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TRIESTE, Italy – illycaffè, the global coffee brand known for its sustainable quality and the privileged communication channel it has created with the contemporary art world, unveils the new illy Art Collection designed by John Armleder, one of the most radical and visionary Swiss artists of our time, known for his multidisciplinary approach that embraces painting, sculpture, design, performance, and installation.
A key figure on the international art scene, Armleder has marked the history of art with a practice inspired by the Fluxus movement and John Cage, challenging the conventions between art and everyday objects, between exhibition space and the domestic environment. His career, accompanied by exhibitions at the world’s most prestigious museums – from the MoMA in New York to the Centre Pompidou in Paris – is now enriched by a new collaboration with illycaffè that reflects his free, ironic, and profoundly conceptual vision.
“I am an artist who presents himself with new things or new forms, or new strategies for producing work,” Armleder stated. And it is precisely in this spirit that he has created a unique collection, entitled “Tastes,” capable of transforming the iconic cup designed for illycaffè by Matteo Thun in 1991 into an element of aesthetic and cultural reflection.
This new edition of the illy Art Collection fully reflects Armleder’s visionary approach and his aesthetic universe. Mirrored surfaces, metallic chrome, and iridescent reflections recall one of Armleder’s most iconic symbols: his famous disco balls.
“A cup is a cup. On the other hand, it could reflect what it contains. And it could represent time,” says Armleder. In this vision, drinking coffee becomes a sensorial and conceptual experience, in which the content changes the perception of the object, just as the reflections of a strobe light change the surrounding environment. Cups and saucers thus become tools capable of unleashing ideas, dreams, and images, inviting us to experience the coffee moment as a pause of wonder and meditation, where taste and artistic vision intertwine.
“With John Armleder, our illy Art Collection is enriched with a new chapter that speaks of creative freedom and the fusion of genres and languages. Each cup is a work to be discovered, an invitation to experience the coffee moment as an aesthetic and intellectual experience,” comments Cristina Scocchia, CEO of illycaffè.
The collection will be presented to the public at four major contemporary art events: Frieze London, Art Basel Paris, Artissima in Turin, and ARCOmadrid. These events reaffirm illycaffè’s commitment to the dialogue between art, culture, and taste, bringing the ritual of coffee to the world’s leading and most influential creative exploration hubs.
The collection will be available from the end of September 2025 on the illy e-shop, in illy stores (illy Caffè and illy Shop), at major retailers, and through indirect e-commerce channels.
John Armleder
John Armleder is a Swiss contemporary artist known for continuing the trajectory of Fluxus artists and John Cage. Armleder’s work spans various mediums, including painting, sculpture, design, performance, and installation. “I am an artist who comes up with new things or new forms, or new strategies for the production of work,” he explained. Born on June 24, 1948, in Geneva, Switzerland, he studied at the École des Beaux-Arts in his hometown, where he later met Patrick Lucchini and Claude Rychner, who helped him found Galerie Ecart in 1969. Their gallery served as a space for performance art and an independent publishing house, bringing many renowned artists to Switzerland, including Joseph Beuys and Andy Warhol.
Armleder gained international recognition with his furniture sculpture series from the late 1970s, which merged decorative art and painting in the same exhibition space to reflect their lack of distinction. John Armleder has been the subject of numerous solo exhibitions worldwide. In the past decade, he has presented solo shows at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice, Italy (2024); Rockbund Art Museum, Shanghai (2021); KANAL – Centre Pompidou, Brussels (2021); Aspen Art Museum, Colorado (2019); Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt, Germany (2019); MUSEION, Bolzano, Italy (2018); Museo Madre, Naples, Italy (2018); and Istituto Svizzero, Rome (2017).
In 1986, Armleder represented Switzerland at the Venice Biennale. His works are in the permanent collections of many museums, including the Centre Pompidou in Paris; the Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles; the Kunstmuseum in Basel, Switzerland; MOMA in New York; and the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Humlebæk, Denmark. Armleder lives and works in Geneva.
