Animated by Design

It’s hard enough to pull off humor in art, much less combine humor and elegance in the same piece. The whole thing can end up a painfully awkward match, like a bad blind date.

When it works, though, the union can be sublime. And Jack Mauch seems to have the touch. Not only can he switch effortlessly from one extreme (his exquisite salt and pepper shakers) to the other (the chicken-legged tavern mug), he can blend the two into one seamless whole.

Case in point: His 2011 end table, with a bold red trefoil as the top, pure midcentury design. But as your eye moves down the piece, the three lobes morph into haunches, ending in a trio of ungulate legs, supporting the piece on the edge of its implicit hooves. A 2011 coffee table accomplishes a similar feat; it’s a clean, beautifully worked surface held up by ... branches? Some kind of delicate miniature deer legs? Or is the table, almost lighter than air, balancing on its tippy-toes?

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