PaperCity Magazine

September 2012 - Houston

Issue link: http://papercitymagazine.uberflip.com/i/112455

Contents of this Issue

Navigation

Page 58 of 79

Red Room: In the former dining room, this 19th-century recamier was salvaged from a Houston Heights antique shop and restored by Hector Valdez; the French antique wears a richly ornamented sari. The painted ���oors are inspired by the exuberantly colored marbles of the Pantheon. Werner-Vaughn���s haunting canvas, Paradise, 1986. In the foreground, an early 19th-century gilded Russian armchair. ���This house is about metamorphosis,��� reveals its owner, artist Salle Werner-Vaughn, about a modest 100-year-old dwelling that���s more simple cottage than high-brow bungalow. Under Werner-Vaughn���s watch, this charmingly crumbling structure somehow precariously clings to existence, blocks from the roar of South Shepherd and the unruly din of 21st-century gas stations, convenience stores and the occasional taqueria. Her words are prophecy, as this little casita, vine entwined and with its patina of years and gently faded paint, has undergone its own transformation in recent days. The perfume of the past hangs in the air, while the rescuer of this diminutive dwelling recites strains of Ovid���s poetry from the ���rst stanzas of the Metamorphoses: ���Of things changed I sing.��� Luscious swathes of silk envelop a Scandinavian side chair, circa 1820, while a pair of Imperial Russian armchairs from the same era gaze across a space towards a French Empire-style recamier. Everywhere the furniture stands like perfect props in a tableau vivant, their placement in contrapunto to haunting paintings from Werner-Vaughn���s own hand. These canvases are tinged with Surrealism, alternating with the romantic attitude of a Claude Lorrain landscape. Enhancing this delicious spell are the artist���s classically inspired bronze sculptures; arranged on painted pedestals, they channel the ancients. The aforementioned Ovid would be right at home in this sensitive setting, with its depths of feeling and its bow to other epochs and long-ago ages. Gazing at the painted walls and ���oors (the latter devised to resemble the wildly colored marble from the Pantheon���s interior), we agree with the artist���s statement: ���I���ve created a beautiful world.��� It���s no accident that, despite its unprepossessing size, this lovely tiny residence in the heart of a rapidly changing neighborhood is called by its creator ���the Palace, By the Way.��� We can almost hear the lyre playing as we glimpse the artist���s sculptures of Apollo, Zeus and Daphne. Now step through this promising portal and enter an era of gentility and grace, elegance and history, art and poetry. And stay tuned: A foundation is planned to preserve this vaporous setting, just one bungalow of ���ve that are part of a cluster of homes and gardens titled Harmonium, that Werner-Vaughn has lovingly tended for more than 20 years, aided by gallerist neighbor Hiram Butler, who one Christmas decades ago gave her a little house to move to her property. Musical recitals, poetry readings and salon afternoons and evenings are all in the future for the Palace, By the Way. Salle Werner-Vaughn is represented by Meredith Long & Company, Houston. Portrait of a Lady in Black-and-White: Artist Salle Werner-Vaughn inhabits her newest work, Palace, By the Way, which she characterizes as ���sculpted spaces ... more than about mere interiors, but instead ... walking into a sculpture.��� Chanel caftan from Neiman Marcus. The antique necklace is from the Near East, a region of fascination and inspiration for Werner-Vaughn (she created an illustrated ���lm for the Metropolitan Museum of Art on the myth of Marduk). SEPTEMBER | PAGE 59 | 2012

Articles in this issue

Archives of this issue

view archives of PaperCity Magazine - September 2012 - Houston