Mirror Mirror

The world’s most important contemporary designers showcase their work within the historic setting of Chatsworth House to shine light and spark conversation on the intriguing juxtaposition of the old and the new, the past and the future, and the evolution of design histories and practices.

Chatsworth is an extraordinary environment to experience design: a repository for great works of fine and decorative art commissioned by generations of the Cavendish family for over four centuries. Expanding on the eponymous 2023 exhibition at Chatsworth, Mirror Mirror features the works of sixteen contemporary artists through captivating in-situ photography with accompanying artist biographies and essays that unearth how historic artifacts and environments inform and inspire modern artists' practices today. This diverse group of artists includes Michael Anastassiades, Ini Archibong, Wendell Castle, Andile Dyalvane, Ndidi Ekubia, Najla El Zein, Formafantasma, Joris Laarman, Max Lamb, Fernando Laposse, Jae Sae Jung Oh, Samuel Ross, Chris Schanck, Ettore Sottsass, Faye Toogood, and Joseph Walsh. From lithe, LED lighting structures illuminating the halls of the Chatsworth library to a seating sculpture hand-carved in Iranian travertine in the grand estate’s formal Rose Garden, these modern works create unexpected and timeless connections with the house’s architecture, interiors, furniture, and ceramics."CHATSWORTH, a massive country house in Derbyshire, in the East Midlands of England, has been IN THE CAVENDISH FAMILY since 1549. Now led by the 12th Duke of Devonshire, the family has long been artistically adventurous in its tastes, a tradition embraced by the current, open to seeing the house as a backdrop for aesthetic exploration. That was never more true than in the summer of 2023, when the New York gallery FRIEDMAN BENDA installed work by 16 makers in and around the mansion. 'This new exhibition is more than a generational update,' the duke wrote of the experience. 'It is a significant intervention into the formal spaces of [the] house.' The show, 'Mirror Mirror,' is now the subject of A LAVISHLY ILLUSTRATED BOOK of the same name published by RIZZOLI. — 1STDIBS.COMGlenn Adamson is an American curator, author, and historian.

Deyan Sudjic OBE is a British writer and broadcaster specializing in the fields of design and architecture.

Dr. Alex Hodby is the senior curator of programme at Chatsworth.

Sash Giles is the curator of the decorative arts collections at Chatsworth.In Association with Chatsworth House