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| One of Doris Duke's Islamic art objects on show at the M.A.D. in New York City |
Doris Duke was born in New York in
1912, to an incredibly wealthy family. She grew up on Fifth Avenue,
and her beauty and wealth attracted much attention. Dubbed "the
richest girl in the world," she became a celebrity as well as an heiress.
Duke soon married and became Doris Duke
Cromwell, but their dream globe-trotting honeymoon became tiring as the media hounded the couple from place to
place. Luckily, the harried pace of the tour didn't distract her: from the blur of daily sightseeing, one canon of art and
architecture stood out clear as a flame. She was enraptured with
Islamic Art.
With images of the Taj Mahal dancing in
her head, she set out to extend her parent's Palm Beach home in the
style of the grand mausoleum. Locals mocked her, joking about the
impending “Garage Mahal”, until one day, the project was
cancelled. Duke and her husband had decided to flee the media
spotlight, and build their home in Honolulu
instead.
Thus was born the famous house,
Shangri-La, and it could be said that Duke spent the rest of her life furnishing it. She travelled the world to collect beautiful art objects like sculpted chairs, wooden chests flecked with mother-of-pearl, and delicately pierced iron lanterns, all which added to the mystique of her carefully-curated home.
While I stood in the exhibit, “Doris Duke's Shangri-La” at the Museum of Arts and Design in New York
City the other week, gazing at an 18th century Iranian
chair, a woman beside me commented to her companion, “This reminds
me of William Morris”. Yes,
there was a floral pattern on the upholstery, but it was more than
that. The chair had a slightly gothic shape, and the tasteful
decoration was so painstakingly hand-crafted, its very existence
reminded the viewer of the original artisan. There was indeed
something very Morrisian about the chair.
Perhaps this should come as no
surprise, since Morris admired the design of “Persian” textiles,
and vastly preferred hand-crafted wooden furniture to poofy, fully
upholstered pieces. It could be argued that Duke's chair is a rough
intersection of the two. Perhaps if Morris had travelled farther from
home than Europe or Iceland, he would have gone beyond Persian carpets, and
collected more widely from the Islamic decorative arts. Because ultimately, William Morris was a collector. He may have had many other strings to his bow, but the truth is, he collected those strings before he added them.
