The Lombard architect Tomaso Buzzi was a leading exponent of the so-called Novecento Milanese. A friend and collaborator of Gio Ponti, he was also a member of the group called Il Labirinto, together with architects and entrepreneurs like Ponti, Michele Marelli and Paolo Venini. And it was with Ponti that Tomaso
Buzzi became one of the most important creators of Italian taste in the 1930s, setting the benchmark for the next few years. An erudite architect, experimental industrial designer and refined interior designer, as well as being a collaborator with the magazine Domus, his services were sought by some of the most important upper-class Italian families: the Volpi, Cini, and Visconti, to mention but a few.
The buildings he worked on include the Villa Necchi Campiglio, Milan, recently restored by the Fondo Ambiente Italiano (FAI), Palladio’s Villa Maser, Treviso, the Palazzo Cini at San Vio, the Palazzo Papadopoli and the Palazzo Labia (all Venice). From 1932 to 1933 Buzzi began to collaborate very actively with the Venini glassworks and was to continue to do so, albeit more sporadically, over the following few years. Buzzi’s creative contribution consisted in an experimental approach to form and materials. His extensive studies on lightning initiated the development of new forms in this traditional sector of Murano glassmaking. Curated by Marino Barovier, Tomaso Buzzi at Venini reconstructs this brief but fecund collaboration, documented not only through a selection of glass objects and original drawings from the Venini Archive but
also unpublished designs held at Scarzuola (Montegabbione), the “theatre-city”, which Buzzi began to construct in the late 1970s. To accompany the exhibition, the first catalogue raisonée of Tomaso Buzzi’s glass works, edited
Istituto: Le Stanze del Vetro
Glass Tea House Mondrian by Hiroshi Sugimoto
The Glass Tea House Mondrian
©Hiroshi Sugimoto+New Material Research Laboratory.
Courtesy of Le Stanze del Vetro.
Sponsored by Sumitomo Forestry and Fondazione Bisazza.
On June 6th, the “Glass Tea House Mondrian” will open to the public on the Island of San Giorgio Maggiore in Venice. The “Glass Tea House” is a temporary pavilion designed by the Japanese artist and photographer Hiroshi Sugimoto as part of the activities of Le Stanze del Vetro. Hiroshi Sugimoto is known worldwide for his black-and-white photographs, and for the first time ever he is to design an architectural building in Venice.
The “Glass Tea House Mondrian” is a project by Le Stanze del Vetro – a long term joint initiative between Fondazione Giorgio Cini and Pentagram Stiftung – which was made possible thanks to the support of Sumitomo Forestry Co. Ltd., and Fondazione Bisazza, in collaboration with Asahi Building-Wall Co. Ltd. Special thanks to Cattaruzza Millosevich Associated Architects for having overseen each phase of the design and construction of the pavilion.
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Concurrent with the opening of the “Glass Tea House Mondrian”, the Fondazione Bevilacqua La Masa will host an unprecedented retrospective exhibition of Hiroshi Sugimoto’s architectural photographs at the Palazzetto Tito: this exhibition, together with “The Glass Tea House Mondrian” at Le Stanze del Vetro, will place this world-famous artist and his commitment towards the built environment at the center of the Venice art scene this season, befitting the new expanded format of the Architecture Biennale.
The “Glass Tea House Mondrian” is a new initiative from those organized so far by Le Stanze del Vetro, broadening its horizons, and involving internationally renowned artists to plan and design an architectural pavilion in the area in front of Le Stanze del Vetro, following the example of the “Pavilion Series” of the Serpentine Gallery in London.
The “Glass Tea House Mondrian” by Hiroshi Sugimoto is inspired by pre-modern abstraction, as perfected by Sen no Rikyû, in the Japanese tradition of the tea ceremony. The Pavilion consists of two main elements, an open-air landscape and an enclosed glass cube. The landscape (approximately 40 meters long and 12.5 meters wide) follows a path along a reflecting pool leading the visitor to a glass cube (2.5 x 2.5 meters), inside which the traditional Japanese tea ceremony will be performed regularly. The glass cube will host two visitors at a time together with the tea master, while spectators can watch the ceremony from outside the glass cube.
Original tea utensils for the “Glass Tea House Mondrian” were designed by Hiroshi Sugimoto and fabricated by traditional artisans in Kyoto.
The flexible and temporary structure of the pavilion will also contribute to transform the area in front of Le Stanze del Vetro – which has never been used before – into a versatile space, to hold meetings and talks, and where visitors are encouraged to interact freely with the pavilion.
