Carlo Scarpa: Venini 1932-1947

This volume reconstructs the fifteen years of the remarkable artistic collaboration between Carlo Scarpa and the Venini glass-making company, from 1932 to 1947.

The pieces featured represent a significant part of his early activity. They are often prototypes or one-offs that document Scarpa’s extraordinarily inventive designs and the variety of techniques and decoration he used.

This was made possible by the intense research carried out especially at the glass-making company’s historical archive, which had at last been rediscovered. The whole production designed by the Venetian architect is illustrated in about six hundred works divided into the different types of glass — around thirty — either used and/or invented by Scarpa in order to breathe life into his refined creations. The types of glass are classified as a mezza filigrana, sommersi, lattimi, corrosi, tessuti, granulari, murrine, incisi, battuti, pennellate, a fili, and are the product of the untiring experiments the artist performed on material and colour.

Precious and unprecedented documentary materials, which includes original drawings and period photographs, complete this catalogue raisonné, providing an accurate account of one of the most important phases in the golden age of 20th-century Venetian glass-making.

The prestigious scientific committee appointed for the volume counts among its members Giuseppe Pavanello, Director of the Fondazione Giorgio Cini Institute of Art History and Nico Stringa, Professor of History of Contemporary Art at the Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, as well as leading experts on the art of glassmaking, such as Rosa Barovier Mentasti, Laura de Santillana, Marino Barovier and David Landau.