in AD’s May 2023 issue. To see this palazzo designed by Vincenzo De Cotiis in print, subscribe to AD.
