A site-specific installation of 21st-century design by California furniture designer and artist Chuck Moffit will open August 25 at floral and perfume designer Eric Buterbaugh’s eponymous gallery. The space is the only one of its kind in Los Angeles that is dedicated to artists who work in the medium of scent and who “embrace the floral in their practice.” Also on-site is the EB Florals Perfumery.
In collaboration with Blackman Cruz, the show presents objects that blend contemporary design and sculpture, with a nod to the ethereal. “The setting at Eric’s gallery gave me a chance to assemble a tableau bringing together my known elements—steel and cast bronze; brutalist and geometric aesthetics—to mingle with the unseen,” says Moffit. “Scent has the most powerful connection to memory, and we are always surprised by its strength. The outcome of an almost glacial grinding of heavy material against weightless scent is what we set in motion.”
Among the works, each also inspired by the gallery’s location, are the steel and bronze Sun floor lamp with a stained glass shade; a stained glass, five-armed chandelier; the cast bronze Tiberinus coffee table, which has turquoise glass inlays; and the steel-frame Dioscuri chair, with velvet cushions accented by single roses in one-inch bud vases.
“Chuck’s vision for a meadow led to Eric integrating elements of the pastoral into the gallery,” says Maddie Phinney, director of Eric Buterbaugh Gallery. “In his land of splendor, miniature bud vases blossom like wildflowers, directly from concrete.”
