Set of Six Rare Piero Fornasetti Arcimboldesca Motif Vegetable Face Plates
View Similar Items
Set of Six Rare Piero Fornasetti Arcimboldesca Motif Vegetable Face Plates
About the Item
- Creator:Fornasetti (Designer)
- Dimensions:Height: 0.2 in (5.08 mm)Diameter: 9.25 in (23.5 cm)
- Sold As:Set of 6
- Style:Mid-Century Modern (Of the Period)
- Place of Origin:
- Period:
- Date of Manufacture:1960s
- Condition:
- Seller Location:Downingtown, PA
- Reference Number:Seller: NY81401stDibs: LU86102266822
Fornasetti
The Italian artist, illustrator and furniture maker Piero Fornasetti was one of the wittiest and most imaginative design talents of the 20th century. He crafted an inimitable decorative style from a personal vocabulary of images that included birds, butterflies, hot-air balloons, architecture and — most frequently, and in some 500 variations — an enigmatic woman’s face based on that of the 19th-century opera singer Lina Cavalieri. Fornasetti used transfer prints of these images, rendered in the style of engravings, to decorate an endless variety of furnishings and housewares that ranged from chairs, tables and desks to dinner plates, lamps and umbrella stands. His work is archly clever, often surreal and always fun.
Fornasetti was born in Milan, the son of an accountant, and he lived his entire life in the city. He showed artistic talent as a child and enrolled at Milan’s Brera Academy of Fine Art in 1930, but was expelled after two years for consistently failing to follow his professors’ orders. A group of his hand-painted silk scarves, displayed in the 1933 Triennale di Milano, caught the eye of the architect and designer Gio Ponti, who, in the 1940s, became Fornasetti’s collaborator and patron. Beginning in the early 1950s, they created a striking a series of desks, bureaus and secretaries that pair Ponti’s signature angular forms with Fornasetti’s decorative motifs — lighthearted arrangements of flowers and birds on some pieces, austere architectural imagery on others. The two worked together on numerous commissions for interiors, though their greatest project has been lost: the first-class lounges and restaurants of the luxury ocean liner Andrea Doria, which sank in 1956.
Fornasetti furnishings occupy an unusual and compelling niche in the decorative arts: they are odd yet pack a serious punch. They act, essentially, as functional sculpture. A large Fornasetti piece such as a cabinet or a desk can change the character of an entire room; his smaller works have the aesthetic power of a vase of flowers, providing a bright and alluring decorative note. The chimerical, fish-nor-fowl nature of Fornasetti’s work may be its greatest strength. It stands on its own. Bringing the Fornasetti look into the future is Barnaba Fornasetti, who took the reins of the company after his father's death.
- Piero Fornasetti Ceramic Arcimboldesca-Motif Vegetable Face PlatesBy Piero FornasettiLocated in Downingtown, PAPiero Fornasetti Pottery Arcimboldesca-Motif Vegetable Face Plates, After Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Set of Nine, Circa 1970s. The plates are after Giuseppe Arc...Category
Vintage 1970s Italian Mid-Century Modern Dinner Plates
MaterialsCeramic
- Piero Fornasetti Pottery Arcimboldesca-Motif Vegetable Face PlatesBy Piero FornasettiLocated in Downingtown, PAPiero Fornasetti Pottery Arcimboldesca-Motif Vegetable Face Plates, After Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Arcimboldesca Pattern, Set of Twelve, Circa 1955 The 1950s pottery plates with a wide ...Category
Vintage 1950s Italian Mid-Century Modern Dinner Plates
MaterialsCeramic
- Piero Fornasetti Pottery Arcimboldesca Vegetable Face PlateBy Piero FornasettiLocated in Downingtown, PAPiero Fornasetti Pottery Arcimboldesca Vegetable Face Plate, After Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Number 12, Circa 1960's. The pottery plates are after Giuseppe Arc...Category
Mid-20th Century Italian Mid-Century Modern Dinner Plates
MaterialsCeramic, Pottery
- Piero Fornasetti Arcimboldesca Vegetable Face Plates, After Giuseppe ArcimboldoBy Piero FornasettiLocated in Downingtown, PAPiero Fornasetti Pottery Arcimboldesca Vegetable Face Plates, After Giuseppe Arcimboldo, A Pair, Circa 1955 The pottery plates are after Giuseppe Arcimboldo- the design of a face c...Category
Vintage 1950s Mid-Century Modern Dinner Plates
MaterialsCeramic, Pottery
- Barnaba Fornasetti Calendar Plate for 2013 with Piero Fornasetti Self PortraitBy FornasettiLocated in Downingtown, PABarnaba Fornasetti Calendar Plate for 2013, with Piero Fornasetti Self Portrait, #518 of 700 The plate depicts an image of Piero Fornase...Category
2010s Italian Mid-Century Modern Porcelain
MaterialsPorcelain
- 1960 Piero Fornasetti Porcelain Astronomici Plate, #7 in SeriesBy FornasettiLocated in Downingtown, PA1960 Piero Fornasetti porcelain plate with number 7 in the Astronomici series. Astronomici means "Astronomics". This is a rare pattern in black and ...Category
Mid-20th Century Italian Mid-Century Modern Porcelain
MaterialsPorcelain
- Piero Fornasetti Rare Vintage Matador & Bull Porcelain Dinner Plates Set of SixBy FornasettiLocated in North Miami, FLThese wonderful hard to find and hard to come by complete set of RARE wonderful bullfight black and white vintage Mid-Century Modern porcelain dinner plates are the genius work and i...Category
Vintage 1950s Italian Mid-Century Modern Porcelain
MaterialsPorcelain
$4,640 Sale Price / set20% Off - Piero Fornasetti Porcelain Set of 8 Gilted Astrolabe PlatesBy Piero FornasettiLocated in Paris, FRPiero Fornasetti 1913-1988 lived and worked in Milano and he was very fond of science. This series normally is composed of 12 designs about astrolabe or "Astrolabos" in Greece which ...Category
Vintage 1960s Italian Dinner Plates
MaterialsPorcelain
- Ceramic Plate with Vegetable Face FornasettiBy FornasettiLocated in Atlanta, GAFornasetti porcelain plate with face made with arranged vegetables. Stamped 11, Fornasetti-Milano, Made in Italy, Arcimboldesca'" and "Arzberg Germany...Category
Late 20th Century Italian Modern Dinner Plates
MaterialsCeramic
- Ceramic Plate with Vegetable Face FornasettiBy FornasettiLocated in Atlanta, GAFornasetti porcelain plate with face made with arranged vegetables. Stamped "2, Fornasetti-Milano, Made in Italy, Arcimboldesca'" to the underside.Category
Late 20th Century Italian Modern Dinner Plates
MaterialsCeramic
- Ceramic Plate with Vegetable Face FornasettiBy FornasettiLocated in Atlanta, GAFornasetti Porcelain Plate with face made with arranged vegetables. Stamped "6, Fornasetti-Milano, Made in Italy, Arcimboldesca'" and "Arzberg Germany...Category
Late 20th Century Italian Modern Dinner Plates
MaterialsCeramic
- Ceramic Plate with Vegetable Face FornasettiBy FornasettiLocated in Atlanta, GAFornasetti Porcelain plate with face made with arranged vegetables. Stamped "1, Fornasetti-Milano, Made in Italy, Arcimboldesca'" and "Arzberg Germany...Category
Late 20th Century Italian Modern Dinner Plates
MaterialsCeramic