FISH WITHOUT PESCE

Buoyant! Grotesque! Translucent! Wildly colorful objects that trace human gestures — freedom, frozen in resin. For over two decades, Fish Design’s spontaneous, irregular housewares have challenged good taste and conventional beauty. The studio’s rebellious spirit is best embodied in their collection of vases — now among the most ubiquitous artifacts of radical Italian design in American homes.

Since its relaunch in 2003, former gym teacher Andrea Corsi has been the quiet engine behind Fish Design’s joyfully unhinged line of trays, placemats, vases, and other resin curios he co-founded with Gaetano Pesce as an ongoing exercise in serial imperfection (the name of the company is a play on the translation of Pesce’s piscean last name into English).

Pesce passed away last year at the age of 84, during one of the most celebrated chapters of his career. In the few years before his death, he completed a headline-grabbing collaboration with Bottega Veneta — Come Stai?, a set of 400 custom resin chairs created for their runway guests — and was honored with back-to-back exhibitions in New York, Milan, Los Angeles, and Design Miami. This late-life surge in visibility helped further cement his legacy as one of design’s most uncompromising thinkers.

Corsi — Pesce’s most prolific collaborator — has always worked behind the scenes, running the Fish Design workshop in northern Italy with a small team, pouring resin by hand, piece by piece, while also handling the business side of the company. And now, for the first time in his life, he’s forced to step into the role of front man.

To mark Coming Soon’s New York Design Week Fish Design installation, a retrospective view of the studio’s output, and the first show of their work in New York since an exhibition at Moss Gallery in 2005 (XXXL: Monumental Works by Gaetano Pesce for Fish Design), I spoke with Corsi about making art out of accidents, the unlikely endurance of a business shaped by two Scorpios, and what it meant to lose not just a legend, a partner, and a friend.

Michael Bullock: Is it true you started your career as a gym teacher?

Andrea Corsi: Yes, I played basketball semi-professionally and studied to be a Physical Education teacher. But that only lasted about a year and a half. I realized pretty quickly it wasn’t for me. I liked languages, and I loved to travel, so I found my way into export work, and then into the design world. Eventually, I ended up at Cassina.

What a wildly unique path.

[Laughs]. Yeah. Cassina changed my life. It was a very special place. Back then, it was like a university for design. I didn’t know anything when I arrived. Zero. But I was a sponge. The people I met — dealers, architects, collaborators — they were incredibly cultured. I just listened and absorbed everything. That’s where my eye started to develop.

Was Pesce was already a star?

Yes, He was well known by then. A few of his pieces were still in the Cassina catalog, but they didn’t sell much. They were too experimental. Too poetic. Tramonto a New York (which translates to “sunset in New York”) was one of them. Beautiful piece, but hard to explain to a customer who just wanted a sofa. I sold the last three before it was discontinued.

That sofa is one of my personal all-time favorites. So how did you end up working together?

In the early 2000s, I visited his studio in New York City on Broadway. We were having a casual conversation, then he proposed, “Let’s restart Fish Design.” Honestly, I was scared. I called my friend Murray Moss and asked, “Can I survive this?” Murray’s partner Franklin said, “Absolutely not.” But Murray told me, Andrea, you might be the only one who can.” That gave me the confidence to say yes.

What was the first step?

In November, after Gaetano came to me with the idea of relaunching Fish Design, I told him my birthday was approaching. “You’re a Scorpio?” he asked. “I’m a Scorpio too.?” For three months we had been staring at each other’s birthdays on the contract and we both never noticed. Two Scorpios! That explained a lot.

That sounds like trouble.

It was. We were both stubborn, obsessive, and persistent. But it worked. He loved to use this Italian proverb, “La goccia scava la pietra” — the drop hallows the stone. Keep going. Eventually you break through.

What was your dynamic once the collaboration began?

Gaetano had the vision. But he wasn’t a businessman. He had tried to produce Fish Design before, but it never worked. Too chaotic. He changed production sites three times in three years, even moving  it to Mexico for a while. The quality wasn’t there. He believed the idea was strong enough to survive anything. In reality, it takes structure. It takes taste. It takes consistency.

And that was your job?

My job was to protect the beauty — to make sure the idea came through clearly. He used to say, “Anyone can make these.” But that’s not true. Anyone can pour resin, but not everyone can do it with balance, with feeling. You have to have a sense of proportion. You have to know when to stop and when to say no.