The “Glass Tea House Mondrian” is an innovative project as it offers a space in which to present and experience architecture, where the Pavilion itself becomes the exhibition, an innovative example in which the artist can freely suggest a theme and a project, open to the possibility of experimenting with the setting, shapes, building techniques and innovative materials.
Within the settings of the Island of San Giorgio Maggiore the “Glass Tea House Mondrian” is also symbolic, encouraging visitors to freely interact with the site, and requiring them to find the right balance between the artifice of architecture and the natural environment that surrounds it.
The “Glass Tea House Mondrian” creates a bond between interior and exterior, nature and artifice, lightness and heaviness, water and soil, a bond which is presented in the use of wood from Japan for the external fence, the use of Venetian mosaics for the reflecting pool, and glass for the tea house, in which the merge between Japanese tradition and modern technology can be experienced.
Inspired by the Ise-shrine, the exterior fence around the pavilion is made entirely of cedar wood and realized through a contribution by Sumitomo Forestry Co. Ltd.
Hiroshi Sugimoto and Sumitomo Forestry chose the cedar wood from the Tohoku region for their commitment in helping to reconstruct areas which were devastated by the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami. Sumitomo Forestry not only uses wood for residential structures, but also for schools and hospitals, demonstrating the architectural potential of this natural, renewable resource, which has no impact on the environment.
The reflecting pool, a key element of the pavilion, is made possible thanks to the collaboration with Fondazione Bisazza. Fondazione Bisazza, based in Vicenza, is specialized in the production of glass mosaics for interior as well as outdoor solutions.
Finally the glass cube is made by Asahi Building-Wall Co. Ltd, a leading company in engineering solutions for architectural façades and glass.
From Glass Tea House Mondrian to the Oriental Art Museum of Venice
LE STANZE DEL VETRO, in collaboration with the Oriental Art Museum of Venice and Ca’ Foscari University, Department of Asian and North African Studies, presents a series of meetings to enhance and promote the Japanese tea culture.
From April to July a sequence of initiatives will connect two locations together: the temporary pavilion Glass Tea House Mondrian on the Island of San Giorgio Maggiore designed by Hiroshi Sugimoto and the Oriental Art Museum of Venice.
The events of this cultural and educational project will be addressed to adults and teenagers involving both local Universities and Secondary Schools.
In May:
Ca’ Pesaro Oriental Art Museum, Santa Croce 2076, Venice
Sunday, May 3 at 3pm and 3.30pm The Japanese tea ceremony: porcelain and lacquer items from the Bardi Collection, guided tour by Severina Bortolato (Italian language)
Free admission, registration required by sending an email to artsystem@artsystem.it or by calling the free toll number 800 662 477 (Monday to Friday, from 10 am to 5 pm)
Glass Tea House Mondrian by Hiroshi Sugimoto, a project by LE STANZE DEL VETRO, Island of San Giorgio Maggiore, Venice
Saturday, May 9 Tea Ceremony curated by So’oku Sen of the MushakojiSenke Tea School (ceremony reserved for Secondary School and Universities students taking part in the project).
Free guided tours are available until 30 November 2015 upon reservation by sending an e-mail to artsystem@artsystem.it
or
by calling 800 662 477 (Monday to Friday, from 10 am to 5 pm).
Napoleone Martinuzzi. Venini 1925–1931
Venice, Island of San Giorgio Maggiore
EXTENDED UNTIL JANUARY 6, 2014
The exhibition Napoleone Martinuzzi. Venini 1925-1931, curated by Marino Barovier, will open to the public on the island of San Giorgio Maggiore in Venice on September 8th, 2013. It is the second exhibition dedicated to the history of the Venini glassware company promoted by Le Stanze del Vetro, a long-term cultural initiative launched by Fondazione Giorgio Cini and Pentagram Stiftung, devoted to the study and the promotion of the art of glassmaking in the twentieth century. Le Stanze del Vetro envisages, among its many cultural activities, ten exhibitions, taking place on a yearly basis, focussing on Venini, whose production represents a landmark in 20th-century artistic glass manufacturing. Each monographic exhibition will present the work of one of the artists who over the years collaborated with the glassware company from Murano. Each exhibition will be accompanied by a catalogue that will form, at the end of the long-term program, the catalogue raisonné of the Venini production.
