Christmas Art Market | 2020

Ca’ Sagredo Hotel, Venice


Exhibition of artworks, design objects and artistic handicrafts Various artists

Ca’ Sagredo Hotel – Venice
8th – 30th December 2020

Tuesday the 8th of December the first edition of the Christmas Art Market has opened in the noble halls of the amazing Ca’ Sagredo Hotel. An exclusive exhibition of art, design and handicraft which only the Venetian mastery could conceive.

An event arranged by ON VIEW Experiences & Weddings by Ornella Naccari in collaboration with G’art [galleria delle arti] and Ca’ Sagredo Hotel.

Works on display: Antares by Fulvia Notari; Antithesis by Laura Zuliani; Antonia Trevisan; Aventurina Design; ImprontaCreativa; Orsola Mainardis Jewels; Vita di Vetro-Andrea Moretti; Stefano Ceretti Photography; This masquerade.


Urbanimal | 2019

The new art project which reflects on the contemporary urban and exhibition space conceived as a living and pulsating organism.
Throughout the seven months of the exhibitions, URBANIMAL hosted like a shelter the artistic sensitivity of some selected international artists who exhibited under the “environmental influence” of the silent and attentive city of Venice.
From the 11st of May the building of Fondazione Masieri became a real “artistic ecosystem” where the exhibition area was not only conceived as a part of the work of art, but also included the surrounding environment, even on a universal scale. The space on the ground floor has been turned into an “ideal room” where all the peculiar features of the area have been organically studied and mirrored the integration of visual art, design and architecture.


THE EXHIBITIONS
Throughout the months of the exhibitions, the building of Fondazione Masieri has hosted different phenomenas of development in the field of “ecology of art” housing the famous installation in recyclable and recycled plastic by Cracking Art symbols of the project (May-November). There were the artworks by the provocative international artist Robert Gligorov (May-July); the celebration of the silicone by the designer Alessandro Ciffo (October, in collaboration with Venice Design Week 2019)

PARTNER URBANIMAL


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Meerkats as symbols/watchmen to carefully guard the Grand Canal (from which they’re observed too) in this project their presence suggests to the passer-by and the visitors to increase their own awareness towards the surrounding environment which deserves it. Meerkats represent a unique example of animal behaviour in the field of living beings. In URBANIMAL the Meerkats suggest the concept of “ecological space” where artworks, design objects and installations share the same delicate environmental system in a heterogeneous way. ​

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“BRAMA RENAISSANCE”
ROBERT GLIGOROV solo exhibition

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The snake, part of the sculpture from which this artwork has taken inspiration (“Laocoön and His Sons”, also called the “Laocoön Group”) is inspired by technology – here represented by the metal tube. This deeply perturbs the vision of ourselves and the surrounding world, avoiding us to embrace – although with desperation – the universe.
The tube comes out strenuously from the man’s forehead – more precisely from where the third eye is located –violently stopping the intuition of the cosmic whole. According to the ancient Indian Vedic texts, Indra kills the cosmic snake Vritra freeing a water flow and giving life to creation. Brahma, the creator god, produces this process through the water gush.
The priest Laocoön who is depicted in the classic sculpture is here represented by the tree hardly managing to face up to the assault of the sea snakes. His restrained pose, his real and absolute presence seem to be unable to warn us against modern nightmares (reborn Troyan horses).As a matter of fact the first outcomes of the global ecological catastrophe are already at the gates of our world.
Robert Gligorov has always conceived his work connected to plants, animal and human worlds since he calls them the great triad representing the trinity space-time-matter. They are immersed in an environmental system which is the integrated part of his artistic elaboration, so that it acquires a sort of sacral connotation.
Scarpa’s room completes and emphasizes the sensory perception of this artwork which becomes pure and absolute since invisible elements such as light, time and emptiness are highlighted.
Gligorov’s video-performance – “The Bobe’s legend” – is the symbol of the soul which soars through the air to generate another thought and another life. It marks -in a delicate and poetic way – the primordial bond among the living beings (in this case man and animal).
Two depictions of a distorted reality (vegetable/human/animal) complete the installation. The combination of space, time and matter is perceived through the loss of focus (blurry image).
The room in the Fondazione Masieri represents a sort of “ideal space” where the spatial references of the composition are repayed to the visitor reinterpreted through the powerful and imaginative plasma of the artist’s creation.


