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Chambers Hotel, New York

The eclectic contemporary art collection at the Chambers Hotel sits in good company with its illustrious neighbor, the Museum of Modern Art, in midtown Manhattan.  The 50 foot wide building,  designed by David Rockwell, combines glass and wood textures with lush velvet, mohair, and leather.  

The interior decor of this townhouse hotel  feels rather like an artist's studio. More than 500 works by emerging artists, including paintings by film director,  John Waters, neon pieces by Kiki Seror and abstracts by Amy Sillman are featured in  the guest rooms, restaurant and bar.  

Site specific works were commissioned from emerging artists before the hotel opened in the winter of 2001, and artists were assisgned one corridor on each floor to create an innovative installation.

The tall lobby walls provide the backdrop for Joanne Greenbaum's "colored drawings on canvas" and extend up to the mezzanine where Kiki Seror's large neon blacklit 3-D graphic designs are actually digitally rendered text gleaned from online chat rooms.    

Katrina Gross created a striking hot-pink and vivid orange acrylic wall painting for the third floor, on the fourth floor Roberta and Bob Smith's provocative slogans cause guests to ponder.  

For the eigth floor corridor, John Newsome produced a fantasy garden setting with brightly colored oversize birds, berries, bees and butterflies.  On the 15th floor, each photograph in filmmaker John Waters' series features feet straddling the colorful tape lines -- marks -- that guide actors on set; the images are displayed near the floor and involve viewers as they walk to their rooms.