The exhibition space for Le Stanze del Vetro was designed last year by Annabelle Selldorf Architects of New York. Annabelle Selldorf Architects specialize in the design of exhibition spaces and museums, and have decided to collaborate with some of the most important Venetian craftsmen, namely Augusto Capovilla and Gino Zanon, two family-run companies that represent local excellence in various fields. As in the case of the exhibition Carlo Scarpa. Venini 1932-1947 – which opened on the Island of San Giorgio last August and will open at the Metropolitan Museum of Contemporary Art in New York next November (November 5, 2013-March 2, 2014) – this exhibition, dedicated to Napoleone Martinuzzi, is made possible thanks to thorough research by Marino Barovier and a group of scholars on the history of the Murano glass-making company and on the important designers who contributed to making it renowned throughout the world. Through the analysis and cross-checking of various documentary sources (photos, catalogues, furnace drawings) and their comparison with the real objects provided by museums, public and private institutions, Italian and foreign collectors, a comprehensive review was made of the glass objects designed by Napoleone Martinuzzi between 1925 and 1931, when he was the Art Director of Venini.
During the period of his collaboration with Paolo Venini, Martinuzzi designed beautiful objects whose shapes are inspired by classical design, but through the use of innovative techniques and of glass paste. The exhibition Napoleone Martinuzzi. Venini 1925 – 1931 traces his whole production chronologically: from the elegant transparent blown glass to the works with an unprecedented opaque texture, from the experimentations with pulegoso glass (a semi-opaque or translucent glass with a rough surface due to tiny bubbles that form by using special ingredients) to pieces with intense and compact colours.
There are about 200 works on display, covering the most significant glass production of the ingenious sculptor from Murano. Many of these works were presented at the Venice Biennale between 1926 and 1930, and at the great exhibitions of decorative arts, in particular the Biennale and the Triennale in Monza. 1930 was an important year in the history of Venini: thanks to Martinuzzi’s talent, the Venini production was noted for the singular richness of the works shown at these great exhibitions. The classical transparent glass pieces were presented, along with a collection of pulegoso glass with an archaic flavour, the striking aquariums together with the brightly coloured velato vases, the cacti together with a colourful bestiary.
The exhibition also delves into the bond between Martinuzzi and the poet Gabriele D’Annunzio, who commissioned the Murano artist to make not only sculptures but works of glass too. To illustrate this particular bond and the artistic vision shared by these two personalities, the exhibition also contains a recreation by the set designer Pierluigi Pizzi of one of the rooms of the Vittoriale, with some of the most important works that Martinuzzi designed for the poet: the bright pumpkin made of “incamiciato” glass (where the glass is covered by a second thin layer of different colour glass) which Martinuzzi designed upon specific request by the poet for his residence, the vase with large ribbed handles, the large basket with fruit, the transparent blue glass cup and the elephant made of red vitreous paste. Each of these objects is a unique piece.
The exhibition Napoleone Martinuzzi. 1925 – 1931 Venini will open on September 8th, 2013 and will run until December 1st, 2013 from 10 am to 7 pm (every day except Wednesdays). Admission is free.
The free educational programs for students from primary to secondary school will also continue running during this exhibition, along with the free guided tours for the visitors of “Le Stanze del Vetro”. More specifically, the educational programs will include activities and workshops, during which teenagers and children will discover the history and the importance of the art of glassmaking in Venice, producing artifacts and participating in laboratory activities and discussions.
In order to take part in the educational program it is necessary to book in advance by calling the toll-free number 800662477 (Monday to Friday from 10 am to 5 pm) or by sending an email to:artsystem@artsystem.it.
For detailed information on the many activities for different age groups: www.artsystem.it
Fragile?
The catalogue presents the works by some of the most interesting international artists of our time who have experimented with industrial and found glass – from Marcel Duchamp and Joseph Beuys, to Ai Wewiei, Damien Hirst, Giovanni Anselmo and Jannis Kounellis, to name a few. This exhibition is part of LE STANZE DEL VETRO project, a joint collaboration between Fondazione Giorgio Cini and Pentagram Stiftung, developed with the aim of promoting the appreciation of and research in glass made in the 20th and 21rst centuries.
In the context of Venetian glassmaking and its peculiar artisan connotation, “Fragile?” aims at taking a different, yet equally important, aspect into account, namely the use of glass as a found object, with specific metaphorical and linguistic features.
