November 18, 2021 marks the 130th anniversary of the birth of Italian designer, architect and publisher Joe Ponti. His bright career is an example of how art becomes a way of life, and each new work translates the ideas of its creator. We recall the life story of Joe Ponti and his projects. 

The Denver Museum of Art designed by Joe Ponti. Photo: Getty Images

In one of Ponti’s interviews to the question “How is architecture born?» he replied: «From the inside”» Perhaps such an answer characterizes this person as accurately as possible, who throughout his life created, developed, designed, from the impressive scale of buildings to the smallest details of the interior and decor. We talk about Joe Ponti and his main principles of work, which are relevant today for everyone involved in art.

Joe Ponti in October 1971. Photo: Duane Howell/The Denver Post, Getty Images

Duane Howell

Joe Ponti was born and grew up in the north of Italy, in industrial Milan, where he received a classical architectural education, graduating from the Milan Polytechnic University in 1921. Phenomenal success and recognition came to him thanks to hard work and unique talent. The inquisitiveness of the mind and the huge creative potential pushed the young man to explore new areas of design, the inimitable ability to easily conquer new heights delighted his contemporaries. And to this day he remains an extraordinary and significant figure in the world of design and architecture.

Joe Ponti with his wife and daughter in their apartment in Milan. Photo: David Lees/Getty Images

Joe Ponti was a real artist, for whom the understanding of art was closely intertwined with ordinary life. During his career, he managed a lot: he was engaged in architecture and design, was an art director, publisher and editor, wrote paintings and critical articles, composed poetry, participated in the theatrical life of Italy, creating stage sets and costumes for the actors of La Scala. Among his famous Italian projects are the Pirelli skyscraper and the first office for the Montecatini company in Milan, the building of the mathematical school of the university campus in Rome, the Parco dei Principi hotel in Sorrento, the Cathedral in Taranto. In addition, Ponti has made a significant contribution to the culture not only of Italy, but also of other countries. In Vienna, he was engaged in interior design of the Italian Institute of Culture, designed a villa for the Planchard family in Caracas and the Northern Building of the Denver Art Museum in the USA (the only work of an architect in the United States), in Stockholm he created a project of the Engineer Carlo M. Lerici Foundation. All his works were highly appreciated.

The Denver Museum of Art designed by Joe Ponti. Photo: Getty Images

Torre Branca tower in Milan designed by Joe Ponti. Photo: Getty Images

Villa Planchard in Caracas. Joe Ponti’s private project in Venezuela. (1953-54)Photo: Getty Images

Villa Planchard in Caracas. Joe Ponti’s private project in Venezuela. (1953-54)Photo: Getty Images

Villa designed by Joe Ponti in Venezuela Read

Joe Ponti at a meeting of the Circolo Filologico Society in Milan. Photo: Leemage via AFP

Two years after graduating from university, in 1923, the young man became the art director of the Richard Ginori porcelain manufactory. The collection created for Ginori was presented at the Biennale of Decorative and Applied Arts in Monza.

Joe Ponti’s set for Richard Ginori in Art Deco style. Photo: Alamy/TASS

Joe Ponti’s jug for Richard Ginori in Art Deco style. Photo: Alamy/TASS

Majolica vase for Richard-Ginori Doccia designed by Joe Ponti. Photo: Getty Images

Ginori 1753 deep plate from Joe Ponti, 33,404 rubles. 

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Since 1928, under the leadership of Joe Ponti, Domus magazine has been published — one of the first publications devoted entirely to design and architecture. He was not only a good publisher, but also a talented editor, he wrote himself and invited his colleagues and friends as authors. The name for the magazine was not chosen by chance: houses in Ancient Rome were called houses of a certain construction for one family or clan. In addition, the house is a kind of micromodel of the world, where everything is subject to certain laws, it is also a symbol of security, which was especially lacking in the post-war years. It was the artist’s understanding of the correct and logical arrangement of living space as a microcosm that influenced the course and development of his creative path, during which the key principles of work were formed.

