Max Ingrand "2079" Ceiling Lights for Fontana Arte, 1960, Set of 2

Dimensions
   

Max Ingrand “2079” Ceiling Lights for Fontana Arte, brass and glass, Italy, 1960, set of two.

A short cylindrical brass canopy, fixed with knurled set screws, carries a perforated inner shield and a pierced brass ring that holds a domed opaline glass diffuser. Around it, several beveled glass discs of different diameters are mounted off-axis. Their edges overlap and trace a loose spiral when the fixture is seen from below. The glass shows its tint and depth along the edges. When lit, the light passes through the perforations and the layered discs and throws a pattern onto the ceiling. Ingrand, a French glassmaker and decorator born in Bressuire in 1908, became artistic director of Fontana Arte in 1954 and designed most of the firm’s lighting of the following decade. His ceiling lights of the late 1950s, including the models 2077 and 2088, make cut and worked glass the principal element, supported by a slim metal structure. The “2079” applies the same approach to a compact flush format, and the offset discs give it a presence well beyond its depth.