Joe Colombo

JOE COLOMBO (Milan, 1930-1971),
Elda Chair, 1963.
First edition.
Fiberglass frame and green velvet upholstery.
The shell shows slight wear due to use and the passage of time.
Measurements: 95 x 95 x 95 cm.

This is an emblematic piece of Space Age aesthetics. With its bulbous fiberglass shell and its small leather cushions drawing attractive meanders when joined, it debuted on the big screen in a James Bond film (The Spy Who Loved Me, 1977). Joe Colombo, its creator, is known for his retro-futuristic designs. According to the legend about this iconic armchair, after visiting a shipyard that manufactured fiberglass hulls for ships, Joe Colombo was inspired. He appropriated that molding technique for the "Elda" shell. The result was a spacious, futuristic chair in which seven removable cushions are attached to a molded plastic frame on a swivel base. He named it after his wife, Elda.

Architect and designer Cesare Colombo nicknamed "Joe" Colombo, was an artist, architect, furniture, product and interior designer who was essential to Italian design in the 1960s. Trained at the Academy of Fine Arts and Architecture of the Polytechnic University of Milan, where he devoted himself, among other things, to painting, sculpture and drawing, skills that would serve him to develop his career as a designer by creating his own studio in 1962. Throughout the 1960s he collaborated with important publishers such as Kartell, O-Luce and Zanotta. Many of his works are still exhibited in museums around the world and the artist is the subject of periodic retrospectives, studies and exhibitions. During the 1960s, the designer worked mainly on the creation of furniture that stood out for being easily modular, flexible and practical, as is the case with these chairs, which can be transported and adapted to the needs of their user. He focused on a global design, where the furniture elements transcend space and architecture. In this way, Colombo moves towards a form of design that helps the user to save space and time. Some of the Italian designer's most famous works are the "Elda" armchair (1963), the "Continental Library" (1965), the "Universal" (1967) and "Tube" chairs (1969) and the "Chariot Boby" (1969). His career and achievements led him to participate in the XIV Milan Triennale, exhibiting some interior design proposals. In 1964 he won the gold medal at the Milan Triennale with the acrylic table lamp, which is now part of the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art in Philadelphia. In 1972, shortly after his death, his overall furniture project was exhibited in the exhibition "Italy: The New Domestic Landscape" held at the MOMA in New York, realized by ELCO - FIARM, Boffi, Ideal - Standard, with the help of Sormani. In 1984, a retrospective of his work was held at the Museum of Modern Art in Villeneuve. Later, in 2005, the Milan Triennale hosted the retrospective Joe Colombo Inventing the Future.