In partnership with creative director Matthew Mazzucca and Barneys’ team, the Haas Brothers created an imaginative universe that offers an interpretation of the Earth through the ages, with some of the Haas’ recurring characters coexisting across eras ranging from the planet’s beginning to the far distant future. Through animation and sculpture, four of these epochs will be depicted in Barneys’ Madison Avenue window displays, illustrating four phases of time: Primordial, Utopia, Millennium, and a vision of the future that’s been titled Mushroom Singularity. Each will see appearances by Haas characters like Rainbow Baggins—a rainbow-striped zebra—Rhinona Wyder, and more. The Madison Avenue windows, as well as interpretations at flagship locations across the country. Click here to read our 2015 interview of the Haas Brothers.
Getting Afreaky: Check Out Our Interview and Studio Tour Of The Mystical Creative Force of Nature That Is The Haas Brothers →
The Haas brothers seem like mystical ambassadors from the future. However, they are not here to portend of doom and gloom, like the current headlines may lead you to predict. Indeed, the future looks pretty bright according to Nikolai and Simon Haas – fraternal twins who make high-end sculptural objects that only the very lucky can afford, but are almost talismanic in their complexity and humorous in their intentional simplicity. The materials the brothers use mimic natural and rare phenomena in nature. This gives their work a sexual energy that takes phallic and vaginal forms, replete with folds and shafts and rounded curves that could make the prudish contingent quite sensitive. Put the work together and it looks like a combination of Maurice Sendak's menagerie of Wild Things and Dr. Seuss on too many tabs of acid. Click here to read the interview and see more pictures.