Illogical Irreverence
Houston House & Home
May 2001, Vol. 8 No. 5
written by Melanie Gilbronson
photos by Laura Chiles
You could say that Kelly Gale Amen, ASID, TAID, created his personal world from an “artsy big bang.” Every room of his home explodes in artistic exaggeration, color contradiction and dramatic interpretation. Shocking colors, extraordinary textures and unusual layerings amalgamate to form a remarkably comfortable macrocosm that dissipates the normal boundaries between nature and shelter. Some people might comprehend his world, and most probably don’t. Kelly himself is an enigma, a charming man of mystery whose dedication to the world of design is evident in his unsurpasses passion for the subject.
He calls his world the “The KGA Compound.” The compound is a secluded inner-city environment in three buildings. The first two, a bungalow-style home and a double garage with a second-story apartment, were purchased by Kelly in 1980. the third building, a second turn-of-the-century bungalow, was added last year to prevent his coveted world from being engulfed by town homes. Contemporary Houston artist John Palmer, with whom Kelly is collaborating on a custom-designed line of canvas upholstered furniture and Compound sculptures, uses the second bungalow as a residence and art studio. “Growth is what the third house is about,” says Kelly. “Projects. Collaboration. Adventure. Change. This keeps us young at heart and full of new energy.”
A graduate of interior design from the University of Oklahoma, Kelly is one of Houston’s – and the country’s – most highly regarded interior designers. The span of his work encompasses not only homes and lofts but yachts and even a trailer. His custom-designed benches can be found in Houston’s Museum of Natural Science, and his work has been showcased on the television show “Lofty Ideas.” He was also one if eight designers featured by Traditional Home magazine in their 1998 book, Signature Style. The book features a home beautifully dressed with romantic fabrics, traditional furniture and complex but pleasing chromatic harmonies. Touches of the exotic side of his design style are evident in his use of interesting pillows and custom-designed cast metal furniture. “What I’m known for is color, juxtaposition and usage of mirror,” says Kelly. “I have no fear.”
The lack of fear is unprecedented in Kelly’s own home, an artistic universe where there are no normal design rules. A flare of creative energy from his artistic subconscious has united the drama of his home’s interior world with the reality of its exterior world. He stretches the envelope, trips the light fantastic and produces a world of surreality. Each space is seemingly unrelated, yet you feel a fluid energy as you move through the rooms and interact with the home. “You’re not really living in Houston,” says Kelly, deliberating on life in the KGA Compound. “You’re living anywhere in the world, and there is an assimilation of objects. Things I love. Things I’ve collected.”
You can only appreciate Kelly’s world if you think out of the box, reach to a higher artistic plane and go where you may have never gone before. At first glance, all seems normal when you enter the combination living room/entry in the first bungalow. A cream-colored sofa forms a conversation area with two French-style chairs covered in a raspberry velvet. Some unusual pillows constructed of painted canvas in curious shapes might give you the first hint something out of the ordinary is taking place. A bold neon light dips down like a short lightning bolt, then sizzles across a moody sky painted by John in a mottled combination of olive green splotched with red, black and yellow. “This is the conventional use of objects in a nonconventional format, ” says Kelly. “No reverence. Lots of illogical irreverence.”
Mirrors covering walls throughout the home supports a surrealistic sense that, in his life and his work, Kelly erases the boundaries. “The usage of mirror is the ability to see what we know in various forms or vistas,” says Kelly, confidently strolling through his home explaining his principles of design, then drifting into a stream of subconscious thoughts. “Layers, flotation, surreal, reflection. and we become another form of that image.” In Kelly’s home, you not only mix and mingle with the art, you become the art.
“Dante’s Inferno” is the name Kelly has bestowed upon the guest bedroom. Layers and layers of paint on the canvas form a highly textured black backdrop and a moving pattern of red erupts in an outburst of fire. “This room began in raspberry for a photo shoot, and then became darker and darker. Then there was the possibility of fire and the addition of motif and more motif. Now the walls are covered with art in canvas form, and the room is filled with the KGA Compound bed in gesso.” Kelly stokes the unpredictable by placing a massive white bed in the midst of the hell he created. “Everybody has their headboard set against the wall looking into the room,” says Kelly. “This KGA bed is placed to look into the garden and to watch nature and to be a part of life. It’s classic. It’s simple. It swirls into a whole other dimension. Traditional? No. Beautiful? Yes.”
The parlor and the music room complete the first bungalow’s livable spaces. In the parlor, a mirrored wall displays a painting with a man’s exaggerated Pinocchio-like nose and reflects a series of photographs of a Greek figure on the opposite wall. “The art is suspended from a cord or wire so as not to define the exact location or placement,” say Kelly. “It is floating. The movement is freeform.” On the floor, Kelly layers the geometric designs of one jewel-tone rug against the pastel tones of another. Two walls are painted a vivid lime green, and a swirl of colors forms another daring ceiling. One of the chairs encircling a glass-topped table boasts a fabric brassiere, one of Kelly’s design siganatures. “John has experienced the painting process of this,” says Kelly, pointing to a fringed love seat upholstered in a canvas. ” He’s not really interested in painting grandmother’s furniture.” In Kelly’s home, the unexpected is always expected.
The music room is symbolic of Kelly’s childhood interests. A large black and white mural by Dewitt Godfrey sits on a wall above the piano. His favorite painting by John, in the form of three panels placed one on top of the other, defines a wall behind the piano, and a wooden pyramid, a limited edition from Michael Tracy’s 1980s collection, informs the room with Kelly’s enthusiasm for art. “I know the artists and I am interested in what they are doing,” says Kelly. A spiral staircase in the music room leads to a bridge that connects the bungalow to the second-story garage apartment.
The glass-enclosed bridge communes with nature floating amidst the foliage of timber bamboo. A wingback chair and a compound sculpture dog bed, upholstered in water buffalo and a Mexican rug, set the stage for Kelly’s favorite place. The garage apartment serves as Kelly’s master suite. His bedroom is simply furnished with a wooden framed bed, a side table and an animal print ottoman. A table topped with a diamond-shaped mirror exhibits the objects of his personal shrine. “Everything that’s on here has been given to me,” he says. “It’s a myriad of memorabilia. My baby shoes. Gifts from friends that have died. It’s all pure, raw, perfect activity.”
Outside, an inviting lap pool sits behind the second bungalow recently renovated for John’s use. “The black and red color scheme of the second home complements the red roof of the white houses, keeping the reflection the same,” says Kelly. “The same, yet different.” Inside, as in the first two buildings, Kelly is adament about keeping the home’s historic integrity intact. Beadboard-clad ceilings and walls are simply painted. Moldings and hardwood floors are refinished.
The second bungalow’s dining room and living room exhibit John’s artwork in the form of paintings, Compound sculptures and pieces of furniture. “I entitle my art escapism,” says John. “John’s paintings are like my interiors,” quips Kelly. The most engaging art form is the center panel of a triptych John has created, a five-square by five-square filled with a Compound sculpture. One side of the complete gridded panel is a colorful painting and the other is the same image in black and white. the sculpture can be interchanged to form 250 different combinations. More simply put, the pieces could be described as interactive art.
Kelly is a nonconformist who has plumbed the depths of his imagination in his personal domain, the KGA Compound. “I am exhausted from being different,” says Kelly. “I would just like to be normal for five hours.”
You don’t have to understand his world; you simply enter and become a part of it. “Life is the ability to be the art form, either in the reflection of the mirror or the reflection of the action of the energy,” says Kelly. “This is what the creative process is, and each piece and each effect is part of this.”
