Incollect Magazine - Issue 15

Incollect Magazine 33 “I am a minimalist at heart,” she explains. “I love very pure, simple forms.” Those simple forms are anything but simple to produce. Behind every apparently effortless curve lies an extraordinary degree of technical precision. “The pieces may look simple,” Cartwright says, “but they are precise, and so technically quite complex.” A notable example is the quiet silhouette of the Solé sconce, which avoids theatrical gestures in favor of subtle proportions and beautiful, minimal details. Rather than commanding attention through scale or ornament, they reveal themselves gradually through the changing qualities of light filtered by hand-blown glass. Light itself is Cartwright’s true material. “Light is one of the most powerful forces we have on earth,” she says. “Without light we don’t have life, period.” It is a conviction that gives her work an unusual sensuality. Through carefully developed glass techniques she diffuses, softens, reflects and warms artificial light until it approaches the gentle radiance of nature. “I prefer to make the light from our pieces feel soft and even, like a sunny spring day,” she says. “I like it to feel radiant, warm and inviting.” That sensitivity extends to color temperature, an aspect of lighting often overlooked by consumers but central to Cartwright’s thinking. She favors warm illumination around 2700 Kelvin, believing it evokes the reassuring qualities of sunlight and firelight. “We feel comfortable in this light,” she says. “We feel safe.” The sensual dimension of her work owes something to an unlikely first career. Before founding Cartwright New York, she spent twenty-five years working in the film industry after studying fine art, sculpture, and photography. Cinema sharpened her understanding of atmosphere and the psychological effects of light, even if glass had yet to enter the picture. Everything changed during a honeymoon trip to Murano in 2001. Arriving by water taxi at the private dock of the late sculptor Pino Signoretto, Cartwright found herself immersed in a world few outsiders ever experience. She was introduced to master glassmakers, private collections, historic factories, and generations of accumulated knowledge. The experience proved Left: A luminous bedroom at the Four Seasons Residences, Tribeca, New York with the Otto Luce chandelier in gilded rosé champagne. Interior design by Nathan Andrew, The Department of Interiors, photo by Nathan Andrew. Right: The library of a South Carolina Low Country home with views of the Kiawah River is wrapped in reclaimed “sinker” cypress paneling, milled from logs dredged from the river bottom. Overhead, Cartwright New York’s graceful Otto Luce chandelier in hand-blown, hand-rubbed gilded white alabaster is perfectly suited to the warm, stylish mix. Interior design by Tammy Connor Interior Design, D. Stanley Dixon, architect. Photo by Eric Piasecki.