Premier numero de la revue «Domus» d’architecture et de design dirigee par l’architecte et designer italien Gio Ponti, 15/01/1928EAST NEWS/

A strip from the Domus Nova furniture catalog for La Rinascente, 1927. Photo: DE AGOSTINI PICTURE LIBRARY

1. «Real dreamers dream very accurately”»

Every work of Joe Ponti, quite tangible in the end, was once just a dream and an invention in the artist’s head. However, it was the ability to translate an idea into reality, to find a way to connect the still fictional with the already real, that allowed the designer to be not only creative, but also necessary for his time and for a long time after. Did anyone think in the 60s of the last century that the cathedral could look something like the Cathedral in Taranto? «Real artists are not dreamers, as many people think, they are terrible realists. They do not turn reality into a dream, but, on the contrary, turn a dream into reality: into a reality written, pictorial, musical, architectural.”

The Cathedral in Taranto designed by Joe Ponti. Photo: DEA / ARCHIVIO J. LANGE

The Genius of the place: Joe Ponti Cathedral in Tarantochit

2. Time always goes forward, what matters is what remains.

The question «What will remain after me?» artists of different times were asked, since not all works of art pass the test of time. Joe Ponti managed not only to leave his sketches, design developments, architectural objects as a legacy of aesthetic sense, but also very practical. For example, based on his sketches, Molteni & C re-released in 2021 the Round D.154.5 chair and the D desk.847.1, and numerous interior design solutions that save space are especially relevant today.

3. Search for new combinations and the idea of intermedia.

The leitmotif of Joe Ponti’s entire creative path was the concept of super art, based on the most daring combinations of well-known types of expressive creativity, already in the 60s a more global form of this idea will appear — intermedia. The approval of interdisciplinarity (but with a pronounced Italian expression) is clearly evident in Ponti’s career, especially in his desire to create collaborations with other contemporary artists. For example, he collaborated with Piero Fornasetti, improving in the field of graphics and optical illusions — their style was called «surrealist neoclassicism».

Piero Fornasetti prints for Joe Ponti. Photo: Fornasetti 

4. The rules are universal, but the emotional experience is unique.

One of Joe Ponti ‘s tips to artists sounds like this: “Don’t draw by the rules. Learn to see by following the rules by which your eye drew. Artists do this. The rules help non-artists”» This position of the Italian designer is inextricably linked with his belief that art, and architecture in particular, is born from within. Conventions and canons fade into the background if the created work of art responds emotionally to both the artist and the viewer. In this case, we are talking about a new level, deeper and therefore more valuable.

Joe Ponti’s letter to his daughter Lisa with a drawing (1960) (picture)

The colored lines of a child’s drawing, a few lines of a letter, but how touching is the inner message coming from this letter.

«An artist is someone who has a predisposition to art, who has a vocation and sometimes achieves something”» Joe Ponti— 

Cathedral of Santa Maria Annunciata in Milan. Photo: Ranzani Mauro

Cathedral of Santa Maria Annunciata in Milan. Photo: Ranzani Mauro

5. Functionality is closely related to form, but not everything is so obvious.

One of the most important logical solutions for the arrangement of small living spaces and their optimization was the use of a modular furniture system with various sliding elements, the ability to fold them and move them easily. It is worth noting that the shape of the furniture itself does not play a primary role. «Functionality is independent of form…> Functionally, you can sit on an ugly chair”»

Ninfea folding chair, 1970s, Reguitti. 

6. The choice of material determines the integrity of the concept.

The most durable material, according to Joe Ponti, is art, which is not surprising, because a real work of art has lived for centuries. However, at the stage of creating a particular work, it is necessary to choose some specific material, since the aesthetic and practical completeness of the work depends on it. Ponti was very attentive to the materials in his works. In 1933, he began to collaborate with Luigi Fontana, and together they created the Fontana Arte company, where they later invited designer Pietro Chiesa and engaged in the development of glass products and the manufacture of stained glass windows. Fontana Arte quickly gained worldwide fame.

Pendant lamp 0024, 1933. 

