SELENE VICO MAGISTRETTI ARTEMIDE ITALIA - BROWN x 3

The 1960’s saw an intense period of exploration in product design with many embracing the recent advances of industrial plastics. Verner Panton, Joe Colombo, Helmut Batzner and Sergio Mazza were amongst those who had chairs utilising modern plastics in production by the late 60’s. Helmut Batzner’s chair, produced in Germany in 1968, a year before the Selene was seen to lack the flair of its Italian counterpart. The Selene was first conceived by Magistretti in 1961 but it took several years working alongside the technicians and model makers at Artemide to produce the first production model in 1969. It was the S shaped cross section that solved the issue with lateral strength of the legs for Magistretti. “ It cannot be drawn. To draw it I’d have to have drawn at least a hundred cross sections”. The Artemide chair was made from a single sheet of 3mm thick Reglar, a new glass reinforced polyester (GRW). It was first shown in white at the 1968 Triennale di Milano. Production of the Selene started in 1969 with white, red and black models shortly followed in orange in 1970. The Green model here came some time in the early 70’s as there is a preface to it in 1972 in an article by Ottagono magazine along with grey and dark brown. In 1984 came a new inspired pallet of yellow, light blue and pink for the aesthetically radical Los Angeles Olympics. Artemide’s production of the chair ceased in the 1990’s then Heller reissued nylon and polycarbonate (colour dependant) injection moulded versions in 2002. Magistretti’s Selene was featured in Italian Design at the Hallmark Gallery in New York City in 1968, MOMA’s exhibition Italy: The New Domestic Landscape in 1972 and used extensively on the set of the British TV series Space 1999 during its run from 1975 - 77.