New York - Belgian outdoor furniture manufacturer Royal Botania is pleased to announce the winner of the “Dress Up the D-Lux Contest.” The brand offered its innovative D-Lux chair as a blank canvas for creativity. After reviewing submissions, the company has selected the artwork of Brooklyn-based artist Rebecca Sherman. Her piece, entitled "Film Still: Midnight in Paris" caught the jury’s eye. Based on the idea of a pre-coded landscape, her dream-like metropolis utilizes fragments of the real world in transit.

To create Midnight in Paris, Sherman made a sculpture of collaged triangular mirrors and small oil paintings of smoke. She photographed the reflections of the paintings in the mirrors and digitally juxtaposed these photos with a silhouetted film still from Woody Allen's film Midnight in Paris. The jagged mirrors would challenge and complement the curvaceous chair and the traditional seating surface. Typical of her work, which involves integrating, layer and manipulating her traditional practice of painting and drawing with photography, collage, digital technology, projection and installation, Sherman will apply the image of this artwork as well as two similar images that incorporate film stills from Christopher Nolan's Inception and Ernst Lubitsch's Design for Living to the chair using translucent adhesive acetate paper. “I plan to mount the three prints to the front three sides (interior back, seat and leg) of the chair,” says Sherman. “I am going to paint the back of the chair silver and the interior square a metallic black,” she adds. The final touch, a signature from the artist underneath the Royal Botania logo.

The one-of-a-kind D-Lux chair will be up for auction and on display at the Design Trust's 2012 Art+Design Benefit Auction (Nov.7th), which is hosted by Interior Designer Kitty Hawks and Interior Design magazine Editor-in-Chief Cindy Allen. Sherman will be on hand to talk about her design inspiration and process.

The Design Trust's 2012 Art+Design Benefit Auction raises funds for The Design Trust for Public Space, which is committed to improving the design, utility, and understanding of New York City's parks, plazas, streets, and public buildings. The organization brings together neighborhoods, public agencies, and design professionals to find innovative opportunities for change, making the city more beautiful, sustainable, functional, and available to all. Its annual Art + Design Benefit Auction brings together New York's leading urban innovators and thinkers for a dynamic evening of conversation, cocktails, community and an art+design auction. This year’s theme of Urban Agriculture addresses a hot topic. A growing world-wide movement, New York City is a leader in the sustainable practice. According to the Design Trust for Public Space, the city boasts more than 1,000 farms and gardens across approximately 50 acres of reclaimed vacant lots, rooftops, schoolyards, and public housing grounds, benefitting the environment as well as the health and well-being of the community.

Source: Royal Botania