Piero Fornasetti Dreams: A May 2016 Collection of Fornasetti Ceramics.

Piero Fornasetti Dreams

May Collection 2016 from Earle D. Vandekar of Knightsbridge, Inc. 1

Left:

Three Piero Fornasetti Astronomici Plates, #4, 5 & 7 in Series, 1955.

Diameter: 10 inches.

Reference:

Fornasetti: Designer of Dreams, Patrick Mauries, Page 220, colour illustration of the complete set of twelve, the author writes, Astronomical Plates, a set of twelve made in 1955. Fornasetti looked at astronomy in 17th-century terms when it was not distinguished from astrology.

Fornasetti: The Complete Universe, Barnaba Fornasetti, Page 614, #162 for several illustrated examples.

$875 each

Cover:

A Set of Eleven Rare Piero Fornasetti Plates Anfiteatro (Amphiteater), 1960's.

Please enjoy our new Fornasetti catalogue. This is a small sampling of our collection of works by Piero Fornasetti. The full collection can be seen on our website-Vandekar.com.

info@vandekar.com

Diameter: 10 inches.

Reference: Fornasetti: The Complete Universe, Barnaba Fornasetti, Page 614,, #162 for plates and tureen in this design.

$4500

Please feel free to contact me: 212-308-2022

Each plate is decorated distinctively with different scenes of Rome in black and gold.

Vandekar.com

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A Set of Twelve Vintage Fornasetti Citta di Carte (City of Cards) Plates. 1960-1970's.

Diameter: 8 1/4 inches x 1 inch high.

Reference: Fornasetti: The Complete Universe, Barnaba Fornasetti, Page 610-611 for examples of design and two preparatory watercolours made in 1950.

$4000 3

A Set of Six Piero Fornasetti Plates of Church Domes & one large with red box.

Cupole d'Italia, Circa 1965.

These plates were designed and executed for building contractor Andrea Brenta, Milan, as Christmas presents. One of each was given every year to clients and friends of the contractor's.

Diameters: 9 1/2 inches & 11 3/4 inches.

Reference: Fornasetti: Designer of Dreams, Patrick Mauries, Page 118-119, where it is mentioned that seventeen were made.

Fornasetti: The Complete Universe, Barnaba Fornasetti, Page 614,, #162 for six plates in this design.

$5000 for set of six & $800 for large single.

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A Rare Set of Six Piero Fornasetti Plates with Coats of Armour, Armature Pattern, Numbered 1-6, 1960's.

Dimensions: 10Âź inches diameter x 1 inch high.

Reference: Fornasetti: The Complete Universe, Barnaba Fornasetti, Page 614, #162 for example.

$4750 6

A Complete Set of Twelve Piero Fornasetti Porcelain Plates, Decorated With Sea Anemones, Urchins & Shells, Conchiglie Pattern, Numbered 1-12.

Circa 1960’s.

Dimensions: 9 1/2 inches x 1 1/4 inches high.

Fornasetti's whimsical and colourful Conchiglie pattern features a different sea creature filling the center well of each plate, surrounded by assorted sea animals, shells, mollusks and fishes. While many of the creatures are realistically rendered, there are a few fantastic animals as well.

Each is also numbered from 1-12 Reference: Fornasetti: The Complete Universe, edited by Barnaba Fornasetti, page 608, #140 for a black and white photograph of eight plates with similar elements that were developed as prototypes for this series in 1947.

We also have an additional nine plates from this amazing and rare series.

$6600

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Nine Piero Fornasetti Porcelain Plates, Decorated With Sea Anemones, Urchins & Shells, Conchiglie Pattern, Circa 1960’s.

Diameter: 9 inches.

$5000

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A Rare Set of Six Piero Fornasetti Porcelain Plates with Bird Hunting Objects, Oggetti Caccia, 1950's.

The set of six plates, numbered 1-6, are each decorated with a different set of objects related to different types of bird hunting placed on a faux bois ground.

Dimensions: 10 1/4 inches x 1 inch height.

