Miami Herald : Water Woes and Wonders at Design Miami 12/04/19

“Miami artist Emmett Moore’s ingenious take on water references the ocean freighters that ship used clothing from Miami to the Caribbean and Latin America. “When I was in high school I would see clothing in warehouses that were piled to the rafters and wondered where it is coming from and where it is going,” Moore said. He soon discovered Miami was a hub for the collection of used clothing from as far away as Canada. In an homage to the recycling effort and the colorful design that shipping containers make when stacked in freighters that ply the Miami River, Moore decided to make a wall cabinet from used t-shirts. He coated the colorful shirts in epoxy and fashioned them into a shelving unit he calls “Express,” a nod to the “Tropical Express” one of the shipping freighters involved in the used clothing trade. Moore, who created the work in his Little Haiti gallery, is represented by Nina Johnson. At the fair, Moore teamed up with Rodman Primack, former executive director of Design Miami/, who recently opened a design gallery in Mexico City called AGO Projects.” -Siobahn Morrisey

RISD XYZ Fall/Winter 2019/20 "T-Shirts Transformed"

“Danica Sunbeam, a fall solo show of functional sculpture and other objects made mostly from recycled t-shirt, takes its name from one of the freighters in Florida that regularly carts away tons of used t-shirts destined for developing countries throughout the world.

As he watched this endless stream of consumer waste leave from the ports of Miami, Emmett Moore 10FD began playing with the material himself to create a range of 3D objects. The vibrant and highly textured chairs, tables and other furnishings that emerged make marvelous reuse of an unwanted commodity.

The work included in his second solo show at Miami’s Nina Johnson gallery (which represents him) simultaneously references 20th-century supply chains.

Danica Sunbeam gave Moore an opportunity to “turn his eye for irony and material refinement towards third-world economies and disposable consumerism,” as the exhibition statement puts it, “allowing viewers to reconsider the everyday materials and forms of the surrounding world.”

Architectural Digest : These Rug Collaborations Have Us Floored

Emmett Moore for Odabashian

When rug manufacturer Odabashian asked Emmett Moore to create his first line of carpets, the Miami-based designer and sculptor looked back to the basics: checks and stripes. “I always start with the archetypes and break those down,” he explains. This time, he meant that quite literally. “I didn’t like how rigid these motifs were. It was counter to the material.” So he printed out images of patterns, laid them out on the ground, and physically wore them down, stomping on the paper and letting cars drive over the scraps. (“It was kind of liberating.”)

A few proved unusable, but most he scanned, pieced back together into digital collages, and overlaid with stock photos of traditional stone flooring like marble or terrazzo. “After they were damaged, they had a much more natural feel,” says Moore, who debuted five one-of-a-kind rugs, each a work of art, with Nina Johnson gallery at the Collective Design fair in March. ninajohnson.com —Hannah Martin