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A Design Fair with a Sense of Play (excerpt)

Beth Katleman, “Hostile Nature,” at Todd Merrill

A Design Fair with a Sense of Play (excerpt)

By Sarah Archer
Hyperallergic, May 9, 2014

"Another highlight is Beth Katleman’s porcelain installation “Hostile Nature” at Todd Merrill, a low relief wall piece inspired by an 18th-century print room wallpaper from the Victoria and Albert Museum. The work brings its source material into three dimensions, but only enough to resemble exquisite fondant icing on a life-sized confection. Each of its framed scenes features tiny, devilish porcelain figures that have been cast from small plastic toys and flea market trinkets. These characters are getting up to no good in fine Rococo style, where you might expect to see expressionless cherubs or romanticized milkmaids passing a quiet afternoon. Set against a vivid chartreuse wall, the sleepy Wedgewood blue-and-white color palette brings to mind the wall of a museum period room that’s been given an electric shock."