The Newport Symposium Opens with a "Bienvenue"

Ambassador Vilmont

His Excellency Mr. Pierre Vilmont, Ambassador of France to the United States, greeted the large audience at the 18th annual Newport Symposium, but not before studying the impressive array of books on display about history, architecture and design outside the ballroom of the Viking Hotel. The event, a three-day affair of lectures by international experts, is a highly regarded international forum for the discussion of a variety of arts and historical issues. The audience consisted of academics, collectors, museum directors and curators, trustees and major donors, and professional furniture appraisers and art dealers-- and Preservation Society members.

The Ambassador, along with Trudy Coxe, President of the Preservation Society, offered a welcome to Symposium attendees on the Monday morning of the event. Pierre Irving, President of the Board, could not be there, so the introduction was made by Don Ross, Treasurer.

Don Ross, Preservation Society Treasurer,

And Trudy Coxe, CEO

The Symposium this year focused on "Great Designers: A Colorful History of the Interior", examining the great personalities and impresarios of taste who directed the course of design history. Featured lecturers included art historian Emmanuel Ducamp, David Gundry of the World Monuments Fund, Peter Kenny, Curator of American Decorative Arts at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Mitchell Owens, Editor-at-Large for Elle Décor magazine, Fabio Grementieri, Director of the Preservation Program at the University of Torcuato Di Tella in Buenos Aires; Peter Kenny, Curator of American Decorative Arts at the Metropolitan Museum of Art; Joan DeJean, Trustee Professor of French at the University of Pennsylvania; Kit Wedd of English Heritage, the United Kingdom; Dr. Steven Parissien, Director of Compton Varney in Warwickshire, England, and many others from around the world. The lecturers shared ideas, attended each others’ sessions, a dinner at The Breakers, a preceding cocktail party at the Redwood Library, and tours of the Newport Mansions, which were de rigeur.

Emmanuel Ducamp

Newport Seen attended the lecture on the "Belle Epoque" in Argentina, which concentrated on the European, South American, Indian-informed architecture of Buenos Aires, given by Mr. Fabio Grementieri at Rosecliff. Pauline Metcalf, of the Victorian Society of America, was instrumental in securing the speaker, having visited the city earlier on an architectural tour. In the audience were Holly Grosvenor and her husband James Arsbel, antiques dealer Kevin Peavy and member of the Board Angela Brown Fischer. The slide presentation was fascinating, in that it was a departure from the Symposium’s focus on interiors. Mr. Grementier likened the creation of grand buildings in Argentina to the "Gilded Age" of Newport, relating that there were more European and historical references in Argentina than in Newport, citing Italian, French. Spanish, pre-columbian, Turkish, Estancia-style, and Spanish Colonial precursors.

Ambassador Vilmont and friend

The speaker, who is an advisor to UNESCO and the World Monuments Fund, is a visiting professor at several U.S. Universities, including Notre Dame. He thanked the Preservation Society, and was awarded with sustained applause.

A contingent from Christie's, New York, included Betsy Ray, Melissa Gagen, and Jeff Gross, along with scholar Victor H. Castaneda, Richard and Margo Grosvenor, William and Alison Vareika, Francis Frick, Helen Winslow, and Paul Szapary.

A highly praised session on the designer Josef Hoffman given by Dr. Christian Witt-Dorring, Curator of Decorative Arts at the Neue Galerie, New York, was followed by a book signing by the speaker, and a sassy presentation of the American designers of the 1930’s to 1960’s, by Elle Décor's Mitchell Owens drew an appreciative audience, detailing the celebrity and Hollywood style of glamour introduced in that pivotal era of American design, dropping such names as Syrie Maugham, Billy Baldwin, Cole Porter, Horst, Sister Parrish, and Albert Hadley.