Ace Artist in Residence Exhibition | Now THIS I LIKE by Margot DeMarco

Now This is Like by Margot DeMarco
Presented with Fort Makers for Ace Artist in Residence

Exhibition on view: February 10 – April 25 | Opening Reception: February 15 – 7 to 9pm

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“Now This I Like” is a collection of drawings and found-object paper mache vases created entirely within Ace Hotel Brooklyn during the month of January, where Margot DeMarco has resided. 

As an artist, DeMarco draws from the world around her, often incorporating found objects such as beach trash and scrap wood into her sculptures and furniture. Now This I Like is a collection of two bodies of work: sculpture and drawings. The found objects in these drawings are interpreted through observation and rebuilt with simple linework. Each drawing is a world within itself, intricately constructed into a zany but plausible illustrated reality. These subtle moments were captured by sneaking, snooping, and lurking through the less glamorous but integral areas of the hotel. Dumpsters, loading docks, coat checks, and storage rooms are the areas DeMarco has chosen to appreciate in these images. 

Paired with the drawings are a series of 10 unique vases. Each vase is made from plastic bottles, packaging, cardboard, and other detritus collected by DeMarco during her residency as well as her explorations around the city. These vases reference classic forms but are decidedly contemporary, giving new life to the invisible, ever-present disposable objects surrounding us. 

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Margot DeMarco is an artist, designer and educator based in New York City. Her work exists in many forms, including: sculpture, furniture, housewares, video, puppetry, photography, window displays, props, illustration and writing. Despite working across disparate mediums, Margot’s art contains a consistent thread of shrewd irreverence towards the world of objects.

FORT MAKERS is a New York City-based studio with a multidisciplinary approach to contemporary art, furniture, stage and product design. FORT MAKERS offers unique collections of furniture, lighting and accessories, as well as artist collaborations, design partnerships, stage and interiors. Through connecting creatives across disciplinary boundaries and searching for a curated commonality in their practices, FORT MAKERS creates atmospheres for participants to discover the unexpected. FORT MAKERS was founded by Nana Spears, Noah Spencer and Naomi Clark in 2008.

Ace Hotel’s Artist in Residence program is the embodiment of our deep conviction that artists deliver us a critical lens through which to understand the world and ourselves. On a quarterly basis, and curated in partnership with creative collectives and art institutions that inspire us, we invite artists across the globe to turn one of our hotel rooms into their studio for a month. Given time and space to create, the artist’s resultant body of work is then exhibited or showcased at Ace and shared with the public.