Mattia Bonetti, born May 2, 1952, is a European designer with a thirty-year career. The buyers of his tables, consoles, and cabinets are major collectors of contemporary art. He is one of those masters whose work of art and design converged on the same territory and live by the same rules.
That is why his whimsical tables coexist perfectly with the works of Jeff Koons and paintings by Keith Haring. Today, fans of Mattia Bonetti’s work are enthusiastically studying a weighty two-volume dedicated to his work, which was published by Editions Louvre Victoire. A fundamental work about the experiences of his life and masterpieces was written by two recognized experts, a connoisseur of collection design Jacqueline du Pasquier, and a specialist in arts and crafts of the twentieth century, gallery owner Jean-Jacques Vattel.
Mattia Bonetti was born in Lugano (Switzerland) in the family of an antiquary. Received an art education. He started out as a textile artist and was fond of photography. From 1980 to 2002, he performed in tandem with the talented designer Elisabeth Garust. Together with her, they decorated interiors, and designed neo-baroque furniture.
The Christian Lacroix logo, Nina Ricci perfume bottles, and Paul Ricard bottles with the sun – all made by the duo Garouste & Bonetti. It is no coincidence that speaking of the 1980s, design historians mention three among the key phenomena: the Memphis group, Philippe Starck, and the fantasy art of Garouste & Bonetti. Designers sold their works in galleries and also received interesting interior orders. It was they who designed the house of fashion designer Christian Lacroix, whom they met in the spring of 1987.
“He showed us that he loved,” recalls Mattia Bonetti. “Lacroix talked about Provence, where he grew up, about the Baroque style, about bullfighting, about the art of Islam, about Spain.” All the words uttered by the couturier were somehow refracted in the imagination of the designers, so that as a result of their work on the house, an absolutely dizzying mix of rococo style with boudoir chic of the 19th century, chairs of the 18th century upholstered in crimson, lilac, orange and blue fabrics, furniture with wrought iron legs in the form of intricate arabesques and table bases in the form of toothpicks. But Lacroix was delighted.
Around the same time, Garouste and Bonetti began redecorating the Château de Bouagelou, 63 km from Paris, where Picasso worked in the 1930s. The repair was ordered by the grandson of the famous artist Bernard Picasso. The design, which came up with Mattia Bonetti, was inspired by the master’s cubist period.
Another eminent customer of the pros was Countess Gloria von Thurn und Taxis. She invited Elisabeth Garust and Mattia Bonetti to remodel her private apartment in Regensburg. Mattia decided to find out the tastes of the client and asked what kind of flowers she likes. “Sunflowers,” replied the Countess. And this determined the appearance of the living room with a purple sofa bathed in bright yellow sunflowers, the work of the Parisian embroidery house François Lesage. “The lamps looked like giant pink condoms and all my friends made fun of me! But I have always wanted to live side by side with modern design and contemporary art,” Countess von Thurn und Taxis recalls about the book dedicated to Mattia Bonetti…
Then the professional paths of Garust and Bonetti diverged. Today Mattia works alone, creating only limited editions. Everything created by the master is sold in London ( David Gill Gallery ) and New York ( Paul Kasmin ), and many objects are already in the collections of the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Georges Pompidou Center, and the Guggenheim Museum.
“I am an individualist and always have been,” says the designer. – Mass character disgusts me – both in life and in work. That’s why I don’t like to travel. Before the crisis, there were crowds of people everywhere, wherever you look – the same thing, all megacities have turned into one continuous duty-free shop. I see the point in dividing things in a single copy or in small series. In the world of total animation and serialization, any item created in a single copy has a different value.
I try to make everything unique in my things: the idea, the choice of materials, the method of production… Serial items, as a rule, are made from one material, a maximum of two. I have this figure that comes to 4-5. I like variety, I like to combine plexiglass, wood, and metal. All materials hold their shape differently. Polymers, of course, are universal: the most intricate idea becomes a reality with them.
There have been crises before, lasting 8-10 years. But they did not unsettle me, I just lived day after day and worked. Of course, you quickly get used to good things. Before the crisis, champagne flowed like water, today I switched to red again and I don’t regret it at all. Something else is frightening: a lot of homeless people on the streets of Paris. It hurts to see them because corporations and banks still earn millions. Twenty years ago, Le Corbusier or Eileen Gray originals were bought from antique dealers. There were a few things. Now the market is full of replicas, repetitions, and “stolen” designs. In my opinion, this is the longing for death. It is better to invest in new names, in promising young designers. This is what galleries do, not chain stores.”
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