A table lamp designed by Joe Ponti for Fontana Arte. Photo: De Agostini / East News

7. Motivation and a conscious approach play a decisive role.

For Joe Ponti, an especially important condition for working was understanding his audience, the people for whom he works. The approach chosen by the artist sets the tone for the entire workflow and makes it conscious, forms altruistic motivation.

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«An architect (artist) must imagine for each window a person on the windowsill, for each door a person who passes through it, for each staircase a person rising and falling, for each portico a person lingering there, for each vestibule two people who met there, on each terrace — a vacationer, for each for each room — living in it”»

8. To create your own recognizable style, sometimes it’s worth showing character.

Questions of style throughout his career did not leave Ponti. It is indisputable that his individual style was formed early and, perhaps, even unnoticed by Joe himself. In 1941, he left Domus and headed the magazine Stile, on which he worked for seven years, simultaneously engaged in painting and literary creativity. He had a special understanding of style, for him style is something passing, a «recurring element”, «recognition in society at a given time”. Today, Joe Ponti‘s style is more about his life philosophy and way of thinking, when the artist is driven by the desire to create something new and perfect.

The carpet is a maze. Mosaic and graphic lines are characteristic of Joe Ponti’s style. 

9. Intelligence can and should be at the heart of creative expression.

Joe Ponti received a classical university education in architecture. Having comprehended the rich Italian tradition of the old masters in his youth, already at a much more mature age, in the book “Love Architecture”, he formulated his own position on the traditional, speaking in favor of clear and precise laws of architecture. «These are the laws of balance, proportions, consistency, materiality, purity, clarity that live in authentic works of architectural art,» the architect wrote. And he continued: «And we will express them in a modern way”» This is how Ponti described his path to innovation in architecture — through academic knowledge, but relying on an intuitive sense of space, turning fantasy into reality.

Silver teapot designed by Joe Ponti for Calderoni Gioielli (1956). Photo: De Agostini / A. Dagli Orti

10. Rationality is not synonymous with avarice.

One of Joe Ponti’s most recognizable design works was the 699 Superleggera chair (Cassina, 1951). The lightest, but stable design weighing 1.7 kg was the result of a reduction in both the shape and the material used. With such a seemingly economy, the chair has not lost its functionality, but has gained the advantage of lightness. «A chair is lighter than air”» sounded the advertising slogan, where in the photo a child lifts a chair with just one finger. The main secret of the designer was that the legs of the chair were triangular, not the usual round ones.

The 699 Superleggera chair for Cassina designed by Joe Ponti. Photo: Leemage/East News

Perhaps there is no such thing in the house that Joe Ponti would not have been engaged in designing at the time, but this is what speaks of his unique talent. We suggest recalling his most interesting and popular works, naming the components of any house in the world in order. So…

If the most famous house, then… Pirelli Tower (1956-1961), built in the form of a crystal with mirror elements and meeting the ideas of constructivism. It was the tallest building with a reinforced concrete frame in the post-war years in Europe.

«Architecture is a crystal”

Pirelli Tower in Milan designed by Joe Ponti. Photo: Mark Kauffman

If the walls, the… multifunctional «equipped walls» (1950), which are a composition of several furniture elements.

If the table, then… coffee table Zodiac, Fontana Arte, 1950.

If the chair, then… cult D.153.1, Molteni & C, 1953.

If a carpet, then … D.754.1 with a large mosaic pattern, which is achieved by using pieces of leather that are different in shape and color.

If you drink coffee, then… from the La Pavoni coffee machine (1948).

La Cornutta coffee machine for La Pavoni (1948). Photo: La Pavoni

«Woe to the machine that admits to the fatigue of its work; even in machines, as in people, we appreciate the tightness of the body, the skill of labor, the elegance of effort”»

And if tea, then… from an Art Deco tea set, Richard Ginori, porcelain, 1932.

If the interior decor, then… Art Deco sculpture «The Witch’s Hand», Richard Ginori, 1935.

If a mirror, then… round model Randaccio, Gubi, 1925.

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If you need light, then… murano glass chandelier 99.80 , Venini, 1946.

Especially for the 130th anniversary of Joe Ponti, Molteni & C has prepared a documentary film, which can already be viewed here. 

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