Collectors at Home, Zoom Series Canadian Society of Decorative Arts First Session: “From Utility to Life: Sculptural Decorative Arts” June 20, 2020 17:00 - 18:00 p.m., ET Vertu Founder, Jennifer Franks, has curated a zoom series, Collectors at Home, for the Canadian Society of Decorative Arts / Cercle canadien des arts décoratifs (CSDA/CCAD) The first session is titled: “From Utility to Life: Sculptural Decorative Arts” Utility and beauty are two main concepts of the class

“There is special providence in the fall of a sparrow.” - Shakespeare, Hamlet J. Franks, Vertu Art + Design, Founder This very personal “momento mori” is my own. I was taking a stroll in Geneva, Switzerland, when a baby sparrow fell directly from the sky with a thud at the crown of my feet. The rest is now history, but the story came to my mind, when a sparrow flew into my library through the window yesterday, as I was reading object stories for #collectorsathome, a zoom ser

Created and Curated by Jennifer Franks for the Canadian Society of Decorative Arts https://csda-ccad.org/Events During the pandemic, most of us are spending more time at home. Collected objects of art and design may provide a comforting reminder of a missed friend or travels. In this spirit of public engagement, I created the Zoom series: “Collectors at Home” on behalf of the Canadian Soceity of Decorative Art / Cercle canadien des arts décoratifs (CSDA-CCAD). For this s

Italian white porcelain tray, Dutch glass on Indian brass stand, rare 18th-century French silver-gilt spoon, French stoneware jug, and Fortum and Mason tea. Photo by J.Franks This photo today captures our personal time at home: beauty, simplicity and function. Every year we do an intense spring cleaning, including the re-evaluation of collections, asking whether they are still loved, used and/or bring pleasure to our lives. Anything that does not serve in this regard is si

Lecture for International Women’s Day Decorative Arts: Definition and Evolution Vertu founder Jennifer Franks presented an hour lecture to the Canadian Federation of University Women (CFUW) titled “Decorative Arts: Definition and Evolution” on historic and contemporary definitions of decorative art in North America and Europe, highlighting the significant role of women in the field. The Canadian Federation of Women hosted this lecture on the occasion of their celebrating I

This still life with shells, porcelain, and glass vessels was my casual backdrop for a day of photo editing for Vertu Art + Design. I have collected, displayed, and photographed the type of useful and beautiful objects one finds in 17th-century Dutch still lifes for many years. From humble to refined objects, my desired result is an informal immediacy. Here flowers are placed loosely in a large, round contemporary glass vase exhibiting a maker's seal (of the kind found on

Laurent Craste I am curious about Laurent Craste, a Canadian artist, whose work I recently saw in a private collection (Toronto). As a decorative art & design specialist with a strong background in 18th-century European ceramics, my first thought of the “suicide” vase, as its owner called it, was that it is a critique of ornate, “garish” antique vases, offensive to many contemporary tastes, but there is more social and historical commentary at work. During the French Revolu

Design for a Cassone, Italian, 16th Century, Anonymous, MMA. Textiles were included in Cassone as  an important part of a lady’s dowry. Decorative Art, Definition Sadly most people do not know the definition of decorative art, albeit decorative arts are represented at every major museum across the globe (where the term is employed).  Decorative art differs from fine art not in quality (in the vernacular sense of “fine”), but in medium. Dictionary.com defines the term: “ar

The classic connoisseur and queen of 18th-century collecting in America, Jayne Wrightsman. Excellent article on the importance of true connoisseurship: http://en.artintern.net/index.php/review/main/html/4/3060 #lifeofvertu #jaynewrightsman Original Post June 9, 2014

Thoughts on the Exhibition now at The Frick Collection: Vermeer, Rembrandt and Hals: Masterpieces of Dutch Painting from the Mauritshuis “Portrait of a Lady” by Rogier Van der Weyden, circa 1460 Detail of Vermeer’s “Girl with a Pearl Earring”, the star of the traveling exhibition of Dutch paintings now at the The Frick Collection in New York. The collecting philosophy behind “Life of Vertu” is about quality over quantity, which in the museum world always brings to my mind T

This week we celebrated the birthday of Oscar Wilde born October 16, 1854. When I think of Oscar, I think of classic-rebellion; he would have liked that “oxymoron”. #oscarwilde #classicrebellion #lifeofvertu Post dated 0ctober 19, 2013