PaperCity Magazine

T win brothers Nikolai "Niki" and Simon Haas, known in the art world as the Haas Brothers, return to their Texas roots (they grew up in Austin) this month with an exhibition at Dallas Art Fair in the Lora Reynolds Gallery space, as well as a meet-and-greet with their Icelandic-sheepskin- covered mega-beast King Dong at The Joule. In just a few short years, the Haas Brothers have ascended to rarified heights in the art and design worlds. Their first big break was a commission to decorate the lobby of the Ace Hotel Los Angeles. Exhibitions at Art Basel Miami Beach and Design Miami soon followed, as did high-profile collaborations with Lady Gaga and Versace. If it sounds head spinning, it is. Traversing from unknown to having their work exhibited in some of the most prestigious galleries in the country, their creations — which range from totemic ceramic pieces to brass-and-fur sculptures — have captivated the art world. In March, their work headlined New York's Armory Show for R & Company, the design-centric New York gallery that represents them. Despite their incredible rise, the brothers remain refreshingly honest and candid. PaperCity interviewed the duo in 2016 for a visit to Houston. Here, we visit again with Niki Haas for this month's Texas takeover. TEXAS CONNECTIONS. Niki Haas: Simon and I met Lora [Reynolds] in Aspen. We'd been doing a residency at Anderson Ranch, and Lora was excited to do a show together. About a year later, we opened "Animalia" at Lora Reynolds Gallery in Austin and have remained friends. It was through Lora that we were introduced to Joe Cole and Tim Headington [Headington owns The Joule], which led to the installation at The Joule hotel of our biggest beast yet, the big furry sculpture King Dong. DALLAS ART FAIR. Much of the work we're showing at the Dallas Art Fair is brand-new, and we really wanted to show a range of the work we produce. For this exhibition, we've included some older works as well, to make the collection [more] representative of what we are known for, because Dallas is a city we've never exhibited in. BRANCHING OUT. We did a show for Cooper Hewitt that was tremendously fun and at the same time very challenging. We worked with a group of women from Khayelitsha, South Africa, on an installation that was meant to represent a harmony of two very different cultures. The piece was built entirely of small glass beads and 70 THE HAAS BROTHERS THE ART WORLD'S MEGA-BEASTS: Le Bar BY STEVEN HEMPEL was tremendously successful — and, for us, a Goliath of a project! We've also been lucky enough to have been acquired by some great institutions, like the Metropolitan Museum of Art, LACMA, Rhode Island School of Design Museum, and Cooper Hewitt, among others. It has been a tremendous privilege to get to interact with such awesome museums. In December, we have a big show at The Bass museum in Miami. EVERYTHING HAS A PRICE. Simon and I worked very hard for a long period of time with little thought about our own physical or mental well- being. No doubt there was a beauty to this … We were able to achieve much very quickly and make a lot of work we were proud of. Ultimately, though, it was unsustainable. S i m o n d e v e l o p e d b a d addiction issues, and I became emotionally detached from the people I cared about. After years of difficult times, Simon went to rehab, and I did some major soul searching. I believe we barely saved our studio from collapse, or we would have just been another Los Angeles cliché: a rapid rise and quick burnout at the Simon Haas and Nikolai Haas — aka the Haas Brothers Beyonclé, 2015 ALL IMAGES COURTESY LORA REYNOLDS GALLERY

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