“UMBRA 5.1”
ALESSANDRO CIFFO solo exhibition
Soundtrack by the composer Antonio Moretti (Vicenza)

Until they ask him to do his own reinterpretation of the Eiffel Tower in silicone, Alessandro Ciffo will keep on experimenting and pushing the limits: infernal eruptions, the most delicate clouds, anything that he can make with this material that he has been shaping for over twenty years now. A material that isn’t just the medium for his artistic expression, it is his artistic expression itself. As I recall, I acquired my first piece in 2001, a tablecloth that I bought at Dilmos in Milan. That was just the first of the twenty or so Ciffo pieces I now have in my collection and every time that I set a table with that tablecloth it’s a special evening. 
Venice is Venice, and no artist (or in this case no artist/designer) can fool around with this place. Here in the Palazzina di Fondazione Masieri where Carlo Scarpa left his unmistakable mark, Ciffo has landed. Brave as always, with a show of tall vases that opens on October 11th, 2019. The vases tower like proud, living creatures that are rearing up and dancing on a stage. The audience can’t help but be bowled over. The show is titled Umbra 5.1, where “umbra” is a play on the Italian word ombra and refers to the shadow that Earth casts when it orbits between the sun and the moon. 
The pieces in Umbra 5.1 are different from the many others that I’ve seen over the years. Here it’s as if Ciffo were tip toeing through the rooms. Starting with the special silicone that he’s using here for the first time: the colors are softer and more harmonious, less pop than other pieces of his that I know so well because they are part of my daily life at home.
These pieces look like they are shot through with Venice’s own special light; it’s as if Ciffo were inspired by a poetic recall of Murano glass. His silicone has never been as close a cousin to blown glass as it is here: it’s just as shimmering, just as transparent and just as ever-changing in the light. It’s apparently fragile just like blown glass and naturally recalls Carlo Scarpa’s work. 
But Ciffo’s work is different and unique because where blown glass was made in two separate and distinct phases- a first design phase where an artist like Scarpa planned and drew and a second executive phase where a team of glassblowers actually made the piece, perfectly timing their gestures to the temperature of the glass- Ciffo is different. As part of a new generation of artists, he does the entire project himself: it’s as if he were both the Carlo Scarpa and the team of expert glassblowers. From start to finish, he writes the script and does the show. Ciffo is both an artist and a warrior. Because he fights with his material with calibrated gestures, days and hours on end, putting his body into the battle but putting his soul into it even more. Because his soul moves his hands and his hands shape his material. I would like to spend a whole day with him at his studio in Biella like a fly on the wall, listening in silence as his fight produces poetry. Watching quietly as thousands of gestures combine to create a vase that can dance in the light. You’ll see what I mean at the show in Venice. Because only seeing is believing in this combination of strength and delicacy that is the purest expression of order and imagination. 


Art criticism by GIAMPIERO MUGHINI


THE EVENT: VENICE ART NIGHT – 22/6/2019

Live music with Fabrizio Tavernelli Complesso

Glass Art, Culture and Design | 2019

Vitrum Milano


Murano glass art exhibition – Since the twenties century – Various artists/collectors
VITRUM – Milano Rho Fiere
1-4 ottobre 2019

Glass has always impressed artists and poets with its peculiar features. As it was a synonym for purity and fragility, over time it gained a special place in the heart of those who desired to be surrounded by “fragments” of delicate beauty. 
From its origins, Venice has always been a vibrant centre of maritime trade flows. Thanks to the Venetian typical taste and an extraordinary intuition towards this investment, Venice created Murano in the late 1200s which became the focus of glassmaking worldwide. 

Ph. credits: Stefano Ceretti ​© www.stefanoceretti.com

Artists, designers, perlere and impiraresse (glass bead creators and bead stringers) – who are currently inspired by the ancient Murano art- are about to show the evolution and nobility of this material: one of the most versatile and fascinating element to be discovered and interpreted by the international public.


Antonia Trevisan, poetess of Glass | 2019 ​

Exhibition of the artwork GRADIVA, DREAM AND REALITY by Antonia Trevisan

CA’ SAGREDO HOTEL VENICE – “L’incontro” room – Cannaregio 4198/99, Campo S. Sofia (30121 Venezia)

​From January 2019 to January 2020

The introduction during the Glass Tourism Project event
A detail of the work

GRADIVA, DREAM AND REALITY – Birth and production

In his novel Gradiva. A Pompeian fancy Wilhelm Hensen tells the passion of Norbert Hanold for a marbled bas-relief admired at the Vatican Museums in Rome. In the female figure who walks gracefully with “a natural, simple and virginal poise”, Hanold recognizes the features of a “Pompeian mistress” giving her the epithet of “Gradiva”, latin for “she who walks”. Hanold is fascinated by the airy and fluctuating movement of her garment uncovering a feet in sandals. Above all, he is irresistibly attracted by her right foot whose fingertips touch gently the ground, while her sole and heel are lying almost vertically. Gradiva seduces Harold’s mind and dreams so much that he even decides to head towards Pompei, in order to find this imaginary woman in the ruined Vesuvian town. In the dazzlingly sunny Campania he actually meets her, but this real woman – who is made of flesh and blood (not of marble) and speaks in german – will help him (archaeologist) to step out of his own delirium. The Gradiva he met across the Pompeii ruins, is actually his neighbour, Zoe Bertgang, a girl with whom he used to play in his childhood.