Instead of precision or originality in design, other aspects will be sought, such a symbolic transparency, fragility and resistance, imprecision and smoothness, along with the construction of elements that draw inspiration from reality and contemporary artistic language
Napoleone Martinuzzi from sculpture to glass
Organised and promoted by the Giorgio Cini Foundation Centre for Studies on Glass, this conference sets out to explore various aspects of the life and work of the celebrated artist Napoleone Martinuzzi (1892-1977). Due to be held on 5 June 2013, the conference can be seen as the ideal complement to a solo exhibition later in the summer. Curated by Marino Barovier, the exhibition will be devoted to Martinuzzi’s creations for the Venini glassworks in the period when he held the position of artistic director from 1925 to 1932. In addition to his activities at Venini and the importance of his position, which decreed his fame, Martinuzzi was principally a sculptor and, very interestingly, deeply involved in the main artistic developments of his day. So among other things, the conference will focus on his friendship
with Gabriele D’Annunzio, his periods spent training in Venice and Rome, an unusual story about his involvement with war memorials, his participation at Venice Biennales, and his role as artistic director of the Murano Glass Museum (1922-1931). Moreover, there will be an analysis of his enterprises with the architect Angiolo Mazzoni, who chose him to work on many decorative projects throughout Italy, from Palermo to Gorizia. As regards his glass works, some little known aspects will be presented at the conference,
such as the story behind his highly acclaimed and “amusing” succulent plants. All these various aspects will fill out the art-historical profile but also the elusive personality of a man who was always present in the crucial artistic developments in the Italy of his age.
Fragile?
Mona Hatoum. Drowning Sorrows (wine bottles), 2004, glass, 15 cm x 200 cm Pier Luigi and Natalina Remotti Collection ph Ela Bialkowska courtesy GALLERIA CONTINUA, San Gimignano / Beijing / Le Moulin
On 8 April 2013, Fragile?, an exhibition curated by Mario Codognato, will open to the public on the San Giorgio Maggiore island inVenice.
The exhibition will feature more than 30 artworks by some of the most interesting international artists of our time who have experimented with industrial and found glass – from Marcel Duchamp and Joseph Beuys, to Ai Weiwei, Damien Hirst, Giovanni Anselmo and Jannis Kounellis, to name a few. This exhibition is part of Le Stanze del Vetro project, a joint collaboration between Fondazione Giorgio Cini and Pentagram Stiftung, developed with the aim of promoting the appreciation of and research in glass made in the 19th and 20th centuries. The exhibition will be open until 28 July 2013.
After the success of the exhibition Carlo Scarpa. Venini 1932–1947, curated by Marino Barovier, which welcomed more than 46,000 visitors, Le Stanze del Vetro project continues in 2013 with two important exhibitions: Fragile?, curated by Mario Codognato, and a new monographic exhibition, curated by Marino Barovier, scheduled for the end of the summer and devoted to the production of renowned artist Napoleone Martinuzzi for Venini between 1925 and 1932.
In the context of Venetian glassmaking and its peculiar artisan connotations, Fragile? aims at taking a different, yet equally important, aspect into account, namely the use of glass as a found object, with specific metaphorical and linguistic features.
Instead of the precise traits of manufactured artworks, other aspects will be highlighted, such as symbolic transparency, fragility and resistance, imprecision and smoothness, along with the construction of elements that draw inspiration from reality and contemporary artistic language.
«In the 21st century, because of historical avant-gardes, visual arts cease to be a sole mimesis of reality through painting and sculpture – states curator Mario Codognato – By using objects and materials taken from the real world and industrial production, a new metaphoric, yet tautologically concrete, dimension is born. Glass, thanks to its widespread use in architecture and its double nature of transparent medium and at the same time barrier, becomes a new linguistic tool through which to create images».
Fragile? displays the creations of some of the most interesting artists of our time, who used glass with diverse and contrasting intentions: from the provoking gesture of MarcelDuchamp of shutting the air of Paris in a transparent ampoule, to the tragic lyricism of Joseph Beuys’s glass fragments as a witness to the ferociousness of earthquakes, from the transformation of industrial objects into poetical individualities by Luciano Fabro to the ironic explosion of car windscreens in a Pipilotti Rist video.
Seen as a whole, the works and artists exhibited in Fragile? translate the infinite potentialities of glass into unprecedented dialectics which inevitably have to do with our daily existence, as a constitutive element of contemporary artistic language.
Fragile? will gather works by, among others: Michael Craig–Martin, Ceal Floyer, Carsten Nicolai, Lawrence Weiner, Monica Bonvicini, Keith Sonnier, Giuseppe Penone, Rachel Whiteread, Luciano Fabro, Mona Hatoum, David Hammons, Claire Fontaine, Cyril de Commarque, Barry le Va, Joseph Kosuth.
The exhibition catalogue will be published by Skira.
Logistics, visitor services and educational programmes will be provided and managed by ArtSystem, the technical sponsor of the exhibition.