$4500

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A Set of Six Piero Fornasetti Strumenti Musicali Plates, Numbered 1-6, Early 1960's The plates, a full set of six different numbered plates, depict a different selection of stringed instruments including guitars and lutes on a faux bois ground. Strumenti Musicali translates as Musical Instruments.

Diameter: 10 1/4 inches.

Reference: Fornasetti: The Complete Universe, edited by Barnaba Fornasetti, page 615, #164 for a colour illustration. This series was made in Italian, French and English.

Fornasetti: Designer of Dreams, Patrick Mauries, Page 171, colour illustration of a plate.

Piero Fornasetti: La Folie Pratque, Edited by Patrick Mauries, An Exhibition Catalogue, Page 252, for a colour illustration of a table top with this design from 1950. Piero Fornasetti. La Folie Pratique, the unique and extensive exhibition dedicated to the life and the work of Piero Fornasetti, introduced in 2013 in Italy by Triennale Design Museum and then Paris at the MusĂŠe des Arts DĂŠcoratifs in Paris, 2015.

$5500

A Piero Fornasetti Strumenti Musicali Porcelain Plate, Number 4 in Series. 1960's.

Single plate sold separately.

$550 10

A Piero Fornasetti Serving Tray with Profili Romani Pattern Appetizer Bowls, Early 1960's.

The gold anodized aluminum original tray holds four rectangular appetizer or serving bowls with the Profili Romani design of named ancient Roman busts with a gold rim. This is one of 18 different patterns in this form.

Dimensions: Tray: 19 3/4 inches x 6 inches deep; dishes: 5 1/2 inches x 4 1/4 inches.

Reference: Fornasetti: The Complete Universe, edited by Barnaba Fornasetti, Page 594-595, #101 for examples of form. The trays could be shaped for four, six, eight or twelve bowls.

$1400 11

A Piero Fornasetti Insulator Paperweight, The New Key To Dreams, Late 1950’s Dimensions: Height: 3 3/4" high.

This is a great piece from Italian designer Piero Fornasetti's line of ceramic insulators, cleverly repurposed into paperweight pen rests and decorated with wonderfully wry designs.

This is the very collectible English-language version of The New [Key] to Dreams, a post-Surrealist legend to dream interpretation. If you dream of a mushroom, it may warn of deception....a butterfly, of wantonness....and so on.

This insulator was probably produced by the Ginori factory for Fornasetti's studio.

See: A related paperweight in form and design at the Victoria & Albert Museum, Museum number:C.67-1985

$700

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A Selection of Piero Fornasetti Paperweights, 1950's.

Dimensions: 4 inches x 3 inches x 1 1/2 inches high.

Reference: Fornasetti: The Complete Universe, edited by Barnaba Fornasetti, Page 559, #8 for examples of form-stone-shaped paperweights.

This form was produced in a 132 different designs.

$450-$650 each

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A Selection of Piero Fornasetti Porcelain Recipe Plates, Made for Fleming Joffe, 1960’s.

Diameter: 10 1/4 inches.

Art work created by Andy Warhol for the Fleming Joffe Company

The Fleming Joffe company was a small leather goods company in New York. Fornasetti was not the only famous artist this company worked with. Andy Warhol produced ads and copy for them as well as decorating their show booths and showroom. They also commissioned Ogden Nash to pair his bouncy text with Warhol's drawings.

These plates were given as gifts, two at a time, to Fleming Joffe’s best customers. Fourteen different designs in all were made. Each plate, bar Corfam, represents an animal that the company used to create hides which they sold to high-end clients in the shoe and handbag business. Corfam was an artificial leather that was going to be the next big thing!

$550-$1250 each 14

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A Set of Six Piero Fornasetti Porcelain Uccelli Calligrafici Bird Plates 1962.

Diameter: 8 1/2 inches.

Reference: Fornasetti: The Complete Universe, edited by Barnaba Fornasetti, page 607, #135 for a colour illustration of a table setting created for a show in Stuttgart in 1962 where the table is set with this series which translates as Calligraphic birds.

$2250 set of six or sold separately 18

Piero Fornasetti Tema a Variazioni Piero Fornasetti's most famous work is, without a doubt, his illustrations featuring the face of Lina Cavalieri, an operatic soprano. Fornasetti found her face in a 19th century magazine, turning the black and white image into an iconic representation of his work. It was known as the “Tema e Variazioni� (theme and variation) plate series.

