Veronica Etro s English grandmother, Audrey, used to bind her books in the beautiful fabrics that draped the Etro family s life. In each volume, she d write the time and place she read the book. That s how we know the prints Veronica lifted from her gran s library for her show today were from the 1940s. Graphic, abstract, naïve, whimsical, they were the meat of the collection. Yes, Veronica paraded the family s signature paisley, splintered, collaged, and mutated, but it was those prints that captured the imagination. And she let them sing in fluid, wrapped shapes. True, there was a metal spine to the collection—the placket trailing down a blouse, for instance—but its essence was deconstruction. Maybe it was the Donna Summer remix on the soundtrack that cued the free and easy disco spirit. Whatever the cause, this was a collection that felt fresher and more alive than usual.
