You know someone who believes in ghosts. One person at least. Maybe it’s your roommate or godmother or that one green-haired partygoer from last Saturday night. Perhaps it’s you. For those who can’t see them, ghosts are invisible but ever-present. A relative, a memory, a story, an absence, they float along a plane that silently imprints on our daily lives, weaving between our hands and bobbing over our heads. Wedged in this gap between conscious and unconscious perception resides ordinary objects used for our everyday convenience without notice: the side table at the dentist’s office where you set down your coffee, the bench at the train station, the vase of yellow tulips. Although unextraordinary, these objects touch the past, present, and future of human existence.

Ghosts of the Mundane, curated by architect and interior designer Crina Arghirescu Rogard and Art and Design Advisor Aurore Vullierme, is a summer exhibition featuring the works of seventeen artists including Arghirescu Rogard herself, Liz Collins, and Mr. Liz Hopkins. Displayed at the NKG Annex in New York City, the exhibit transforms objects into the extraordinary by challenging conventional design, bringing attention to minute details, and uncovering the intangible imprints that mark our surroundings.

Drawing on her experience at the prestigious Politecnico di Milano, Arghirescu Rogard melds refined materials and light in tailor-made design pieces, blending traditional European processes with modernity. In Ghosts of the Mundane, space and object become one entity, evoking memory, nostalgia, and ephemerality. One piece, a swing sculpted from silicone and resin, portrays the ghosts of childhood, swinging like a pendulum between the past and future.

Collins moves seamlessly from fine arts to design with textile mediums such as yarn and fabric. Two of her pieces, “Claudia’s Chairs” and “Fat Curtains,” arouse an air of surreal domesticity, contorting the boundaries between art, aesthetics, and functionality. She reconceptualizes the physicality of the chair, an object used for relaxation and gathering, as a sculptural form draped in fabric to symbolize layers of memory.

Hopkins’ work compliments Collins’ focus on domesticity, centered around craftsmanship and urging viewers to inspect the subtle details they would otherwise ignore. Their work surpasses sculpture to include lights, tables, chairs, and wall works. For the exhibition, they constructed a series of tables, a vase, and several evocative light fixtures, moving beyond functionality to comment on materiality and transformation.

Arghirescu Rogard, Collins, and Hopkins’ works alongside equally skilled artisans challenge the viewer to hold everyday objects to the same standard that they would hold the extraordinary, the influential, the ethereal. Ghosts of the Mundane reshapes objects of substance, basking in a pale golden glow like an otherworldly apparition. Golden is the standard the Mundane has earned.

Here, we speak with the curators and a few participating artists about the exhibition, their creative processes, and personal/collective histories. 

Crina Arghirescu Rogard And Aurore Vullierme

As the curators of Ghosts of the Mundane, how do you think the installations intertwine with the supernatural?

Our shared European roots, Romanian and French, profoundly shaped our approach to curating Ghosts of the Mundane. We were born into environments steeped in magical realism, ancestral beliefs, myths, and superstitions, rich with narratives that transcended the ordinary. These stories were not just tales but a way of seeing the world—a lens through which every object holds the potential for deeper meaning and connection.

We dove into our shared historical, artistic, and philosophical inspirations and concerned ourselves, as Maya Deren once wrote, with “That point of contact between the real and the unreal, where the unreal manifests itself in reality.” Objects carry within them the capacity to act as what we like to call “roots-objects.” They become not just static entities but dynamic repositories, intertwining these temporalities into a singular experience of the uncanny.

Like spaces, objects within those spaces hold emotional and historical resonance; they become saturated with the spirits of memories. Moreover, objects can serve as conduits through which we understand our identities and heritages. They carry stories and secrets, personal and collective histories woven into their material forms.

In Ghosts of the Mundane, each featured artist brings a unique interpretation to the concept of roots-objects and uses their medium to unpack invisible layers, whether through painting, sculpture, design, or installation.

Crina, as an architect, interior designer, and furniture designer, does your work often favor fantasy over reality or your artistic vision over functionality?

I aim to strike a delicate balance between fantasy and reality, artistic vision and functionality. My designs don’t necessarily favor one over the other. Instead, they meld both to enhance each other. I believe that functionality should have its own beauty and that artistic vision can imbue everyday objects with deeper meaning and allure.

Could you walk through the process of creating “Carte Blanche Swing”? How does this piece, an object often used by a child, explore nostalgia? What “ghosts” are brought up through your art?

The creation of the “Carte Blanche Swing,” a collaborative effort with Liz Hopkins, was deeply rooted in this philosophy: a journey into the essence of nostalgia and the tactile memories of childhood. The process began with the selection of materials that resonate with purity and simplicity yet are sophisticated enough to carry the weight of memory. This swing, while functional and playful, serves as a portal to the past, invoking the “ghosts” of childhood freedom and uninhibited imagination. It invites adults to reconnect with the simple joys that are often forgotten.

Liz Collins

What was the creative and physical process behind “Fat Curtains”?

I made this textile in 2003 with a vision of excess, of folds of flesh, of an elegant and lush exaggeration of the word “Fat.” I used a manual knitting loom and a special knitting technique that creates 3D surfaces and sculptural forms by only knitting in select areas which allows for volumes of material to build up. There were several panels that I then stitched together to make one large expanse of drapery folds.

How do the materials used, silk and rayon, challenge perceptions, and why do you think textiles appeal to you as an artist?

Knit silk and rayon are typical of wearable knit garments, and this piece does have a quality like a knit summer dress. This allows for some associations and also to think of it as a skin. Textiles are so expansive and versatile, and the word and the category cover so many things. I have always been drawn to fabric, yarn, and thread—malleable materials that carry color and texture in rich and exciting ways.

How does “Claudia’s Chairs” relate with or transform domesticity and functionality into “the unseen?”

The conjoined chairs are interdependent and in relationship. They can be positioned in so many ways which allows people to be playful and have new considerations when sitting. They are also sort of lyrical and elegant. Functionality hides out in this sculpture—there is tension about use just like the inherent tension present with the slack ropes of fabric between the chairs.

Mr. Liz Hopkins

Several of your pieces have unique structures involving light, such as “Untitled (Leaning Light),” “Screen," and “Simon WAsP Light.” Is light a component of everyday life you feel is overlooked? What is the story behind the interplay of light and shadow in your work?

Long before I had a studio practice, I traveled with a five-gallon bucket in my old Volvo full of parts and eclectic components. I’d build lamps out of junk, treasure, and elements from nature. I felt like I was giving these objects purpose and value again–upcycling. Recently, I’ve given myself much more time to discover where my ideas can go, pushing the boundaries of what can be achieved with light. I need more lives. Unlike furniture, where functionality dictates specific dimensions, lighting is unbound by such constraints. This freedom allows for an expansive exploration of space and ambiance, enabling light to sculpt and define environments in profound ways. 

Your art carries an essence of transformation and time passing. Is there a certain common thread or thematic continuity that reappears within your work?

Time passing is a good way to describe my work. I resonate with it. My process is not just about constructing an object. There’s a feeling, a story that unfolds over time. I create a scenario where the work will be most loved, most thanked, and most useful. I try to craft carefully with a vision of how each piece will integrate into lives and spaces, become cherished, appreciated, and ultimately transformative. Sometimes the piece, and in this case, the Light, allows the person to be more of the person they want to be, as if good lighting really does make you look better. Even more, it makes you feel better. It’s in these transformations that my work finds its true essence, allowing light to become a powerful medium through which individuals can express and realize their desired selves. I would like my art not only to mark the passage of time but to participate in shaping the moments it measures 

Written by Emma Raff