The present lot was designed by Danilo Silvestrin in 1968 for the German photographer Lothar Wolleh’s apartment in Düsseldorf. Silvestrin’s innovative design for the living room featured entirely transparent acrylic furniture and comprised several ‘acrylic spheres’. The present design was intended to be stored in the room in its closed, spherical form and opened when entertaining guests, as illustrated in the accompanying photograph taken by Wolleh of his wife Karin and son Oliver.

Having trained as an architect in his native Italy, Silvestrin moved to Germany in the 1960s where his work became greatly inspired by contemporary art. In Düsseldorf Silvestrin worked closely with the artists of the Zero group, whose work incorporated light and motion in order to explore new forms of perception. During the same decade, following his success as a commercial photographer, Wolleh turned his focus to portraiture. Wolleh gained recognition for his portraits of renowned international artists, some of which were close friends of the photographer, using a characteristic square format, and often featuring a symmetrical composition.

Phillips would like to thank Danilo Silvestrin for his assistance with the cataloguing of the present lot.