Padua: Studo GR 20 – Contemporary Glass, Sculptures, Installations, Jewels
exhibition. Historian of contemporary jewelry, curator of exhibitions at an international level,
associated with the famous Padua Jewelry School, Graziella Folchini Grassetto
is the director of the contemporary jewelry gallery Studio GR20. The exhibition
Contemporary Glass, Sculptures, Installations, Jewels is on show, until
December 22 in the charming fourth floor walk-up studio above an arcaded street
in the center of Padua. The collective
show, shows works from well-known international jewelers using glass as their
medium “In a journey from Sculpture to Jewelry, which also vaunts ancient traditions
in glass, the present selection has privileged artists who are both innovative
and expert, and who work not only with metals but also glass. It is striking how their common choice of
contained, rigorous forms, in which predilection moves towards non-color, black
and white, reducing it to the mere definition of a simplified project.” writes Graziella
Folchini Grassetto in the introduction to the catalogue of the exhibition.
Above: Graziella Folchini Grassetto with water glasses by Maria Grazia
Rosin in hand-blown Murano glass.
Contemporary Glass, Sculptures, Installations, Jewels exhibition – Maria
Grazia Rosin. “Maria Grazia Rosin combines lightness, which the Venetian
techniques guarantee with an imagination rich in influences from both artistic
trends such as Informal Art and Pop Art, without excluding certain machinery of
Kinetic Art, and design, comic strips, or the world of science fiction
impregnated with literature.”
Contemporary Glass, Sculptures, Installations, Jewels exhibition – Maria
Grazia Rosin. “With her mobile installations in glass Rosin works on the art of
sculpture, of which Art Nouveau in France was the sublime manifestation, with
the extreme lightness of contemporary Venetian techniques. In the ancient magic
of blown glass, she creates empty, transparent, luminous bodies, the clear-cut
identity of which is not confined to burnishing with silver or gold, fluid dabs
or brush strokes.”
Contemporary Glass, Sculptures, Installations, Jewels exhibition – Evert
Nijland. “Evert Nijland has also recently
produced a series of marvelous works in glass called “Venezia”, a monument to
the Renaissance and Baroque forms in a measured interpretation. At the same time, he has intensified the
reduction of figures, facing the naturalistic theme in a realistic but
intensely pure search. He concentrates on the theme of flowers, expressing
great pleasure in the evolution of their pale petals, the transparency of which
reveals the base piece of old, rough wood, its support and frame, releasing a
painful feeling of transience.”
Evert Nijland
Contemporary
Glass, Sculptures, Installations, Jewels exhibition – Ruudt Peters. “The symbolism of Ruudt Peters is impregnated
with naturalism, and this artist treats metaphysical themes in his
extraordinary works entitled “Sephiroth”, interpretations of ancient religious
beliefs. All the pieces always have a
load-bearing structure, a silver grid, in which evolutions, spirals, curls and
tangles of glass are interwoven. The
ridged spectrum appears to be the center of reference of sensitive, perceptive
and emotional contributions from a nature containing fantastic forms, which can
be measured with discriminating laws suitable for defining Theosophic theories.
The irregular universe of free, trans lucid formulations seems to become
integrated in the discipline of severe rules:
the norm, in its absolute clarity, makes blown glass symbolic.”
Contemporary
Glass, Sculptures, Installations, Jewels exhibition – Beate Eismann. “Beate
Eismann works not on fantasy figures in her enamel jewelry but on the richness
of many varieties of signs. Writing
seems to emerge irregularly from glassy materials layered on metals, the
tiniest deformations of which express messages and communications. These traces are mysterious incunabula to be
deciphered, while the fascination of the fine materials, in their sober nuances,
are remarkable for that moderation of the color range of whites or
pale blues, rigorously kept to minimum almost imperceptible modulations.”
Contessnally
note: all text is taken from the catalogue, Contemporary Glass, Sculptures,
Installations, Jewels written by Graziella Folchini Grassetto.