Venice Glass Maestro Lino Tagliapietra Speaks the Language of the Angels - "The Origin of the Journey" at Ca' Rezzonico

At Lino Tagliapietra's InGalleria on Murano 
Photo: Cat Bauer

(Venice, Italy) Lino Tagliapietra will be on 89-years-old on August 10, 2023. He is a Leo, a fire sign, ruled by the Sun, and represented by the Lion. (So am I, which is one reason why I love him:-) Working with fire on an island in the lagoon seems like a good job for a Venetian Leo.

At InGalleria, Tagliapietra's exhibition space on the island on Murano, I asked him the meaning of the cursive white glass symbols that seemed to spill out from the heavens and onto earth through an image of his open hands. To me, the white glass sculptures looked like letters that formed a word. Were they symbols written in a secret language? He said, no, he had created them just for fun. But I kept thinking there was something more...

Other reasons why I love Lino Taglipieatra:

• He is the most brilliant glass artist on the planet today. 
• He can translate the language of the angels into physical images that human beings can understand.
• He's zooming around Venice at 90ish as if he were only 70ish.
  
  

  

  Lino Tagliapietra at Ca' Rezzonico
  Photo: Cat Bauer

I first encountered Lino Tagliapietra more than 12 years ago, back in 2011 when his retrospective Lino Tagliapietra, De Murano allo Studio Glass. Opere 1954-2011 starred at the Istituto Veneto di Scienza Lettere ed Arti. I reviewed it in a post entitled Lino Tagliapietra, Master of the Glass in Venice.

The post started off:

Lino Tagliapietra thinks in glass. His thoughts are beautiful and complex, and we have the great privilege of seeing those thoughts solidified in glass, a material created by the gods themselves when lightning strikes the earth.

Please click over and finishing reading what I wrote (it's short:-) so you can get the backstory (it is just a simple click!):

Angel Tear by Lino Taglipietra

Lino Tagliapietra, Master of the Glass in Venice

OK. Are you back now? Did you read it?

Right now Lino Tagliapietra has another gem of a show tucked inside the enormous Ca' Rezzonico palace on the Grand Canal, which itself just recently re-opened to the public. Entitled "L'origine del viaggio" or "The Origin of the Journey," it represents the core of his life's work.

Back in the 1970s, Tagliapietra revolutionized American glass design when he introduced students at Dale Chihuly's Pilchuck School in Seattle to Venetian glassblowing techniques. Since then, Tagliapietra divides his time between Murano and Seattle, so he slides easily between speaking in both Italian and English.

L'origine del viaggio at Ca' Rezzonico by Lino Taglipietra 
Photo: Cat Bauer

 

After the press preview, we were fortunate enough to be whisked across the lagoon to the glass-blowing island of Murano where Lino Tagliapietra was born almost 90 years ago. We entered his showroom, and ... he was already there! Minutes ago he was at Ca' Rezzonico! And now he was greeting us on Murano!

There are some moments in life when you know that you are actually living something rare and precious in real time, and yesterday was one of those days. To be chatting with Lino Tagliapietra, in the showroom of Lino Tagliapietra, on the island of Murano...

While I was nosing around on the upper level of InGalleria, I stumbled upon a letter in a blue frame on a bookshelf signed by Jeff Babcock. To me, it sums the man up:

Lino

You are a lion

my Maestro

the studio

your domain

you move with the power and grace

of the great cat

At the bench

you work magic

with this unruly glass

Touching

softly as you would a baby

when the piece is young

but as it grows

it needs a firmer hand

At times you pounce

attacking with power

and gentleness

controlling but never breaking the spirit

of the object you form

In your hands

you make of it

all it could ever wish to be

You are the best

I have ever known
You have my eternal respect

Jeff Babcock
6-7-97

Lino Tagliapietra explaining avventurina
(If you've read my previous blog post, you will know what that is:-)

When it was time to leave, I wanted to ask the Maestro something that had been on my mind the entire visit. I showed Lino Tagliapietra the photo of his hands and the squiggly glass objects below that he said he had created just for fun.

I said, in Italian, "To me, those are letters from another language -- the language of the angels. You have translated the words of the angels into something humans can understand. And the word you have written is 'love.' Do you agree?"

Lino Tagliapietra smiled and said, in English, "I agree one hundred percent."

Lino Tagliapietra. L'origine del viaggio at Ca' Rezzonico runs through September 25, 2023. Go to Ca' Rezzonico for more information. Go to Lino Tagliapietra for more information about the Maestro.

Ciao from Venezia,
Cat Bauer
Venetian Cat - The Venice Blog