How many people work at Fish Design today?

Four, including me. I make most of the vases myself. My second artisan handles trays, table mats, and some of the coffee tables. I’m slowly starting to delegate, but it’s hard. I’m obsessive. I’m in the lab all day. Meetings, phone calls, production — always with headphones on, always with my hands in resin.

How many pieces are you producing yearly?

Thousands and each one is different. That’s the point. Serial, but never identical. That’s why it still works.

When I watch films of you making these objects, it looks like a performance. So much of it is instinctive. The beauty is like a gesture frozen in time.

That’s exactly it. It’s a one-shot deal. You can’t correct resin. Once it sets, it’s done. So, your hand has to know what to do before your brain catches up. It’s physical, emotional, instinctive. The material remembers you.

Personality over perfection could be the Fish Design mantra.

Yes. And risk. You have to risk something every time. You can’t fake it. The object reveals the energy of the person who made it. Gaetano always said, “With Fish Design, the artisan becomes the artist.” I believe that. Not because I see myself as an artist, but because you have to put your whole self into the gesture. That’s what makes it alive.

Are the forms fixed? For it to be considered a Fish Design piece, does it have to be part of the original collection of forms you and Gaetano agreed on?

Exactly. From the beginning, we decided on a defined number of models — about 30. We’ve introduced a few functional additions, like a picture frame, but the core collection is set. Color is where we’ve always had freedom.

And color’s become a huge part of the work.

It’s everything. At first, I handled the production, the forms, and the business, but color wasn’t my strength. That changed when our art director, Manu Ferrero, joined in 2016. She brought a new vision — fresh combinations, a growing palette. Now we have about 30 solid colors and 20 transparent ones. The whole collection became cooler, more expressive. Her arrival marked the third phase of Fish Design.

You’ve said the color is more than just surface-level.

Yes. It’s the color that makes it sing. It’s not the cherry on the cake — it’s much more than that.

There’s something inherently Italian about all of this work. I’m thinking about Italy’s long history of glassmaking, pasta machines — there’s something similar in the gestures.

You’re right. Gaetano always talked about how in Italy, everything is connected: glass, food, textiles, ceramics. It’s all part of the same way of making. That’s the context Fish Design came from. And don’t forget, as a student, he learned glassblowing in Murano — he trained with Venini, Moretti, Vistosi. When he moved into resin, that sensibility carried over: color as temperature, form as movement. I always say I’m just a drop in the ocean of Italy’s craft history. But I’m proud to be that drop.

Did Gaetano ever share his thoughts on why Italians seem to thrive at design?

Once I asked him, “Why do we have this history of art and design?” And he said, “Andrea, Italy is the most beautiful country in the world. We grow up surrounded by beauty. That’s the difference.” At first I thought, that’s too easy. But he was right. The landscape, the light, the architecture — it affects how you see, how you make.

It reminds me of the psychosomatic condition of Stendhal syndrome — it’s when beauty is so overwhelming that it actually disorients you. It was first diagnosed in Florence, right?

Yes, exactly. It’s happened to me in the studio. I’ll be working — mixing color, layering resin — and suddenly, something shifts. I feel it in my chest, like a pressure. It’s not something you can explain. I have to stop, breathe, let the piece settle. It’s this strange moment when beauty sort of pushes back.

Since Gaetano passed, has your relationship to the work changed?

Personally, it’s been a huge loss. When he was alive, I never thought about it that way. But now, I realize I owe him everything. I became who I am because of that collaboration. I started working with resin at 40. I had no idea it would define my life. And honestly, I never thought that it would have such a strong impact on my life. He taught me that you must take risks. That it’s better to do something wrong than do nothing at all. That the mistake is not only acceptable, it is essential.

What does it feel like to be making this work for over 20 years?

I’m proud. It took me years to get good. I didn’t start making resin pieces until I was 39. Now I’m 60 and I finally feel like I know what I’m doing. It’s physical work. It demands a lot from your body. But it keeps me sharp.

It’s incredible that you found a way to combine the athleticism from the first phase of your life with design. You seem to have created your ideal job. 

Very true. This means a lot to me because I’ve always been complicated, and this work gave me something to hold onto. Working with Gaetano was the best therapy I could have asked for. Today, I am a happy person. And a big reason why is because I do what I do.