Paul Morris

Paul Morris is a West Village-⁠based artist and the founder of Leeloo + Zohan. His practice spans photography, digital collage, botanical illustration and textile design. Every piece is made to order in editions of 100.

Background

The eye is inherited. Paul is the fourth generation of his family to make pictures. His great-⁠grandfather George A. M. Morris began with the photographer G. W. Pach in 1898 and became his New Jersey successor. His grandfather’s 1942 Kodachrome portraits drew national acclaim in U. S. Camera. Paul learned on his father’s 1959 Nikon F, developing film in a working photographer’s darkroom. He shoots a 2015 Sony A7R II now.

Paul studied at Parsons School of Design and graduated in 1997. There he developed the eye for overlooked beauty that still shapes the work. The geometry of a vintage NYC postcard. The texture of an 1870s botanical plate. The quiet drama of a photograph taken at the right hour. These are the materials his work returns to year after year.

After Parsons came three decades of magazine work. Senior designer on the editorial side of George, the magazine John F. Kennedy Jr. founded. Promotion designer at The New Yorker. Design director at Rolling Stone, The Advocate and Departures. Freelance art director for Vogue, Allure and InStyle. Later creative director of Maui Nō Ka ʻOi Magazine. Magazine work teaches you to decide what deserves the page. The studio applies the same judgment to silk.

The Leeloo + Zohan studio

The studio takes its name from Paul's cats. They are the unlikely muses present for every late night and every breakthrough. It is a design studio first and not a fashion brand. The work is silk scarves, fine art prints and objects. Each one is made to order in an edition of 100, then returned to the archives.

Source material runs from the Library of Congress and other public-⁠domain archives to vintage postcard collections and original photography. Every piece is designed and composed with the rigor the underlying material deserves. What ends up on silk or archival paper should be worth keeping.

What the studio produces

• Silk scarves. Editions of 100 on 100% silk habotai. Three sizes, made to order, shipped to order.
• Fine art prints. Made-⁠to-⁠order photography and compositions on Fuji Crystal Archive paper, acrylic-⁠mounted and ready to hang.
• Custom + trade. Corporate gifting, interior design trade, wholesale inquiries. See our wholesale page.

Selected series

• Vintage Postcards. NYC architecture from postcards printed 1905⁠–⁠1946, reconstructed into modern textiles.
• Botanical Series. 19th-⁠century botanical illustrations, recolored and recomposed.
• American Folk Art. Quilts, samplers, and stencil motifs translated into silk.
• Founders Series. Two designs built around the cats the studio is named for.

Contact

Press, gallery, trade, or custom inquiries: info@leeloozohan.com. Studio visits by appointment. Social: Instagram, Saatchi Art.