Glass-art exhibition space · San Giorgio Maggiore, Venice · Italy

Le Stanze del Vetro

Le Stanze del Vetro (“The Glass Rooms”) is an exhibition space on the island of San Giorgio Maggiore in Venice, dedicated to the study and display of glass as an art form of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. A long-term cultural project of the Fondazione Giorgio Cini and the Pentagram Stiftung, it presents monographic shows on artists, designers and Murano glassworks, restoring critical attention to a medium central to Venetian identity.

At a glance

Type: Exhibition space and study centre for modern glass art
Period: Opened 2012
Style: Contemporary gallery within a former monastic island complex
Location: Isola di San Giorgio Maggiore, Venice, Italy
Coordinates: 45.4291° N, 12.3448° E

Overview

Le Stanze del Vetro occupies a building on the island of San Giorgio Maggiore, across the basin of San Marco from the heart of Venice. It is run jointly by the Fondazione Giorgio Cini and the Pentagram Stiftung as a space devoted to glass as a fine and applied art. Exhibitions alternate retrospectives of leading designers with explorations of historic Murano production.

History

The project was launched in 2012 on the island long associated with the Cini Foundation, which since the mid-twentieth century has restored the former Benedictine monastery as a centre for culture and scholarship. Le Stanze del Vetro added a permanent programme dedicated to glass, accompanied by a study archive devoted to twentieth-century Venetian glassworks.

What you see

The galleries present rotating exhibitions of vases, sculptures, lighting and design objects in glass, drawn from major makers and Murano furnaces. Displays are arranged to highlight technique, colour and the dialogue between artists and master glassblowers. The setting on San Giorgio Maggiore frames the visit with views over the lagoon.

Cultural significance

Le Stanze del Vetro has helped renew scholarly and public interest in glass as a modern art form and in the heritage of Murano. It positions Venetian glass within the wider history of twentieth-century design and craft.

Practical information

Admission to the exhibitions is generally free, with seasonal opening hours. Check the official website for the current programme and visiting times.

Getting there

The island of San Giorgio Maggiore is served by the Venice public waterbus (vaporetto), a short hop from San Marco. The exhibition space is within the Cini Foundation complex on the island.

Sources & resources

Further reading: San Giorgio Maggiore on Wikipedia. More cultural heritage destinations at culturalheritageonline.com.

Find it on the map

Google Maps See the location on a full map → Street View Walk around the place virtually → OpenStreetMap Free community cartography →

The multi-year cultural project LE STANZE DEL VETRO was inaugurated at the opening of a new permanent exhibition space on the island of San Giorgio Maggiore, intended to host, on an annual basis, a series of monographic and collective exhibitions dedicated to international artists who used during their career, glass as an original means of expression and a means of researching one&#39;s own personal poetics. The goal is to show the innumerable potential of this material and to bring glass back to the center of the debate on the international art scene. The building intended for the exhibitions of LE STANZE DEL VETRO is located in the west wing of the former boarding school on the island of San Giorgio Maggiore and has 650sqm of exhibition space.



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In addition to the exhibitions, the space hosts conferences, educational workshops and other events dedicated to glass. The redevelopment of the building was carried out by the New York-based Annabelle Selldorf Architects studio, with the collaboration of architects Fabrizio Cattaruzza and Francesco Millosevich. As part of the LE STANZE DEL VETRO project, the Giorgio Cini Foundation with the support of Pentagram Stiftung has also set up, within its Institute of Art History, a special Study Center which promotes the progressive establishment of a general archive of Venetian glass , The creation of a specialized library, the organization of seminars and conferences aimed at scholars and artists interested in the history, technologies and developments of glass art, also making available scholarships for researchers interested in the topic. With this project, glass, recently reappeared also in the Venice Pavilion of the Biennale, from which it had been absent since 1972, regains a new exclusive space.



Thanks to it, not only the historical and cultural perspective of this art form is deepened, but also the study of technologies and production methods is favored which, starting from the early twentieth century, have opened up to experimentations and innovations more radical, especially thanks to the contribution of those internationally renowned artists and designers to whom the exhibition program of LE STANZE DEL VETRO is dedicated. To promote the enhancement of glass art and its history, each exhibition provides for the publication of a catalog, edited by the most important scholars and international experts in the sector, published by Skira. Over the years, all these publications will become a fundamental study and research tool. The activities carried out under the LE STANZE DEL VETRO project are coordinated by a scientific committee composed of Luca Massimo Barbero (President), Marino Barovier, Rosa Barovier Mentasti, David Landau, Jean-Luc Olivi&eacute;, Nico Stringa and Giorgio Vigna.


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https://culturalheritageonline.com/places/the-glass-rooms-l2309/

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