Nicola L.’s Omniscient Eye Lamp Continues to Intrigue
Hannah Martin, Architectural Digest
November 2023
After the Moroccan-born French artist Nicola L. began sketching eyes in the late 1960s, it was her Belgian friend Marcel Broodthaers who helped her turn them into lamps. Broodthaers, who had been making artworks from thin, vacuum-formed plastic, brought Nicola to his Antwerp factory, where she produced an edition of 50 visionary lights: A bulb encased by a blue, green, or brown iris, with a movable lid-shade, was mounted on a steel rod. Years later, in 2008, she would create pendants, table lamps, and sconces for Galerie Pierre Alain-Challier in Paris. […]