Artist Shantell Martin, known for her black-and-white works done via ink marker, once said “I draw on everything.” This week, she lived up to her own words by turning her pen to an unusual canvas: B&B Italia’s Camaleonda Sofa.
Oh yes. The bulbous couch, designed by Mario Bellini in 1979, just got a modern makeover. Usually adorned in leather, corduroy, velvet, or boucle, Martin put hers in a white fabric conducive to dreamy doodling. In front of a live audience on Tuesday night in Miami, she adorned the piece with artful squiggles, female faces, and phrases like “yes” or “be you be who”.
Martin was taken with what she views as the timelessness of Bellini’s creation. “When I was researching, that was what stood out – the simplicity of the design.” She felt an immediate visual connection to the Italian maker: “That’s also how I work. It's about creating a lot of impact, but with the least amount of lines.” In her iteration, she embraced plenty of white space. The piece, which now sits in B&B Italia’s store in Miami’s Design District, is able to be viewed, and sat on, by the public. “The people bring the colour,” she says.
It’s just the latest high-profile moment for the iconic design, which was recently re-released by B&B Italia in 2020. (Don’t believe us? Read about it here. Or, well, just scroll through interior-design Instagram.) Yet Martin’s moment has an additional, perhaps longer lasting impact. The Camaleonda, is, yes, a very famous design. It’s also a 40-year-old one which risks remaining in the annals of its history rather than evolving into the future. But Martin – a young, buzzy artist – shows that the Camaleonda Sofa is ready to stay relevant for generations to come.
