- Title
- Esfera Lounge Armchair
- Date Made
- 1968, manufactured 1974
- Medium
- Fiberglass, polyester resin, suede, and stainless steel
- Dimensions
- 35 1/2 × 44 × 42 in. (90.17 × 111.76 × 106.68 cm)
- Accession Number
- M.2023.33a-c
- Collecting Area
- Latin American Art
- Curatorial Notes
São Paulo-born designer Ricardo Fasanello first ventured into the world of design with the dream of creating race cars. After relocating to Rio de Janeiro as an adult, he shifted his focus to furniture production. Instead of employing local tropical woods as did many contemporaneous designers in Brazil, Fasanello experimented with new materials such as fiberglass and polyester resin that were frequently associated with industrial design, often combining them with natural leathers. His resulting sculptural furnishings for the home and office represented a significant innovation for modern furniture in Brazil.
The Esfera (Sphere) lounge armchair, first created in 1968, is one of Fasanello’s most famous designs. The designer employed his signature tortoiseshell fiberglass to fashion a half-sphere in which sit suede cushions. This futuristic design reimagines the silhouette of the chair, reflecting Fasanello’s lifelong fascination with speed and aerodynamics. LACMA’s chair swivels on a stainless steel base, which Fasanello used only in his earliest versions of the Esfera. In later versions of the chair, which remain in production to this day, Fasanello replaced the metal base with fiberglass to make the chair lighter. This Esfera is one of two sold to Brazilian ambassador Italo Mastrogiovanni in 1974. Mastrogiovanni’s pair of chairs traveled the world to the ambassador’s postings in Geneva, Porto, and Abidjan, showcasing Brazilian design on an international scale before returning to São Paulo.
Rachel Kaplan, 2023
- Provenance
Italo Mastrogiovanni (1932–2021, São Paulo, Geneva, Porto, and Abidjan), 1974; by inheritance to his wife Mariela Mastrogiovanni, São Paulo, 2021; Andrea Tarnowski Fasanello, Rio de Janeiro, 2022; LACMA, 2023.
