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Entry wall text.
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On a holiday week-end last month, DH and I went to New York City to visit family and take in Suzie Zuzek: The Prints That Made The Fashion Brand at the Cooper-Hewitt museum, on view through January 2, 2022. The first major museum exhibit of her work, this show celebrates the colorful, appealing textile prints created by artist Suzie Zuzek (1920 - 2011) for Key West Hand-Prints and utilized by fashion entrepreneur Lilly Pulitzer.
Ms. Zuzek was a top student in her class at the Pratt Institute; marriage brought her to Florida. Her work for Key West established her style of animated line drawings of closely observed elements of the natural world, combined with bold colors. The silhouettes of Lilly Pulitzer's garments were fairly simple, such as the shift dress below; the print made it special and eye-catching. The dress was designed by Pulitzer in the late 1960's, the fabric, Mum-A-Lily, by Zuzek.
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Shift dress, Lilly Pulitzer, ca. 1969. Print by Zuzek.
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There were relatively few garments in the exhibit; the focus was on the watercolor/gouache drawings from which silk-screens were made in order to hand-print the fabrics. Through the efforts of researcher Becky Smith and others the original drawings were retrieved from storage and are now archived and properly cherished. Several of the drawings are gifts to the museum, and exhibit curator Susan Brown has mounted an excellent, informative exhibit.
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Ensemble, Lilly Pulitzer, 1969. Ponchita's Petunias print, Suzie Zuzek.
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One of Zuzek's designs became the logo of Key West Hand-Prints - Suzie's Suns, below, now in the collection of the Cooper-Hewitt.
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Suzie's Suns, 1965.
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Suzie's Suns, detail.
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After Pulitzer and Zuzek met, more or less serendipitously, all of the print fabrics used by Pulitzer were Zuzek designs. The printed garments were immensely popular and Pulitzer expanded into menswear and items for children. Notably, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and former New York City Mayor John Lindsay sported Pulitzer attire. The wall below, collaged with Zuzek designs, features photos of Onassis, Lindsay, and others, wearing their Lilly's.
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Wall of Zuzek designs, photos of Pulitzer-attired celebs.
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Lilly's Llamas, 1967.
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Lilly's Llamas, detail with "Lilly" worked into the llama fur.
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So closely intertwined were Zuzek designs with Lilly's company, that Zuzek began incorporating the name Lilly into some of her drawings, as in the llama above.
Some of the archived designs have been revived, in a limited way, and the recreation of the silkscreens, on a printing table, is shown below. There was also a looping video showing the steps involved in making a silkscreen fabric. The inclusion of process, not just the end products, elevates this show above other similar exhibits.
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Video of silkscreen process and recreated silkscreen on printing table.
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Color separation silkscreens.
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Zuzek, who later worked in many media and opened an art gallery, was inspired by just about everything. Her designs include imagery one would expect for a tropical seaside locale such as Key West, but Zuzek celebrated foliage, vegetables and especially animals, which were closely observed and, while anthropomorphized, accurately proportioned and detailed in her free pen-and-ink linework.
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The Reef, 1979.
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Tropical Harvest, 1973.
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Sweet Corn, 1972.
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Cole Slaw, 1972.
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Our special treat was a chance encounter with one of Zuzek's daughters, Kathy dePoo (dePoo was Zuzek's married name). She graciously chatted with us for a while, describing life with an engaged, endlessly creative parent always working on a project, and enlisting her children to assist with activities such as organizing and storing bottles and sea glass retrieved from the beach. I apologize the poor quality of the image, which does neither subject justice.
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DH with Zuzek's daughter, Kathy dePoo, visiting from Florida.
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Beach Bottles, 1964.
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The Pulitzer/Key West/Zuzek collaboration continued until 1985
when Pulitzer sold her company. Key West Hand-Prints
ceased production in 2007. I missed out - in the 1990's we took family vacations to the Keys, but I didn't realize I was near a fabric mecca. Happily, an "internet friend" de-accessioned one of her Zuzek dish towels and kindly gave it to me.
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Key Bouquet, Zuzek dish towel.
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Key Bouquet, detail.
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I sent this nice person the exhibition catalog, published by Rizzoli and one of the best contemporary art books I've yet seen. Titled Suzie Zuzek for Lilly Pulitzer: The Art Behind an Iconic American Fashion Brand 1962-1985, the ISBN is 978-0-8478-6764-6. Printed in Italy, the color reproductions are spot on and many of the designs are reproduced at scale (no impossibly tiny images here.)
Finally this exceptional artist is receiving acclaim. Now, we need some of those designs to be re-issued!