The ordinary and ironic ending of the novel – where they finally declare their love for each other- doesn’t fade the gripping fascination of the reader while following the tangled plot of Norbert’s obsession.
This novel, published in 1903, was recommended by Jung to Freud, who wrote Delusion and dream in Jensen’s Gradiva in August 1906, interpreting the text through the instruments of his psycoanalytic analysis. Norbert Hanold’s case is described as a typical repression of the early love which finally reawakens due to the female figure of Gradiva-Zoe.

This novel offers a wide range of interpretations since it mingles archaeological passion and myth, hallucination and reality, eroticism and sublimation.

Since they are trasferred onto a glass slab, the images of both female figures live each other’s life like in the complicated delirium of the archaeologist. In this visionary story the artist Antonia Trevisan “tells” us that Gradiva and Zoe – at the same time flesh and marble – are conflated in an evocative dialogue of shapes in motion; the past of the ancient bas-relief adopts the features of a today’s young woman. Dreams and reality overlap like two parallel and illusionary lives. Both are possible. Antonia Trevisan has been processing glass since the very beginning of her career, and now uses the transparency of a temperate glass slab in order to capture the protagonist’dreams and love on a catchy image. Through a slightly reflective shadow effect the two female figures are projected in a dreamlike fourth dimension which at the same time condenses and goes beyond the flat surface of painting and the three-dimensional features of sculpting.


ANTONIA TREVISAN
Born in Vicenza, she lives and works in Vicenza and Venice.
After his early studies at the Scientific High School, Antonia Trevisan attended workshops of painting, design, furniture design and technical drawing at the Experimental Technical Institute. Then she studied at the Faculty of Sociology in Trento and decided to begin a career as a teacher in Middle Schools, especially focusing on graphic composition and photography.
From 1970 she took part in a series of evening meetings with architects such as Carlo Scarpa, Arrigo Rudi, Giorgio Bellavitis, Federico Motterle, Umberto Tubini and Domenico Sandri, the ceramist Pompeo Pianezzola, the glass sculptor Luciano Vistosi and the weaver and designer Renata Bonfanti at the Gigi Lanaro’s furniture store in Vicenza. In particular Renata Bonfanti referred to the principles by Gropius and Bauhaus which gave autonomous value to applied arts, so that she was persuaded of the importance to offer the Society new object models inspired by the highest simplicity and functionality.
In that period Antonia Trevisan began to design and produce her first windows of coloured blown glass sheets that she assembled with transparent glue and inserted into shatterproof glass panels.
In 1988 she created her brand “Antonia Trevisan idee colore”. Now her prestigious artistic glass windows are distributed in Veneto and Lombardia.
Since 2002 she has directed her energies especially towards painting. Finally in 2010 her pictorial production became visible on the occasion of her first solo exhibition which was followed by a remarkable series of shows in Italy and abroad.
Since her fascination for the multiple aspects of art and in addition to the project Gradiva. Dream and reality, her artworks have surveyed several concepts related to psychology and/or sociology.

Past events | 2016-18

“Faces of shadow” text by Paola Caramel, performed by Cecilia La Monaca + Installation “Gradiva” by Antonia Trevisan | theatrical reading included in Arts’ Connection, Glass Festival |Venice 11 May 2018

“Fire Flamenco” The soul of a murrina, performed by Manuela Carretta and Angelo Giordano – curated by Petra Cason (Vicenza) | music and dance show included in Arts’ Connection, Glass Festival | Venice 13 May 2018

“Soundtrack for desperate nights” by and with P. Caramel + Davide Calvi at the piano, 21 April, 2018| reading included in the festival “Poetry Vicenza”

Virgilio Patarini, “Cold days” curated by Paola Caramel | 14 January-28 February 2018 | Cantiere Barche 14 – Vicenza

“Diary of a Madman” by and with Virgilio Patarini, from Gogol’, 25 February, 2018 |performance included in Festival Gli stati della mente – Vicenza

