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Remix Revolution:
“Artworx, Desixns, and Collextions” by Raymond Waites

April 3 - May 10, 2008

The Jule Collins Smith Museum of Fine Art is pleased to present the first solo museum exhibition featuring the work of Raymond Waites (b. 1940), one of Auburn University’s most distinguished alumni working in design. A native of Demopolis, Alabama, Waites graduated Auburn with honors in 1963, earning a Bachelor’s degree in Visual Arts. He began his career at Marimekko, the innovative textile and fashion design firm based in Helsinki, Finland, before developing and marketing his own diverse range of signature products.

Remix Revolution: “Artworx, Desixns, and Collextions” brings together examples of Waites’ multi-faceted creative endeavors, presenting original paintings, designs for furniture and manufactured accessories in combination with objets d’art and memorabilia borrowed from his personal studio. The dual intent of the exhibition is to highlight a selection of Waites’ significant design achievements and provide a glimpse into the artist-designer’s creative environment and his eclectic sources of inspiration. Reflecting an enduring passion for global cultures and history, Waites’ approach to design, as he has described it, melds “the opulent with the humble to create timeless and refreshing” expressions in “casual elegance.” The wide appeal of his sumptuous sense of décor, and its concurrent market success, is amply evidenced by the large number of shops around the world that carry Raymond Waites products. His numerous collections of home furnishings and couture, created across several decades of practice, have garnered many important professional acknowledgements, including recognition by the Fashion Institute of Technology, the International Furnishings and Design Association, and amfAR: The Foundation for AIDS Research, from which he received the Chuck Yancy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2005. Several publications on Waites’ designs appear under the imprints of Little, Brown and Company, Harper & Row, and Clarkson Potter, elaborating on his intuitive aesthetic and philosophy.

Waites serves on the design advisory boards of the Fashion Institute of Technology and Kent State University, and has presented lectures at the Rhode Island School of Design, New York University, and for trade associations including the National Retail Advertising Council, the Industrial Design Society of America, Color Marketing Group, and the International Furnishings and Design Association. In 1984, the Alabama state legislature declared March 10 Raymond Waites Day, honoring this native son for his contributions to the home industry in America.

 

Dennis Harper
Curator of Collections and Exhibitions