A very rare pair of chairs by Fornasetti Studios made in Italy towards the latter end of the 20th century. These chairs are handcrafted using the original artisan techniques. They are silk-screened by hand, hand painted and covered with a smooth lacquer. This particular model is called the “Musicale” chair (or Lyre chair) and it is one of the more sought after models designed by Fornasetti. There is a very limited production of these chairs, these ones dated (1997 and 2000) and numbered (3 of 3, and No.1 respectively) to the reverse and still bears the original manufacturer’s label. These functional yet sculptural items are sure to bring to life any interior thanks to the signature quirkiness so distinctive of Fornasetti furniture.

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 dishes, 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.

Literature: Patrick Mauries Fornasetti Designer of Dreams, Thames & Hudson, page 176 for comparable illustrated chairs. Also, The Life of Piero Fornasetti, 16th May 1998, page 12 for a photograph of Piero Fornasetti seated on an example of these chairs.

Condition: very minor scrapes, otherwise excellent. Please note that although these chairs are an identical pair and were purchased from the same home, they are a matched pair insofar as the years of production are three years apart, 1997 and 2000 respectively. The only visible difference is to the underside, please refer to photographs.

Dimensions: 41cm wide, 94cm high, 45cm deep, seat height 46cm