Orsoni Venezia 1888

Today at the Venice Film Festival is the day of ‘Joker: Folie à Deux’, directed by Todd Phillips. In these images, Emanuele Sari's project is dedicated to the enigmatic figure of this extraordinary comic book character, who has achieved great success in cinema. From a negative character in the famous Batman series to the absolute protagonist in the latest film versions, Joker continues to captivate, and in this mosaic work, the artist Sari captures all of his dark beauty.

Emanuele Sari - Luxury Venetian Mosaic
"Joker" 2023
Contemporary mosaic technique with Orsoni smalti
Self leveling, direct method on wood support
Size: 175x100 cm

The third edition of Homo Faber begins today in Venice, the exhibition that every two years selects the finest crafts from around the world. This year, the curation is by Luca Guadagnino and Nicolò Rosmarini. Homo Faber 2024 will be on display until the end of September at the monumental spaces of the Cini Foundation on the Island of San Giorgio.

Additionally, throughout the month of September, many artisanal workshops in the city will be open for visits. The Orsoni furnace is also participating in Homo Faber in Città with special openings to welcome the public who wish to learn about the history and excellence of the artisanal production that the furnace has been passing down from generation to generation since 1888.

Access to visits is by registration only on the website: https://orsoni.com/homofaber2024/

Train stations in major Italian cities are open-air museums. Even the Santa Lucia station in Venice hides small masterpieces, although many details were lost after the last restoration. However, looking up where the old ticket office used to be, you can notice a colorful mosaic that is a true work of art.

The artist Mario Deluigi, together with Anton Giulio Ambrisini, won the competition organized by the Ministry of Transport in 1954 and created the mosaic project using Orsoni tiles. Inaugurated in 1956, the 52 square meter work is titled 'Interpretation of the History of Venice through its Productions and Commercial Trades' and is a masterpiece of Spatialism. With its 20 meters of colorful tiles, it recalls the stories of travelers and merchants in one of the places that is now one of the gateways to Venice.

The Orsoni Color Choice is a journey into the artisanal production of the historical furnace. The folder's four panels showcase the color ranges of Venetian smalti, the 20 shades of gold, from white to copper, and the colored golds.
The Orsoni Color Choice is an inspiration tool for interior designers and architects, an essential work tool for every mosaicist.
And for those who have the pleasure of visiting Venice in person, the Orsoni Furnace Color Library is the place to choose from the thousands of out-of-catalog colors that extend this carefully curated portable selection.

You can order your Orsoni Color Choice by writing to [email protected]

In the world of glass, when we talk about enamel, we don't mean something that covers (as we commonly understand this word) but rather non-transparent glass, colored in paste. To make enamel, it is necessary to add a body, milk glass that removes transparency from the glass and gives it body. To make Venetian enamels, both body and soul are needed... it seems incredible, but these are precisely the ingredients that give opacity and color to Orsoni smalti.

Designed between 1957 and 1958 and considered by Adriano Olivetti, who commissioned it, as "a business card in the most beautiful square in the world", the Olivetti Store was a true challenge, a long and arduous task. Yet, Scarpa masterfully transformed the narrow and dark shop of a historic building—located at the corner of the loggia of the Procuratie Vecchie, of which it is a part, and a passageway leading to the canal behind—into a modern, spacious, and bright environment, intimate and exclusive but open to the square in relation to the city.

Many details make the Olivetti Store a pinnacle of Scarpa's career and an important chapter in the history of world architecture: in addition to the aforementioned mosaic floor, there is the service door made of Orsera stone that perfectly blends into the wall, the eye-shaped windows, and the lights integrated into the rosewood wall coverings, which give off an amber glow across the entire loggia and a corner of the square at night.

Forms, materials, colors, and technical solutions owe much not only to Scarpa's genius but also to the typically Venetian craftsmanship, which evokes the lights and reflections of Venice, making a visit to this small space a surprising discovery.

