New York flotsam, but make it art

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New York flotsam, but make it art

Last Friday night, a giant sculpture of an inflatable pigeon beckoned partygoers into “A Beautiful Chaos,” the debut art show by Eugene Serebrennikov and Vicente Morillo, who work together under the moniker Another Day. The exhibit is a hipster hypebeast extravaganza suited to the sleek Williamsburg loft they’ve rented to host it. Psychedelic street signs tower over the entry, and further spectacles await within, like an incandescent park bench, a golden trashcan, a massive parking ticket and a foot-tall Yankees cap. Everything at “A Beautiful Chaos” is over the top. It’s a giant ode to all of New York, from the city’s filthy frenzy to its magic mania. Opening night thrummed with a DJ and crowds of Brooklyn’s top artists.

Morillo declared the whole affair “beautiful,” down to the last attendee. “It’s people I consider family, friends, random people that I never met before,” he told Brooklyn Magazine on opening night. “They fit perfectly with the concept, with the way we understand the beautiful chaos.”

Serebrennikov says that it was Morillo who first uttered those words, “beautiful chaos,” which immediately became the genesis of this exhibit. “As soon as he said those words two years ago, we went off on a tangent, trying to figure out how to highlight the beauty in the chaos of New York,” adds Serebrennikov. “Because it’s even deeper than that. It’s not just New York. Beautiful chaos is life.”

Serebrennikov and Morillo first met about a decade ago. Serebrennikov, who served as Nike Basketball’s art director in Portland, discovered Morillo’s work while sourcing artists to do a project for Kobe Bryant. Not only did Srebrennikov like Morillo’s art style, he also liked his style of working. Morillo was based in Spain and didn’t speak English at the time. The two kept collaborating, though, trading sketches remotely and sharing discussions over Google translate. In 2017, they made the leap, and each moved to New York, where they founded their creative agency Burn & Broad, which has done projects for Mountain Dew, Cardi B and more.