Concert of Fabrizio Tavernelli’s band or crowfunding campaign promoting “Infanti” album |We_Crociferi – Venice | 19 December 2017

“Long live Italy…? About murders against culture” Mail Art exhibition curated by Paola Caramel | B&V Kayak – Venice | 20 January – 28 February 2017

“The sound of sun”, musical reading by and with P. Caramel + A. Ferrarese (piano) Refectory of A. Trevisan, Cà Zenobio – Venice | 29 October 2017

Liquid identity | 2018

Street art in Venice. Two spaces, two outdoor spots, two artists, the same purpose

G’art [galleria delle arti] in collaboration with ArteMea (London) carry out and bring to Venice a completely innovative art project. 
For the Liquid Identity event Venice and London will be connected by an imaginary creative thread. 
​​From June these two artists will present their joint and personal artistic languages to produce social engaged art.

Venice will be a stage of some performative actions where the artists’ contemporary patterns will be involved in the urban fabric like their “personal icons”. They will meet the immutable Venetian landscape pushing pedestrians and inhabitants to question their dearest topics of the city.

While messing about with the city’s creative element – water – both artists enjoy experimenting different materials. They produce new trends and reinterpret their own artistic patterns pushing the audience to question the sense of this whole contemporary evanescence. Venice is the most sumptuous but fragile example.

With its condition and problems, Venice is emblematic of a delicate existence. Its being a “dreamy city” is actually in a very precarious situation. Its artistic and architectural beauties, the lagoon ecosystem and even the universal symbolic value of the city are seriously threatened by the pollution of its water and air. This is caused by the relentless commercialization and by the different phenomena generated by mass tourism.

Street art was born in the USA between the 70s-80s as an expression of “subculture”. It was then exported and celebrated in the most prestigious galleries in the world. Now street art appears to the public with these artists whose personal languages intertwine with the city. For Endless with the release of a new brand called EAU DE LAGUNE. 
An interesting artistic expression which uses bright colours and street style ironically and offers a new conscious meaning to the contemporary icons.  

Liquid identity | Act one: the “wall” paintings

Thanks to the support of private owners and the architect who is currently responsible of the works, we managed to carry out four “wall paintings” in Cannaregio district. Respecting the ancient venetian buildings, the artists performed on wooden panels. Location: fondamenta dei Ormesini (on the corner of calle Turlona)

Liquid identity | Act two

The main exhibition in the Venetian venue of the Ancient School of Laneri – Santa Croce district

Liquid identity | Act three

The exhibition moves to another district. Endless and Papibulldozer have come back where their first act took place. Now they show in the post-industrial space BVK in Cannaregio, Calle Turlona 2866 (on the corner of fondamenta dei Ormesini).
On the occasion of the opening, a new live painting was performed by Papibulldozer

Liquid identity | Finissage

Be LOCAL – The event gathering art, handicraft and wine tasting
Liquid Identity is about to end. Since this project is rooted in local community too, we have decided to propose a special event in collaboration with some Venetian companies.
Italian Event Better – Tour operator and event planner
Muranero – African fantasy in Murano lampwork glass
Ca’ Eolia – A traditional Venetian “bacaro” with a modern twist

The artists

ENDLESS

Endless is a London-based artist. His provocative and radical creations tell a story of our world that is bold and intense. Starting out using the walls of our nation’s capital as his canvas, Endless’s reputation has risen to capture the attention of its residents, foreign visitors and the media alike.
One of the artist’s most iconic works is the Marky Mark, a tongue-in cheek take on Mark Wahlberg’s Calvin Klein advert from the 90s. In this piece the striking replacement of the original branding by Endless with the fake alternative “Calvin Classics” was requested
by Channel 4 to be used for a viral testicular cancer campaign, called “Feeling Nuts”. 
​Other artworks include a reinterpretation of Chanel brand, where the famous perfume bottle has been
renamed as “Chapel”. Endless created new images for the boxer David Haye, for the Liberty Store London and in collaboration with world famous Uk art duo, Gilbert and George, for a prestigious
exhibition in Singapore. Furthermore Endless worked with them on a series of new images to be exhibited in his latest solo show.

