Hydrangea Hill Cottage: Serendipity I

Ser-en-dip-i-ty - an aptitude for making desirable discoveries by accident; luck; good fortune.

I'm home again from a whirlwind trip to New York city last week that was fun, exciting, informative, fast paced, entertaining and, among other things, serendipitous!

As I told you in a previous post, one of my first stopping points would be Anthropologie......and it was! Couldn't wait to get there and see what was new! And it was great, as always.

I was still thinking about the display of dog art I saw there last March (2010) when I visited....all done in paper collage. It was unforgettable and I had thought of it many times over the past year.

So, it was with great interest, and very serendipitous, when I happened upon this book, Paperwork, by Peter Clark, as it immediately took me back to last year's exhibition at Anthropologie and I wondered if it was his dog art I had seen, or if it had been done by various artists (and perhaps inspired by his work)? I've tried researching last year's Anthropologie's display since arriving home, and I still don't know the answer to that question, but in the process, have discovered a lot of information about Peter Clark who, until last week, was a complete unknown to me.

If I may digress a moment, I need to mention that I had also hoped to visit the Crosby Street Hotel while in the city, as well. I have been following the interior design of Tim and Kit Kemp's British hotels for several years, so when I heard they were opening their first North American hotel in NYC a couple of years ago, I had to check it out online and when I discovered their Crosby Street Hotel had a fabulous dog art theme going on in the hotel lobby, I knew I had to visit there and get some photos.

My plan was made! While my daughter took her two children to visit the Tenement Museum on the Lower East Side, I would dash over to the Crosby Hotel.....only 11 blocks each way!....I could manage that in an hour or two....after all, when we booked the Tenement Museum the week before we left for our trip, there were only 3 tickets left.....just enough for them and I would find something else to occupy my time while they visited the tenement building. However, while we were standing in the museum shop and at the very last minute, another ticket became available and I chose to do the tour with my family. There was no time left to get to Crosby Street, as we had other plans and the heat in the city was unbearable.....we had to get back uptown!

Getting back to Peter Clark, in doing my research on his work last night, I discovered that the Crosby Street Hotel is decorated with his dog art!!! And furthermore, a new art gallery opened in NYC in April and it's current (and temporary!) exhibition is Peter Clark's collaged dog art!! It's there until the middle of June! And the gallery, http://www.r-h-g.co.uk is situated on Mott Street, directly between the Crosby Street Hotel and the Tenement Museum on Orchard Street. Rebecca Hossack has owned an art gallery in London for over 20 years and has exhibited Peter's work there in the past - hence, Kit Kemp's (London) familiarity with his work.

So, even though I missed seeing the Crosby Street Hotel (I will yet), and missed seeing his current exhibition at this new gallery, I am elated that I found this book and learned more about Peter Clark's fabulously creative work - designed completely with recycled paper - old books, letters, maps, junk mail, stamps, and any other paper ephemera he can get his hands on. He's an artistic genius!

I hope you enjoy his art as much as I do! And, oh yes, I enjoyed the Tenement Tour and the extra time with my family!