Ph. FAI - Negozio Olivetti

Ancient gold is a hand-pressed plate with a gold leaf that is beaten for a longer time to reveal the amber glass that supports it in transparency. Since 1888, the historic Orsoni furnace has been producing mosaic tiles used to restore masterpieces of art and architecture, ensuring a long life for the mosaic artistic heritage worldwide.

The main mosaic in the apse of the Basilica of Santa Maria Assunta in Torcello depicts the Virgin Hodegetria, where Mary holds the Child with one arm and gestures to Him with the other, symbolizing the path to salvation through Christ. Surrounding this image are the twelve apostles and two local saints, Heliodorus and Hermagoras, highlighting the local identity of the island's religious community. Visiting the Basilica of Santa Maria Assunta is like diving into the history of Venice, observing works that not only tell religious stories but also the cultural and artistic history of the island of Torcello. This site represents a bridge between Byzantine and Western traditions, offering visitors a unique experience in the Venetian lagoon.

Since 1888, we have been creating gold mosaic tiles using an elaborate and ancient artisanal process. Venetian gold leaf is protected by an ultra-thin glass layer that ensures its durability over time. The blue glass backing imparts a warm and antique color to Orsoni Venezia's gold mosaic.
Get inspired by colors and browse the Orsoni Project book available on our website https://orsoni.com/project-book/

To pair gold leaf with blown glass requires a velvet touch. The actions are delicate yet firm, swift and precise. This work carries with it centuries of history, as at the Orsoni furnace we continue to repeat the same techniques passed down to us by the Byzantines.

The garden of the Fondazione Querini Stampalia Venezia, designed between 1959 and 1963 by Carlo Scarpa, encapsulates the essence of Venice. Carlo Scarpa created the garden as if it were a large flower pot, where the presence of water is fundamental. Like in Middle Eastern gardens, there are two fountains on opposite sides of the green area. The water continuously flows from one side to the other in marvelous architectures that resemble geometric mazes in metal and stone or alabaster.
Thus, it is not surprising to find here in the garden some details that are works of art. The wellhead of a cistern, a Gothic lion nearby, symbolizing Venice, a Roman-style capital, decorates one side of the garden surrounded by a Japanese atmosphere. A Byzantine touch is given by the mosaic tiles of Mario De Luigi's work, embedded in the concrete wall with their gold and silver leaf.

The glass tesserae are cut using a frame to easily obtain tiles of the same geometric shape. Each plate is first marked with a diamond point, and then each tile is hand-cut along the incision of the cutter. Smalti piastrina are mainly used in contemporary mosaics because they can be easily cut with mosaic pliers. They are used in irregular formats and ensure lightness in decorations such as frames, tabletops, floors, and artistic mosaics.

Browse 𝑺𝒎𝒂𝒍𝒕𝒊 𝑷𝒊𝒂𝒔𝒕𝒓𝒊𝒏𝒂 𝑪𝒐𝒍𝒐𝒓 𝑪𝒉𝒂𝒓𝒕 https://bit.ly/3S78bLR

Glass is a fascinating and mysterious material that continuously changes states during its process: heat transforms silicon sand into liquid glass, which then becomes solid once cooled. However, glass remains fragile until it is further annealed. What magic there is in glass, in its infinite forms, colors, and transparencies...

Find out more https://orsoni.com/furnace/

St. Mark’s Basilica in Venice is one of the most extraordinary examples of Byzantine architecture in Italy, renowned worldwide for its spectacular mosaics. These mosaics, covering a surface of over 8,000 square meters, represent one of the largest collections of Byzantine mosaic art outside Istanbul.
Since 1888, the Orsoni furnace has been producing the glass enamel and gold leaf tesserae for the conservation restoration of the mosaic cycles on the domes and facade of St. Mark’s Basilica.

Read more https://orsoni.com/projects/st-marks-basilic-venice/

Red smalti are always a surprise. As the plates cool, the minerals that create the reds deposit on the surface, creating truly special effects. Some seem to carry on their surface the memory of the fire that created them.
The reds are infinite worlds, and just changing the viewpoint reveals all the possibilities these colors offer to our creatives.

