Overvalued/Undervalued: Design Miami in New York

Undervalued
Marcel Breuer, "Wassily Chair" (1928), approx. $45,000. On view at Demisch Danant

A highlight of Josh Baer and Suzanne Demisch’s ambitious two-venue art and design show, “In Their Own Words” (at Demisch Danant and Freidman Benda galleries through March 31), this rare and superb design icon still bears its original canvas seat and back, not to mention its bent, tubular, nickeled steel frame.

Conceived during Breuer’s fruitful years at the Bauhaus in Dessau, where he apprenticed and taught, the chair is revolutionary both for its tubular steel design and as a provocative homage to the designer’s fellow Bauhaus prof Wassily Kandinsky. Breuer’s chair bears the geometric rigor of the epoch-making compositions that defined modernism.

You can buy re-issues of the Wassily Chair with chrome-plated tubing for a fraction of the price, but this vintage object, though faded in color and patina, trumps all comers.

Courtesy Demisch Danant