“Pieces From a Larger Puzzle,” an exhibition devoted to the work of the Italian architect and designer Gaetano Pesce, opens today at the Italian Cultural Institute in Los Angeles. The exhibition — the first of the iconoclastic designer’s work to be shown on the West Coast — provides a comprehensive overview of Pesce’s remarkable 40-year career and includes prototypes, production models and rarely seen video footage.
Much of the work on display is from the collection of Michael and Susan Rich, a Los Angeles couple who have been acquiring Pesce’s work over the last 15 years. The first gallery includes many of the designer’s most iconic pieces, from the late-1960s “Up” series to the Tramonto a New York sofa, which resembles a bright orange sun setting behind New York’s skyline. Visitors will also be able to see some of Pesce’s recent work, including customizable, limited-edition plastic shoes from the Brazilian company Melissa. In the second gallery, the curators make the connection between student and teacher by displaying fragile objects, including invitations and book covers made of resin, in cases designed by Scarpa’s son Tobia. The exhibition is on view through Aug. 31.
The exhibition curators — John Geresi, a banker who is also a design aficionado; Peter Loughrey, the director of LA Modern Auctions; and Francesca Valente soccer jerseys, the director of the Italian Cultural Institute — have done the same with their witty installation design. Pesce’s misshapen, brightly colored resin and plastic vases are displayed on an ad hoc bookshelf made of plywood planks balanced on the rungs of an industrial stepladder, while tables, chairs and sofas sit on rough wooden shipping pallets, as if they’ve just been uncrated.
Pesce, who is known for his experiments with industrial materials like polyurethane foam, resin and plastics, celebrates the unconventional in his evocative, boldly colored furniture and objects. Influenced by both the highly detailed work of his teacher soccer jerseys, the influential architect and designer Carlo Scarpa, and by the Arte Povera movement’s use of everyday, often crudely constructed materials, Pesce fuses both high and low in his work.
Courtesy Collage Classics, Dallas, Photograph by John Geresi. A view of the exhibition with the Golgotha chair, made of cloth impregnated with resin, one of Pesce’s earliest experiments with industrial materials.
Courtesy Los Angeles Modern Auctions (LAMA). The exhibition “Gaetano Pesce: Pieces From A Larger Puzzle soccer jerseys,” includes a 1985 prototype (from the collection of Michael and Susan Rich) of I Feltri, a stylized version of the classic wingback chair made of resin-infused felt. Photo courtesy Los Angeles Modern Auctions (LAMA).
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