An Interior Decorated
Date: 1979
Art Form: Installation Art
One of Kozloff's most famous works was An Interior Decorated, an environment composed of a glazed ceramic tile floor (comprised of one thousand star-and-hexagon-shaped tiles), ceramic pilasters, silkscreened hanging silks and lithographs on silk laminated on rice paper. The installation was first exhibited at Tibor de Nagy Gallery in 1979. Kozloff said the entire piece was her “personal anthology of the decorative arts” because it includes motifs from so many traditions, such as American Indian pottery, Chinese painted porcelains, French lace patterns, Sumerian carvings, Celtic illuminations, Turkish woven and brocaded silks and Coptic textiles. Rather than using assistants Kozloff prefers to hand paint all her tiles, a highly labor intensive process but one which demonstrates her respect for traditional cultures and methods. Rejecting the romantic concept of the artist as an inspired genius working in solitude, she also readily discloses her sources and techniques. Art critic Carrie Rickey wrote in the catalog of the exhibition, “An Interior Decorated is where painting meets architecture, where art meets craft, where personal commitment meets public art.” The project was redesigned for every space in which it was exhibited between 1979 and 1981.