He said: "What inspired me to create more than 500 variations on the face of a woman? I don’t know. I began to make them and I never stopped. "

Diameter: 10 inches Reference:

Fornasetti: Designer of Dreams, Patrick Mauries, page 192. Mauries writes: For Fornasetti, a single product never exhausted the possibilities of an idea.

He loved to let his imagination roam, finding more and more layers of meaning and association in the process. Much of his work, therefore, takes the form of variations on a theme.

Favourite themes include the Sun, playing cards, harlequin, hands andabove all- an enigmatic woman's face that he found in a 19th century French illustrated magazine and which fired him to go on creating image after image until he had turned out over 500, most of them in the form of dinner plates.. They are, in a way, a mediation on the mystery of femininity, the same face appearing, as in a dream, as a moon, a flower, a lake, a mask, a mosaic, a clock, a single disembodied eye.

$650 each 19

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The plate is one of the most unusual Tema E Variazioni plates in the series. It was also used on the slip cover of My Life and Times by Henry Miller (1972). $750 22

Two Rosenthal Fornasetti Temi E Variazioni Motiv 13 & 15, 1980's.

The striking gold-rimmed black and white printed plate depicts a Sargent Pepper-type military jacket with a left hand slipped between two button.

Each button is the face of Lina Cavalieri.

Diameter: 9 1/4 inches.

During the 1980's, Rosenthal helped revive Fornasetti's reputation by using some of his most enduring illustrations on their products.

$700

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A Set of Small Piero Fornasetti Orchestra Coasters, Numbered 1-8, 1960's.

The set of small coasters are numbered from 1-8 and each depict a different assortment of orchestral instruments.

Dimensions: 4 inches x 1/2 inch.

Reference: Fornasetti: The Complete Universe, Edited by Barnaba Fornasetti, Page 601, #123.

$875

A Piero Fornasetti Set of Boxed Coasters of Tall Ships, Velieri Pattern, Circa 1960.

The coasters, each with a different ship and a gilt rim, are boxed within an original blue box with a compass printed on the cover.

Diameter: 4 inches.

$675

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A Set of Eight Mid Century Modern Piero Fornasetti Porcelain Coasters, Antique Drinking Vessels.

Storia Del Bicchiere Pattern.

The rare porcelain set depicts different antique drinking vessels each with a description.Drinking horn belonging to Sigfrido; German Glass Boot shaped XVIII; Venetian Goblet Belonging to Caterina Coraro; The first glass of the first man; Egypt XVIII dynasty Glass belonging to Princess Vsichonsu; Champagne flute of Edwardian epoch; Rhyton or glass of Alexander the great epoch.

Diameter: 4 inches.

$800

A Set of Piero Fornasetti Coaters with Cocktail Recipes in Original Box, 1950's-1960's.

Reference: Fornasetti: The Complete Universe, Barnaba Fornasetti, Page 601, #123.

$800

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A Set of Piero Fornasetti Wine & Liquor Coasters, "Vini E Liquori", 1950's.

The charming complete set of coasters show Gin, Rum, Sherry, Madeira, Port, Rhenish, Brandy and Whiskey. Each coaster is printed in black and white and highlighted in gilt.

Mark: The name of pattern-Vini E Liquori within a bottle, the Fornasetti hand and brush & Fornasetti Milano, Made in Italy and the importer's name- For Rosenfeld Im-

ports Inc..

Diameter: 4 inches.

$800

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A Large Metal Piero Fornasetti Chinoiserie Tray, Piccolo Coramandel (small coramandel), Late 1950's.

The beautiful cream-coloured ground tray is lithographically-decorated and gilded with Chinoiserie designs of Chinese figures amongst exotic buildings. The back is black.

Dimensions: 30 1/4 inches x 22 1/2 inches.

Marks: printed label Fornasetti Milano, Made in Italy (with cleaning instructions).

Reference: Fornasetti: The Complete Universe, Barnaba Fornasetti, Page 543, #178.

$3000

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