The Art of Stillness: Laura Bartlett on Curation, Space, and Meaning
people • DESIGNERS
Laura Bartlett is a London-based curator and art advisor renowned for her nuanced approach to contemporary art and design. With a career that began at Gagosian's inaugural London gallery, she has since cultivated a distinctive curatorial voice that emphasises materiality, light, and the emotional resonance of space. Through her practice, Bartlett continues to bridge the worlds of fine art and interior design, offering a perspective that is both intellectually rigorous and deeply personal. In this interview, she invites us to discover notable design innovators and her poetic approach to art curation.
Words: designeers
APRIL 2025
WEBSITE: laura-bartlett.com INSTAGRAM: @laurabartlett_london
DESIGNEERS
Your journey into art curation has been remarkable. If you had to describe your curatorial style in three words, what would they be?
Laura Bartlett
Poetic, Thoughtful, Process-driven.
DESIGNEERS
What was the very first piece of art you ever purchased (or wished you had)?
Laura Bartlett
Having worked with artists since my early 20s, I’ve been lucky to have been given meaningful pieces over the years, but the first thing I actually purchased for myself was a small lithograph by Françoise Gilot from the 1950s. I often draw, and there’s a peacefulness and a simplicity in her use of lines that resonates with me.
DESIGNEERS
If you could time travel to any art movement or era, where would you go and why?
Laura Bartlett
I’d like to have been part of the Black Mountain College community in the 1940s and 50s—an iconic gathering of notable design innovators whose influence resonates with Bartlett’s vision today. The way artists, writers, choreographers, musicians, and thinkers came together there feels incredibly alive to me — that fusion of disciplines, where making and thinking weren’t separate.
I imagine sharing ideas over meals, watching performances unfold in real-time, and learning by doing. The teaching of Josef and Anni Albers, with their focus on perception, material, and process, would have been incredibly formative. But it’s also artists like John Cage and Cy Twombly and their experimental approaches to sound and visual language that I’d have loved to experience. The interwoven nature of their practices, always searching and redefining, would have been an exciting environment to be part of. The openness, the spirit of experimentation, and the allowance for failure as part of the process felt both radical and profoundly human.
DESIGNEERS
What’s the one piece of advice you give to collectors who are just starting their journey?
Laura Bartlett
I would ask them to think about their most meaningful or interesting belongings and apply that mindset to the art they’re drawn to, rather than worrying about where it will go until after the purchase.
DESIGNEERS
Art and interiors often go hand in hand. How do you think people can curate their spaces with art in a way that feels meaningful?
Laura Bartlett
An artwork brings a certain voice to a space. It doesn’t always have to be the lead singer in the room and can have a presence in lots of different ways, but it’s vital that it contributes something unique and connecting.
“There’s something deeply compelling about how simplicity, form, and space can evoke absence and restraint, creating a quiet, reflective space within the artwork.”
Laura Bartlett
DESIGNEERS
If you could have dinner with any three artists, living or dead, who would they be, and what’s on the menu?
Laura Bartlett
I'd love to be transported to Florence to the studio of Piero della Francesca and have a simple rustic meal served while asking him questions about his process. His serene visual language and cool palette have always intrigued me.
Robert Rauschenberg in the late 1960s, New York. It sounds like he was great company—intellectual, warm, and entertaining—and I think his work is important. We’d eat at a dinner and go back to one of his parties on Lafayette Street.
Lastly, I’d spend an evening with Leonora Carrington, who was rebellious, witty and an important figure in the surrealist movement. She’d be an inspiring company. We would probably meet in Mexico, where she lived, and eat local food over many hours discussing art, feminism and her fascinating life story.
DESIGNEERS
What’s next for you? Any upcoming projects or collaborations you’re particularly excited about?
Laura Bartlett
I am looking forward to curating an outdoor sculpture exhibition at Rochester Square, in Camden, this summer. The garden has an informal and unkempt layout, which is very appealing. The show will be called Fauna and will be an opportunity to focus on representations of animals and mythic beasts. I am an unfulfilled naturalist, so this is a way to bring my interests together.
DESIGNEERS
If you had to curate a project based on your current obsessions, what would be the theme?
Laura Bartlett
I’d love to curate a project exploring the intersection of minimalism, spirituality, and natural forms. There’s something deeply compelling about how simplicity, form, and space can evoke absence and restraint, creating a quiet, reflective space within the artwork. I’m particularly drawn to the Japanese abstract movement at the moment, where this approach invites contemplation and offers an almost meditative experience. It feels like a space worth protecting in these chaotic times.
