Office-Gallery With an Inviting Aesthetic

Howard Sadowsky had a chunk knocked out of the solid granite top of his desk because he wanted it to strike a note about living and working in the heart of Southern California earthquake country.

Sadowsky, an executive vice president at the Westwood offices of Julien J. Studley Inc., a commercial real estate brokerage, admits that breaking the granite was whimsical.

Some people might even say he ruined a good piece of stone.

Yet the broken granite is in keeping with the tone at Studley, where dozens of paintings and sculptures grace the offices, reception area and hallways.

These are not rented pieces or the sort of background art that some businesses display just to cover the walls or to hang unobtrusively and, above all, inoffensively. Neither is it art as a business investment, although many of the pieces have increased substantially in value over the years.

“It’s a passion of mine,” said Sadowsky, who prowls galleries looking for new works to buy and new artists to discover.

Sadowsky’s taste runs to the bold, the unusual, the provocative.

For more than a dozen years he has collected art and tried it out at Studley, favoring up-and-coming artists and, especially, up-and-coming California artists.

Like his broken granite desk, he said, the art may provoke different responses in different people, but it rarely goes unnoticed.

“I look for pieces that are stimulating and provocative,” he said.

“Sometimes I buy something that other people don’t like, or that they consider disturbing, but overall I think everyone likes most of what we have here.”

Sadowsky believes there’s an argument that the art serves a practical purpose by making the office a more inviting place to work.

“I’ve always believed that art and business work very well together,” he said. He also believes the office collection, which belongs to the firm, has helped others appreciate art as he does.

But ultimately, it’s art for art’s sake, an appreciation that is its own reward.

“It’s here because I love it,” he said.