ALBERTO VIGNAZIA ≠ PAPIBULLDOZER

Papibulldozer is an alter-ego. Or perhaps Alberto Vignazia is Papibulldozer’s alter-ego. Papibulldozer is interactive and photovoltaic. He appears as a drawing, an illustration, a movie, a picture. His work can be built, recycled and installed. Since it is figurative, abstract or simply quoted, it spreads through each media with its own cynicism by expressing contemporary paradoxes. Both of which are individual and collective. 
Papibulldozer is a performer. Papibulldozer makes his own history. Alberto Vignazia doesn’t. He’s shy.
He attended D.A.M.S. in Turin. He decided not to graduate as a stance going against the academic system. Alberto finds his way taking a very close look at the fringes of society. He likes moving towards what is apparently hidden which is full of meaning and substance. He likes what is troublesome and unpleasant to observe. The main step in Alberto’s life was the birth of Papibulldozer and his blog on “cinema, art, politics and swear words. not necessarily in this order”. In this place/non-place Alberto can finally express himself. He travelled and exhibited at: Passaggi a Nord-Ovest, Biella; CHIARI & geniali, Brescia; ARTEINGENUA, Milan and Rome; Chair and the Maiden Gallery, New York; Paratissima 11, Turin along with his alter-ego Papibulldozer.

#FEELPEOPLE®

At the LIQUID IDENTITY event it is also present a photographic project designed by Stefano Ceretti.
Stefano is a professional photographer from Piemonte (Biella). Starting out from his passion for art and society he created a virtual place to socialize.
The title already suggests his peculiar inclination to bridge over landscapes, places, settings. In fact even if they are conventional, they acquire a new meaning just when the human subject arises.
He started out by shooting/promoting companies and commercial activities which consider first people (more than profit). Then #FEELPEOPLE® has naturally claimed a new value: perceiving people everywhere, no matter what.
So it came the moment to develop branches like #feelpeoplewall, #feelstreet, #feelportrait, #feelpregnant, #feelwedding, #feeldog and the “city” series as well:
#feelvenice/london/berlin/paris/shanghai/hongkong/newyork…

Stefano is the only photographer who is allowed to follow close on our artists’ heels. He is our sharp eye on the different identities connected to LIQUID IDENTITY. In this way every pedestrian can join #FEELPEOPLE® community which now gets a special “liquid” sense: #feelliquidinvenice

www.stefanoceretti.com

MURANO GLASS FOR LIQUID IDENTITY 

At the LIQUID IDENTITY exhibition we will have the pleasure to present a bottle of EAU DE LAGUNE. It will be created especially for this event with Endless brand by the Glass Cathedral’s glassmaker. For this purpose the Glass Cathedral (former Church of Santa Chiara in Murano Island) joins the group of our excellent partners in town. A sharp artistic production which tries to offer a new awareness to the aesthetic expressions whose Venice is the most celebrated and globally recognised. As the glass bottle is put on display in an oblique position, Venice appears to be the most stunning and fragile icon of contemporary worship.


LOCATIONS

Ancient School of Laneri

After a serious fire this building was supposedly rebuilt by Baldassarre Loghena in 1633. Today it still presents an Istrian stone façade and two doors on the ground floor. Each door shows an arch-shaped iron edge and it also keeps the wrought-iron initials of the patron saint. Looking up at the first floor, you can see two double-arched windows on the side of an aedicula devoted to Saint Bernardino. Moreover on the top floor you can admire wonderful ogival windows with cartouche. At the present the interior doesn’t have any furniture but it keeps the original wooden ceiling intact. On the ground floor there is a wide room with three marbled columns. At last we can see the former Capitolo’s room on the first floor where some altars used to be in the past. Luckily we can still see them.  

Confraternity of the Laneri (wool guild)

Under the protection of Saint Bernardino, this confraternity had a specific altar in the Church of Saint Pantalon which can still be seen nowadays (thethird one on the right). The confraternity was divided into three branches: those who thrashed the wool, those who combed it with iron combs and those who untangled it with hooked iron combs. They depended on the Camera del Purgo or on the Provveditor de Comun. In 1773 20 shop lads and 200 workers were archived. On the 4th of May, 1786 the Senate suppressed the agreement. After the abolishment and various uses the building became a cinema as well. At the present the Patronato of Tolentini is located here. 

A quote from the book: “Scuole grandi e piccole a Venezia tra arte e storia” by S. Gramigna and A. Perissa

Salizada San Pantalon, Santa Croce 131/A – 30100 Venice

BVK SPACE

Inaugura nel 2016 da un’idea dell’imprenditrice cilena Beatriz Valenzuela. L’ex magazzino in Calle Turlona a Cannaregio si trasforma in uno spazio multiculturale per assumere un doppio ruolo, galleria d’arte e spazio dedicato ai servizi (tour in kayak, laboratori, incontri…)

Calle Turlona 2866 (corner Fond.ta Ormesini), Cannaregio 30121 – Venice