Arteluce Biography
The Italian lighting design company Arteluce (1939 – 1973) was founded in 1939 by the young Venetian designer-entrepreneur Gino Sarfatti. The political upheavals of the time forced Sarfatti to abandon his degree in aeronautical engineering in Genoa and move with his family to Milan. There, despite a lack of formal training in design, Sarfatti pursued a career in lighting. During World War II, Sarfatti fled to Switzerland, returning to Milan after the war to restart his company. In 1951, the first Arteluce store opened in the lively Corso Vittorio in central Milan. The store was redesigned by Marco Zanuso in 1953. Arteluce's second store, located on the charming Via della Spiga, was designed by Sarfatti's long-time friend and fellow lighting designer Vittoriano Viganò in 1961. Arteluce quickly established itself as a visionary and successful lighting brand thanks to Sarfatti's commitment to technical, material and production research. He designed over 400 lamps in his life, which are celebrated for their minimalist yet expressive aesthetic and experimental materials. In the mid-1950s he began working with Plexiglas and, in the early 1970s, pioneered the use of halogen bulbs in fixtures. Sarfatti has also dedicated himself to improving every single element of a lighting fixture, from the switch to the wiring and reflectors. The ultra-minimal model 1063 (1954) would influence Italian floor lamp design for years to come. It won the prestigious "Grand Prix" at the Milan Triennale and is known as the most eloquent example of Sarfatti's purist vision of beauty in everyday objects. In the same year Arteluce received the ADI Compasso d'Oro for the Model 559 and again the following year for the Model 1055. In the 1960s, Arteluce became a creative center for the most talented Italian designers, producing projects by great talents, such as Franco Albini, Cini Boeri, Franca Helg, Ico Parisi and Massimo Vignelli. The lighting system for the Teatro Regio in Turin, one of Arteluce's last projects, which included hundreds of hanging plexiglass tubes installed under the direction of legendary architect Carlo Mollino in 1972, is considered one of the company's greatest successes. In 1973 Sarfatti sold his business to Flos and retired to Lake Como. Many Arteluce creations are still in production today, and several original models are permanently kept in important museums such as the MoMA in New York. Somewhat forgotten after the merger with Flos, Sarfatti's designs are experiencing a renaissance among vintage collectors following the first retrospective exhibition of his work at the Triennale Design Museum in Milan in 2012.