Carlo Scarpa. Venini 1932–1947
29 August – 29 November
29 November – 6 January EXTENDED
10am – 7pm
closed on wednsday
free admission
On 29 August 2012 the exhibition CARLO SCARPA. VENINI 1932–1947, curated by Marino Barovier, will open to the public on the Island of San Giorgio Maggiore in Venice.
Consisting of over 300 works, the exhibition reconstructs Carlo Scarpa’s career in the years when he was artistic director of the Venini glassworks, from 1932 to 1947. Due to run until 29 November 2012 and open from 10 am to 7 pm (free admission, closed on Wednesdays), this exhibition is the first public event of Le STANZE DEL VETRO (Rooms for Glass), a long-term cultural project launched by the Fondazione Giorgio Cini in collaboration with Pentagram Stiftung for the purpose of studying and showcasing the art of Venetian glassmaking in the 20th century.
The exhibition
The works are divided into around thirty types that vary according to execution techniques and glass textures (from sommerso to murrine romane, corrosi and a pennellate glass).
The material on show also includes prototypes, one-off items, original drawings and designs, plus period photographs and archive documents. The exhibition explores the significance and importance of Carlo Scarpa’s glass design experience in his overall work. During his Murano period, Scarpa further developed his interests in experimentation and craftsmanship and the show thus provides a great opportunity to compare his work as a glass and furniture designer and his architecture. The exhibition itinerary includes a video room showing two documentary films on the relationship between the Venini glassworks and Carlo Scarpa. The films were produced by Pentagram Stiftungand made by director Gian Luigi Calderone, who had previously made Casa Venini, a film about the history of the Venini-Santillana family. The first film, a fifteenminute documentary entitled A Carlo Scarpa e ai suoi infiniti possibili (1984), shows images of glass objects designed by Carlo Scarpa. The images are accompanied by the music of Luigi Nono, composed in 1984 with the same title to commemorate his friend. In the film the musicologist Stefano Bassanese illustrates the structure of the music and the affinities between the designer and the composer. A second documentary Carlo Scarpa, fuori dal paradiso (2012) describes Scarpa and his glass through personal accounts by those who knew him well, such as former students and, especially, his son Tobia. This onehour film will be shown twice a day and is on sale in the exhibition bookshop.
As part of Le Stanze del Vetro project, the director Gian Luigi Calderone will make a film for each future exhibition as a way of enhancing and complementing the show and its themes.
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The exhibition CARLO SCARPA.VENINI 1932–1947 will run until 29 November 2012 and is open from 10 am to 7 pm (free admission, closed on Wednesdays). As of 15 September guided tours of the exhibition will be available, whereas an educational service for children and young people will begin in October and will last until the exhibition closes on 29 November. Booking is required for both services either by telephone (toll free 800 662 477; from 20 August, 10 am – 5 pm, Monday to Friday) or email to artsystem@artsystem.it.
Le STANZE DEL VETRO has adopted a model often found in English-speaking countries of free access to museums based on the idea that the cultural heritage belongs to the community.
That is why admission to the exhibition and the tours and educational services is free of charge.
The organisational coordination of the exhibition, guided tours and educational services is by ArtSystem, the technical sponsor of the exhibition.
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Le STANZE DEL VETRO project
From the point of view of developing the art of glassmaking in general, Le STANZE DEL VETRO project also aims to organise events and initiatives in collaboration with major Venetian and international institutions, such as the Venice Civic Museum Foundation, the Murano Glass Museum, the Abate Zanetti School for Glass and Ca’ Foscari University, Venice. The initiatives will be dedicated not only to contemporary artists who have used glass as an original means of expression and medium in their poetics but also to highlighting and studying the leading producers and major collections of glass worldwide. As part of Le Stanze del Vetro project, the Fondazione Giorgio Cini, with the support of Pentagram Stiftung, has set up a dedicated Study Centrein its Institute of Art History. In addition to the periodic organisation of exhibitions on Venetian glass, the Study Centre will promote: the gradual construction of a General Archive of Venetian Glass, to be made available to the scholarly community and for reviving and developing the art of glassmaking; the creation of a specialised library within the art history library; the organisation of seminars, conferences and workshops for scholars and artists interested in the history, technology and development of the art of glassmaking; and lastly, scholarships specifically addressed to researchers interested in the topic.The activities in Le STANZE DEL VETRO project rely on a scientific committee made up of Giuseppe Pavanello (Director of the Fondazione Giorgio Cini Institute of Art History), Marino Barovier, Rosa Barovier Mentasti, David Landau, Laura de Santillana and Nico Stringa.
Photo by ETTORE BELLINI
