Old Westbury, NY – An exhibition that has drawn more than 60,000 visitors and garnered press on multiple continents will return to Europe next year, according to New York Institute of Technology Assistant Professor Charles Matz. He is the architect, media producer, and master planner for "Through My Window" (known as "De Ma Fenêtre" in France), an exhibition of digital C prints and watercolor photographs by the Korean artist Ahae on view this past summer at the Jardin des Tuileries at the Musée du Louvre in Paris. There, it occupied the 12,000-square-foot, four-story Bespoke Exhibition Pavilion, where museum-goers saw several hundred photographs selected from nearly three million taken from a single window in the artist's atelier. For three years, Ahae captured South Korea's countryside, from the changing seasons to its retinue of wildlife.

"The artist Ahae is challenging our ingrained limited perception of the natural world," says Matz. "He highlights, through his tireless act, our loss of contact with nature, and ultimately our eventual, possible, optimistic recovery."

Staging the Musée du Louvre's first solo photography exhibition in one of France's famous gardens involved collaboration among several players, including British interior designer Guy Oliver and curators Keith Yoo (Ahae's son) and Henri Loirette, the Musée du Louvre's director. Their vision of a serene haven for contemplating art took shape as an elegant granite pavilion with two large, skylit oval galleries housing the artist's photographs printed on watercolor paper for a color-drenched effect. Visitors entered the garden pavilion by crossing a wooden bridge into a darkened hall lit by a photograph sized to the dimensions of Ahae's atelier window. The design team also produced two public symphonies in tandem with the exhibition for garden visitors.

The mobile exhibition is scheduled to move to Milan in March, where it will be housed within the renown Castello Sforzesco, a 14th century castle, and subsequently at the Venice Biennale. It will return to Paris in the summer, with an installation at the Palace of Versailles. In advance, the book publisher Assouline has released 150 illustrations of Ahae's work in hardcover. The artist, who is also known as an inventor, entrepreneur and environmental activist, extended his influence to high fashion when Giorgio Armani unveiled a 2012 couture line inspired by Ahae's colorful landscape prints.

Matz designed previous incarnations of "Through My Window" for Vanderbilt Hall at Grand Central Station in New York City and the National Gallery in Prague in 2011. His firm specializes in creative direction, planning, and logistics for clients in the fields of architecture, design, media, and fine art. His credentials include registered architect, certified interior designer, and award-winning art director and film/TV producer with international clients such as Viacom, Disney, SONY, and the New York Stock Exchange.

In April, Matz traveled to Italy, where he helped to produce NYIT's design booth at the Milan Furniture Fair, one of only two by U.S. universities at the event's SaloneSatellite exhibition for emerging and new designers. As a recipient of an NYIT research grant, he is conducting a geospatial mapping project to restore five ancient gates in Harar, Ethiopia, a world heritage site designated by the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization. He is also preparing a summer program for 2013 in collaboration with the Musée du Louvre.

2013 Tour Dates

• Milan, March 15-April 31: Castello Sforzesco
  March 26-April 31: Urban Center: Galleria Vittorio Emanuele
• Venice, June 1-Nov. 24: Venice Biennale
• Paris, June 25: Versailles

Exhibition Credits

• Charles Matz: architecture, lighting design, project management, master planning, and concert production
• Oliver Laws: project conception, special events, interior design, concert production
• Buro Happold: structural engineering
• ONECS: project construction and events

Additional Media for "Through My Window"

• "Why Korean Photographer Ahae Gets Special Treatment at the Louvre," DesignWire Daily
• "Photographer Ahae Adds to South Korea's Cultural Revolution," Travel + Leisure magazine
• "Selection of Photographs," Artdaily.org

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Rose Sumer
Writer/Reporter
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