For years, Orsoni has been developing cultural activities by initiating interdisciplinary collaborations on the theme of color. In 2020, in collaboration with D20 Art Lab of the Ca' Foscari University of Venice, the interactive experience "Sounds from the Library of Color" was created. In this experience, imperial reds, flesh tones, and blues are narrated through poetry to immerse the visitor in the world of color and its history. The three poems, translated over the years into different languages, are the result of study and interviews to uncover the meanings behind the production, the names inherited over the years, and the contexts in which the three main color families of the furnace come to life, a bit like magic, and since 1888, from a heritage that is also passed down through words.

Read the Color Poems here: https://orsoni.com/the-color-poem/

The collaboration between the Orsoni furnace and the Venissa Casa Burano project represents a significant meeting point between artisanal tradition and innovation in the context of design and hospitality, further enriched by the contribution of Studio Baukuh. In this interior design project, Orsoni Venezia 1888 demonstrates how a traditional material such as Venetian smalti (enamel glass) can be integrated into contemporary contexts, blending tradition and creativity while keeping ancient glassworking techniques alive.

Read more about this project on the Orsoni website https://orsoni.com/projects/casa-burano/

Piastrina smalti is our finest glass smalti (4 millimeters thickness) primarily used for contemporary artistic mosaics. It is valued for its brilliance and variety of colors, as well as for its lightness and uniform color across the surface. Smalti Piastrina pieces can be cut into geometric elements or into various shapes and sizes using glass nippers for more artistic forms. This type of smalti can be used for many types of decorations: walls, ceilings, small surfaces, and artistic objects.
🟥 🟨 🟩 🟦 Discover the color palette of Orsoni Smalti Piastrina http://bit.ly/3S78bLR

The exhibition ‘From the Heart to the Hands: Dolce & Gabbana ’ is a declaration of love for artisan craftsmanship, for the skilled hands that every day create beauty by continuing ancient arts and crafts. It’s a daily labor of gestures that repeat and refine until reaching the highest levels. That Made in Italy that Dolce & Gabbana embodies and surrounds itself with, just like the work of all the master artisans who, like the historic Orsoni furnace, have collaborated to create the wonderful sets of this grand exhibition.

Palazzo Reale, Milan
from April 7th to July 31st, 2024
https://milano.dolcegabbanaexhibition.com/

"From the Heart to the Hands" is an incredibly poetic expression, and it's exactly what we do every day at Orsoni Furnace. Being a craftsman requires passion, and to be part of the excellence in craftsmanship takes effort, and love. The same passion that Stefano Dolce and Domenico Gabbana depict in their wonderful exhibition "From the Heart to the Hands: Dolce&Gabbana" set up in Milan, a journey through everything that has inspired the creativity of the two designers over the last 40 years of their careers.

Palazzo Reale, Milan
from April 7th to July 31st, 2024
https://milano.dolcegabbanaexhibition.com/

"From the Heart to the Hands: Dolce & Gabbana" is a unique exhibition project, a tribute to the value of craftsmanship, the essence of Dolce&Gabbana since its origins. A narrative that, through the dream of Haute Couture, explores the sources of inspiration that have shaped the minds and hands of the two founders of the fashion house: from a passion for Italian culture to love for artisan tradition revisited in a contemporary key. "From the Heart to the Hands: Dolce&Gabbana" will also present the work of visual artists in dialogue with the creativity of Dolce&Gabbana.

The exhibition journey unfolds in a succession of themes that highlight the multitude of cultural references that have inspired the work of the two designers: among these, craftsmanship, visual arts and architecture, Italy and its traditions, innovation, theater, music, Opera, Ballet, and the sweet life.

