Glass 5000 B.C–1900 A.D. A Brief History Giorgio Spanu
Glass has been one of the most successful mediums used in modern art. In fact, the rich diversity of thought and craftsmanship in modern fine glass has made it possible to use the more recent concepts of form and design so successfully that those interested in other arts are turning to glass for inspiration, wrote Leloise Davis Skelley, author of Modern Fine Glass, published in New York in 1937. Today these words ring truer than ever.
Archaeological findings and some conservative conjecture date certain Egyptian glassware at circa 5000 B.C., but a more accurate date would be the late predynastic period, before 3400 B.C., as shown by findings of pale green glass beads in graves of that time. Fairly definite evidence indicates that glass was made in northern Mesopotamia, today Iraq, about 2000 years B.C. Egyptian records dating back to 1500 B.C. and the Cartouche of King Thotmes III (1501-1449 B.C.) serve as definitive proof of the existence of glassworks in that period.
The Phoenicians, however, are generally credited with the invention of the glassblower’s pipe early in the Christian era, an event that completely revolutionized the process of glassmaking. The innovation created a new technique of wide application that, in a short period of time, oriented a large segment of the glassmaking industry toward utilitarian products: phials and perfume flacons, goblets, and vessels for common use. The Phoenicians were among the first peoples to produce and utilize glass commercially.
At the same time, the glassblowing technique made possible the combination of transparency and extreme thinness in the glass object, either free blown or molded. This inspired the glassblower to search for the purest obtainable materials with which to work and to strive for the realization of a quality of glass that was terse, homogeneous, and free from discoloration. The Phoenician glassblowers succeeded in resolving all problems arising from the new technique, and thus marked the actual beginning of the history of glass.
The Romans, however, became leaders in glassware and far surpassed most of their neighbors. During this period, Rome was consolidating the Empire and, with the advent of the pax romana, a favorable climate was created for the development of the arts. It was a peaceful period for production and freedom of trade. The acceptance of the art of glassmaking in everyday life was widespread. The most commonly manufactured items entered into daily use in a wide variety of forms, while the more refined items reached a higher plane of expression in the ornamental field.
>When the Roman Empire fell, the inheritance of the glassmaking technique took refuge in the East. Byzantine glassmakers were most likely responsible for the westward movement of the art of glassmaking, which eventually reached Venice. One of the earliest dated records of Venetian glass is 580 A.D., when a shipment of glass mosaics was sent to the island of Grado, where the cathedral of Santa Eufemia was being rebuilt. The first written document, however, dates 982 A.D. and is signed by Dominicus Fiolarious. In 1224 A.D., Venice had a recorded guild of glassblowers, and in 1271 A.D., the first written document, Capitolare Fiolaris, regulated the production of Venetian glass phials and other glass containers. This document was replaced in 1441 A.D. by the Mariegola dei vetrai.
Initially, glassmaking was an art of minor expression, satisfied with the production of modest objects for common use. But it carried within itself the memories of a tradition of sophisticated techniques and the seeds of the decorative grandeur of Islamic art. Venice reawakened the first of these memories and developed the second. Not before the Renaissance, however, did the glass commonly known as Venetian reach any degree of recognition. Later, in the new artistic climate of the Renaissance, glassmaking began to return to Roman-inspired forms. Venetian glass drew from these forms in order to reach expressive heights never before achieved. The glass now had chromatic qualities that it could not renounce, based on the experience of its mosaics, its enamels, and its beadwork.
In 1291, for a number of reasons, including severe labor regulations in Venice, the doges were forced to move glassmaking from the city of Venice to the island of Murano. The official reason for this relocation was the fire hazards created by the furnaces. In reality, it was easier for the Venetian authorities of the Maggior Consiglio to regulate not only the diffusion of glass throughout the world but the profession of glassmaking itself.
The early Murano craftsmen, artists rather then glassworkers, produced marvels which rivaled and surpassed much earlier glass works. The art of Venetian blown glass had its Golden Age in the sixteenth century. Thin-stemmed chalices, finely shaped bowls, and tiny covered baskets were executed according to the designs of the most celebrated painters of the time. Thus it came about that Italy, through Murano, taught the world to love glass as an artistic reality, just as Rome, almost a thousand years earlier, taught humanity to appreciate the art as a technical achievement.
Either from a desire to make a better living or for a love of adventure, numerous Muranese glassblowers defied the strict laws of the Serenissima and began to settle in other countries. France was one of the first to house Muranese glassblowers in centers such as Paris, Rouen, St Germain-en-laye Nantes, and Nevers. In addition, many colonies were settled in several of the small Italian states, as well as in countries throughout Europe, including Austria, Belgium, Spain, and Sweden. The Muranese established new workshops creating production of the so-called façon de Venice or Venetian style and, as an unintended result, trained foreign apprentices.
Murano taught the world the art of glassmaking not only as a result of the emigration of its workers, but also by the classic method of teaching through books. In fact, the first book dedicated to the technology of glassmaking, The Art of Glassmaking, Divided into Seven Books, was published in Florence in 1612 by Antonio Neri and written, most likely, by an unknown Italian glassmaker of Muranese origin.
Some ten years after the first edition, other editions of the treatise were published in Italy, while translations and commentaries multiplied abroad. The book circulated throughout the world in Italian, German, English, Latin, and French, and was the accepted authority on glassmaking for more than a century.
The late eighteenth century saw new characteristics in the art of making glass. First, came the success of Bohemian glass, hard and irregular, but clear and enriched by elaborately worked surfaces. Second, there was the introduction on the European market of the very beautiful English lead crystal. And third, Bernardo Perrotto of Altare invented a casting process for glass which represented a decisive contribution to the industrial production of plate glass in large dimensions. All these events brought about the fall of Venetian glass.
In Murano itself, the glass industry survived by a miracle; one performed by a Muranese glassmaking genius, Giuseppe Briati. He adhered to the basic principles of certain technical elements of Bohemian glass to produce crystal containing potash, called Cristallo. He then devoted himself, from 1730 until his death, to the imaginative production of engraved light fixtures, furniture decorated with highly ornamental centerpieces, and complicated crystal and polychrome chandeliers.
Still, despite the great commercial success that the use of Cristallo brought to Venice at the beginning of the nineteenth century, the art of Muranese glassmaking almost disappeared. Briati had been dead for some time and the little that had survived of his technique of making crystal received yet another blow in the fall of the Serenissima Venetian Republic.
Glass as an art form has deep roots, and after 1860, while the old artisan handicrafts slowly blossomed sporadically throughout the Italian Peninsula, a revival occurred in the glassmaking industry in Murano. This occurred as a result of a half century of courageous ventures; masters, both young and old, returned to traditional techniques. At the same time, the industry employed new trends to its advantage. Production was placed on a more elevated plane of artistic conception and achieved a more contemporary commercial organization. Dr. Antonio Salviati evidently followed a similar line of reasoning in 1856 when he partially revived the Muranese glass industry by returning to classic Venetian designs of less elaborate ornamentation. By the beginning of the twentieth century the field thrived in Murano. In addition to artistic blown glass, natural or refinished with wheel engravings or cast-enamel decorations, the Muranese glass industry created art glass, beads, crystal tableware, mirrors, mosaics, and stained glass along with items for utilitarian purposes.
Century-old techniques and the most modern methods transformed the molten glass by drawing, blowing, pressing, casting, and hot molding. By the beginning of the twentieth century Murano, tied to the celebrated glassmaking activities of the past, became the first and the best once again. It is at this point in time that Murano: Glass from the Olnick Spanu Collection begins.