Artist Kenny Scharf’s funky home and garden: the ultimate canvas
By David A. Keeps
“What I love about Hollywood is that you can find western ranch and Swiss chalet architecture all mixed together in a 1959 tract home,” artist Kenny Scharf says. “Fantasy is allowed everywhere.”
The painter-sculptor follows that philosophy in his professional life and in his highly personal (some might say peculiar) home and garden in Culver City. They’re filled with installations made from travel souvenirs, recycled household goods and found objects. His signature cartoon-inspired paint swirls cover garden pots, kitchen appliances, even the front door.
We recently paid a visit to Scharf, whose first Los Angeles show in four years, “Barberadise,” opens Sept, 12 at Honor Fraser. Here, he works on a painting at a farm kitchen table with chairs he purchased at a Pennsylvania flea market in the 1980s. In the living room, a George Nelson Marshmallow sofa sits underneath a painting by Scharf’s contemporary Francesco Clemente and a swing-arm lamp that came with the house.
“What I love about Hollywood is that you can find western ranch and Swiss chalet architecture all mixed together in a 1959 tract home,” artist Kenny Scharf says. “Fantasy is allowed everywhere.”
The painter-sculptor follows that philosophy in his professional life and in his highly personal (some might say peculiar) home and garden in Culver City. They’re filled with installations made from travel souvenirs, recycled household goods and found objects. His signature cartoon-inspired paint swirls cover garden pots, kitchen appliances, even the front door.
We recently paid a visit to Scharf, whose first Los Angeles show in four years, “Barberadise,” opens Sept, 12 at Honor Fraser. Here, he works on a painting at a farm kitchen table with chairs he purchased at a Pennsylvania flea market in the 1980s. In the living room, a George Nelson Marshmallow sofa sits underneath a painting by Scharf’s contemporary Francesco Clemente and a swing-arm lamp that came with the house.
(Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)
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