Palazzo Reale, Milan
from April 7th to July 31st, 2024
https://milano.dolcegabbanaexhibition.com/

In the world of artistic mosaics, the traditional hand-cutting technique stands as a testament to craftsmanship and precision. Every piece of glass or stone is meticulously shaped by artisans using tools like the hammer and hardie, tools that have been fundamental to mosaic artists since ancient times.

Hand-cutting allows for a unique level of detail and texture, giving each mosaic piece a distinct character that machine-cut tiles cannot replicate. This method not only enhances the visual depth of the artwork but also ensures that each creation is truly one-of-a-kind.

Learn more about artistic mosaic techniques: https://orsoni.com/mosaic-techniques/

The art of mosaic is always contemporary. Throughout every era, mosaics have managed to renew their codes, adapt to artistic currents, invent new technical solutions, and evolve. A mosaic artwork embodies the creativity of the artist and the artisanal wisdom of those who have produced this ancient material, cherished for centuries for its infinite range of colors, its ability to reflect and interact with light, and the preciousness of an ancient technique that carries centuries of history yet remains ever contemporary.

This precious material, called “Cotisso” (untempered colored fused glass), is born from the mineral oxides added to color the quartz sand, and it is what remains at the end of production, a leftover of the process. Once the crucible is emptied, the excess enamel is cooled and stored for future production, with each color precisely separated. This division is not random but necessary: mineral oxides react differently to various temperatures.

This careful preservation prepares the ground for a new beginning. When the time is right, the "cotisso" is taken from the bins and melted again. It is a process of renewal that reveals the magic and versatility of glass, transforming what was considered waste into a valuable and usable resource.

Imagine the crucible as a stage of transformation, where the magic of art and functionality merge into one.
These refractory ceramic containers are much more than mere work tools: they are the theaters where glass transforms from raw material to artwork. Initially, the crucible is like a blank canvas, ready to embrace the heat and the raw material of glass.
But it's in the moment of replacement that the magic unfolds: the crucible emerges from the furnace, coated with colored glazes fused in the previous weeks. And in this delicate balance between functionality and beauty, the crucible reveals itself for what it truly is: not just a work object, but an icon of art and craftsmanship.

Blue in mosaics is not just a color but an element that adds depth, meaning, and beauty to the works. Throughout the centuries, this color has maintained its allure and its ability to evoke deep emotions. Whether in ancient or modern mosaics, blue continues to enchant and inspire, transforming simple tiles into timeless masterpieces.

Discover all the colors of Orsoni smalti > https://orsoni.com/color-choice/

Our work is crafted with skillful gestures. Pairing delicate blown glass with gold leaf requires gentle hands, precise movements, and a love for the craft. Watching these hands is mesmerizing! Countless times, these artisans have repeated the same movements, contributing to the decoration of some of the most beautiful places in the world with their delicate gestures. How much history resides in these intelligent hands!

It has been 10 years since the installation of The Sky Over Nine Columns, the nomadic artwork by Heinz Mack featuring nine golden columns, each over seven meters tall, exhibited on the Island of San Giorgio Maggiore in Venice during the 2014 Architecture Biennale. The column, a representation of the upright stance of humans, is the first element in architectural history, creating a direct connection between earth and sky. The gold leaf mosaics, made up of over eight hundred thousand tiles, exemplify local craftsmanship and represent Venice's historical cultural relations between East and West. The installation also serves as a luminous performance piece, adding a widely visible source of wonder to the rich Venetian landscape.

The installation The Sky Over Nine Columns was created by Beck & Eggeling International Fine Art (Düsseldorf) and Sigifredo di Canossa, in collaboration with the Fondazione Giorgio Cini and with the support of Trend Group (Vicenza).
Ph. Alessandra Chemollo

Manuela knows the sound that the diamond tip must make when scoring the gold leaf plate. She knows the glass so well that she can tell if it has been 'cooked' correctly and can hear by ear if the sound produced by the cutting tool's tip is scoring the plate too much. Being a master artisan means having learned the craft so deeply that one can feel it with all the senses; only these individuals can teach younger generations a trade that is an art. The art of handmade craftsmanship.