People who live in glass houses throw art parties.
By: Ilene Dube
In the late afternoon of a late September day, the sun casts a golden glow over the Atrium on the Brook, the Belle Mead residence and offices of Anton and Francoise Nelessen.
It’s hard to say just what it is that strikes a visitor first: the tufts of ornamental grass sprouting on the roof, the 75-foot greenhouse, the allée of sculpture by Jonathan Shor (who, at this moment, is carrying what appears to be a baguette but is in fact a wooden appendage to one of his stone works), the Toulouse Lautrec-inspired painting in the entryway, or the 30-foot-tall fig tree arching over the salt-water pool in the greenhouse.
Behind the pool, an aluminum fountain, built by Mr. Shor, sends a soothing sound throughout the modern structure. Ms. Nelessen’s Belgian accent and warmth and Mr. Nelessen’s artwork scattered here and there contribute to the feeling that this space is an incubator for art. And, indeed, the family does nurture artists, and is hosting a celebration of architecture, sculpture and painting Oct. 13 to 15.
The original one-story house was built in 1964 and designed by architect William Thompson, who later became known for his New England style of colonial architecture, most notably in the Castle Howard neighborhood in Princeton.
The modern house on River Road in Belle Mead was designed for a family who lived next door and needed to house an Indonesian art collection, according to Mr. Nelessen. The family lived with the collection for a number of years and sold the house to a Swiss pianist.
After the death of the following owner, the house was vacant for a number of years, and when Hurricane Floyd hit in 1999, it was covered over with mud.
The Nelessens, who had previously restored a 1799 farmhouse in Franklin Township and then restored a Queen Anne-style house on Princeton’s Bank Street in the mid-’90s, first eyed the potential of the Belle Mead house in 1973. In 2000, Ms. Nelessen drove by and saw the house boarded up after Floyd. The house had everything they were looking for: "It was big enough for a place to live and work and close to the water," says Ms. Nelessen. The Bedens Brook burbles through the backyard.
Ms. Nelessen shows a photograph of the swimming pool covered with mud when they bought the house in 2000 it looks as if, well, as if a hurricane had ripped through.
"Everything was left just as it was the last day the owners lived here," says Mr. Nelessen. "Clothes were still in their wrappers, medicines were out, there was food in the refrigerator. Everything was overgrown and under mud." It took 33 dumpsters to haul it all away.
But of course Anton Nelessen, the award-winning urban design guru a self-described urban visioner would have the foresight to see through the mud to find the jewel he and his wife of 34 years could create. A professor at Rutgers University’s Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy and founding member of Princeton Future, the downtown Princeton advocacy group, his company, A. Nelessen Associates, has created downtown redevelopment plans for Milwaukee, Cambridge, Mass., and Atlanta, among many others.
Ms. Nelessen taught at the Waldorf School of Princeton from 1991 to 2005 and retired so she could focus on other projects. In addition to maintaining the indoor garden in the greenhouse that magnificent fig tree, planted in 1965, requires pollarding (a style of pruning) every year, and when it drops its fruit all over the slate floor, that, too, needs attention Ms. Nelessen has been running art workshops in the Atrium on the Brook. Last year, classes in watercolor, Japanese bookbinding, fiber art and clay sculpting were offered in the 30-by-70-foot glass-enclosed space, surrounded by bougainvillea and other tropical plants. Ms. Nelessen, who has done everything from building architectural models to architectural photography and jewelry design, calls herself a "butterfly."
It was through the Waldorf School that the Nelessens met Jonathan Shor. Mr. Shor’s wife, Amy, teaches there, and Mr. Shor had offered one of his stone benches at the school’s auction. The Nelessens tried to get the piece but were outbid and so sought him out to commission a similar bench. Next came the stone fountain by the pool, which circulates the water and hides the plumbing, and then a stone sculpture by the front entryway.
"We liked Jonathan," Ms. Nelessen recounts, and so next came the offer for him to use part of their property as his studio. Not only do they allow the use of the space, but "they are patrons, of a sort, providing shelter, electricity, water and all sorts of good inspiration and support," says Mr. Shor.
It took two years to restore the house. Architect Bill Thompson was consulted on the original plans. "Bill had tears in his eyes because he feared someone might demolish the house," says Ms. Nelessen. "He was so pleased we were restoring it."
The restoration process involved gutting the 7,000-square-foot house. "We just kept the outside walls," says Mr. Nelessen, who holds an undergraduate degree in architecture from the University of Minnesota and a master’s of architecture in urban design from Harvard University. He designed the 1,500-square-foot addition that houses A. Nelessen Associates and its nine employees.
The house uses passive solar heat and hot water, and the green roof all those ornamental grasses up there add insulation reduces the need for air conditioning and extends the roof life.
In addition to about 16 works of sculpture by Mr. Shor, the open house will include more than a dozen paintings by Russian students and 53 paintings by Mr. Nelessen. The urban visioner has been painting since his undergraduate days, and in fact paid for his college education through the sale of his drawings, paintings and sculpture. "I even had enough money to put the down payment on a car," he adds.
Some of his paintings on view are from the "Embedded" series, in which he uses disassembled computer parts embedded in roof tar and oil paint. He compares these to Jackson Pollack’s paintings in which cigarettes were embedded on canvas. Blacks and silvers dominate the palette, and one wall of the atrium, painted black, is covered with a silvery painting of Doric columns. "It’s a spoof, having this classic style painted in a modern house," Mr. Nelessen says, adding how it looks best when lit at night.
Ms. Nelessen grew tired of all the black and white and craved color, so she set up one room of the house as her office and filled it with brightly colored paintings. The couple has collected artwork since they were married, and sell the paintings so they always have something fresh on display. During the 16 years they lived in the farmhouse in Franklin Township, they collected more traditional artwork. When they moved to the Queen Anne house on Bank Street, they collected Queen Anne style furnishings and bibelots, and continue to rent that property with all its period accoutrements, which would clash with the modern Belle Mead abode.
"It’s wonderful to have all this creativity happening here," says Ms. Nelessen. The next project is to have a cloth sail installed on the roof to balance the lower side of the house with the side that holds the offices.
The Russian paintings that will be for sale are from a trip to St. Petersburg. There, the couple met a dealer with "a vast number of canvases," says Mr. Nelessen. "I have not seen paintings of this quality at this naive price. The Russian schools take you through this realism that schools in America no longer do. If it all sells, I’ll go back and buy more. If it doesn’t sell, we’ll wind up with great paintings, but the house gets full so we need to keep it moving."
The Nelessens have three sons: Guillaume, a professional bicyclist; Mathieu, who works for the Special Olympics; and Zebulon, an architecture student at Parsons School of Design. All three sons form a cycling team that competes on the state level.
Outside, there is a sculpture by Guillaume and an amphitheater where the family holds poetry readings and small concerts.
"It’s been so nice to work here," says Mr. Shor, who works out of an open-air studio that can be enclosed when the colder weather comes. "It’s open and attractive, and people are coming in and out."
The piece for which he has made the baguette-like appendage out of cedar is based on a lily stamen, and the stone is polished smooth. Mr. Shor says he’d like to make a grove of them.
A Celebration of Architecture, Sculpture and Painting, featuring the sculpture of Jonathan Shor and the paintings of Anton Nelessen at the Atrium on the Brook, 49 Millstone River Road, Belle Mead, will begin with a preview Oct. 13, 4 p.m.-dusk, and continue Oct. 14, 2-6 p.m. and Oct. 15, 2-4 p.m. For information, call (908) 874-8770 or e-mail [email protected] or [email protected]. For information about upcoming classes, beginning Nov. 11, e-mail [email protected]