Venice Round 3

About a week ago, Ali and I took another trip to our favorite city in Europe, Venice. We wanted to meet a few master glassblowers on Murano and see more of the Biennale before it closed. Venice has one of the greatest international art exhibitions in the world (its a popular place to exhibit artwork) and Murano is a mecca of glassblowing. Venice is also a city like none other, a "magic" city in my opinion. Venice is a good place to be for Ali and I.

 We arrived in Venice late to find the hostel so we could wake right up and go straight to Murano. It took a little while to find the Hostel and check in and everything but we got it eventually. It was cold and rainy in Venice.

 The next day we woke up and met the other people staying at the hostel during breakfast. A really cool world traveller named Randy and his wife were also staying at our hostel for a few days before leaving for a cruise. Randy was about 70 and originally from Seattle but now he lives in Paris. He traveled all around the world when he was young and he understood the way we traveled. We could easily talk to Randy for hours. We got down to the Rialto Market Vaporetto stop and saw that it was high tide.

 Venetian police boat.

We got to the La Ferrovia (where the Vaporetto Lines that go to Murano depart from) and we found that there was an un-announced 3 hour strike for today, right then. I called Roberto and told him that we would be arriving at 1:00 now instead of 10:00. It was cold and rainy and we were really bummed that we might miss many of the glass hotshops that are only open in the morning. This strike really screwed up our plans.

 While waiting for the strike to finish, we got a bite to eat and I worked on blog posts for a bit. While at the cafe we used the restroom and the doorknob to the mens restroom was a prime example of a strange europe doorknob. Not all the doorknobs in Europe are funny but many of them are just bizarre in the way they operate. There aren't many standard round doorknobs that you just turn. We caught the Vaporetto to Murano after the strike was over and after a somewhat long boat ride through choppy waters, we reached Murano and went to Roberto Dona's house.

 At the Carlo Dona tool house, they were hard at work making glass tools. You see neat things when you visit Murano on a weekday! The shops aren't usually open on weekends. It is best to go to them on weekday mornings. That guy over there was polishing tweezers.

 There were buckets of diamond shear blanks on the floor.

 This guy looked like Roberto Dona's father, the son of Carlo Dona. I think he was grinding down blades for Jacks. Most of the "real" Murano glass shops are still family owned and run. It is neat to see them passed down from generation to generation. Roberto told us where to find Dino Rosin and his friend and venetian goblet master, Davide Fuin. Our professors told us to go visit Dino and visiting him was one of our goals when first going to Murano. Roberto called Dino and he told us that today was a little busy for him and it was a cold shopping day and he wouldn't be working in the hotshop. That was fine with us, we just wanted to see him. We set out and walked through the rain asking the glass shops and pizzerias where Dino was as we went.

 Eventually, we found Dino's door we rang the bell and came right on inside.

 Dino's shop was like all other Murano glass shops, his whole family was running the shop, and Dino also had an office and showroom run by members of his family. In this photo, you can see, Dino's son Diego who speaks a little bit of english. Dino was cold shopping one of his pieces when we came to see him. He makes lots of solid sculptures with a unique thin swirling color glass backround. Dino also creates big bubbles that have been cut away to become shapes in the cold shop. It was really neat to see some of his stuff even though we only got to talk to him for a little bit in our broken Italian.

 More of Dino's hotshot.

 A Murano water fountain.

Next up on our list was Davide Fuin, Venetian master glassblower and goblet maker. We got some directions from Dino's sister and braved the rain to walk to the other side of Murano to find Fuin's studio. While walking we passed by the church on Murano.

 Eventually, we found the door to Fuin's studio with the faded name on a glass plate.

 We found Fuin's studio in a small community of studios but Fuin was nowhere to be found. It looked like he was just there and would be back any time but It was starting to get kind of late in the day (2:30) and although Davide Fuin supposedly works till 4, he must have taken the rainy day off early.

 You can see Davide Fuin's special jacks. They are made super tiny by Carlo Dona. Fuin had many Dona Tools on his bench. He even left his watch!

 We looked around the group of studios and found this "Venice Printmaking Studio". Quite possibly the only non glass studio on Murano.

  Like every good glass artist, Fuin makes drawings and works from them. Surprisingly enough, it looks like the goblet master is making a goblet.

 Eventually, Ali and I got tired of waiting for Fuin to show up. We were cold, wet, and hungry and we still wanted to see this Murano glass museum. We headed down deserted Murano streets through the rain and eventually we got to the museum. It was worth the cold walk because in the museum, there was AMAZING glass. The Museum had lots of old Venetian vessels with more "fur fur" than we had ever seen before. We had always heard of these famed vessels, but never had we seen such good examples. Sadly there was a strict, no photo policy at the museum but Ali and I did buy a book that was pretty inexpensive for the size of it.

 By now it was about 5:30 and we just wanted to get food and get back to our hostel. We grabbed some pizza and tried to warm up a bit at a little pizzeria then we caught the boat back to La Ferrovia and eventually, we made it back to the hotel soaking wet and very cold. It is hard to really have fun in these conditions but aside from the weather, the strike, and not being able to talk a ton to the glass masters, it wasn't really a terrible day and we were glad to be in Venice.

 The next morning, I woke up and looked out our balcony window to see the small courtyard flooded from the canal water! The water was flowing in from under the gate and it was way cool!

 We walked through the Rialto Market to the Rialto Market Vaporetto stop. The weather looked much better and sunnier than the day before.

 We got on the PACKED Vaporetto and set out for "Giardini" (where the Biennale is held). The water was very high and was flooding the restaurants and sidewalks. Its business as usual in Venice.

 High water.

 After a crowded vaporetto ride and waiting in line to get tickets to get into the Biennale, we finally got in. Like last time, we saw many more exhibitions. I will include some of my favorites.

 It is interesting to see what some countries put into the Biennale. Venezuela for example, put in graffiti street artists, and while there are some famous street artists, graffiti is typically shunned in the high art world. Its nice to see them ignoring the people who wouldn't consider the graffiti "fine art".

 I showed Ali my favorite piece in the Biennale, Kimsooja's "Breathe" piece. As always, there was a line.

After the South Korean pavilion, we went and got lunch. Last time we were here this sign wasn't on but this time it was. Way cool neon! Be on the lookout for a Euro Neon post coming soon! I may send it to Fred Tschida and Sarah Blood at Alfred.

 This is the inside of the Ship bar. There was a bit of a line.

 We went to the Finland pavilion...

 The artist, Antti Laitinen was doing some very interesting things where he would disassemble things from nature and then re assemble them in his own way. These are trees he built from a tree that he cut down in Finland. Read the description to see a bit more about his work.

 A disassembled pond.

This one was neat.

He took everything from this square of forest and laboriously sorted everything into categories. He took HD video of him working. I believe it is this absurd almost meaningless work that Laitinen is going after. He is making the process itself the art piece and he documents it in a presentable way.

 Antti Laitinen's work was very interesting to me.

Another interesting exhibition was the Hungry Pavilion. Fired but Unexploded is the work of Zsolt Asztalos and he focuses on unexploded munitions, scattered throughout Europe (and the World) through its many wars.

 Asztalos uses the medium of video and sound to convey the message here. The video is just a still image of a bomb or artillery shell that never detonated and the sounds that went with it ranged widely from the sounds of a church mass going, to the sound of someone doing dishes in a kitchen, to the sound of children playing and even the sound of lots of people laughing. They were snapshots of domestic life and they bring up the question of who the bombs were originally fired at (many of the munitions weren't really very accurate) and what if the bombs went off? (how would today be different) What happens if they do explode in proximity to these innocent people? It was a very neat exhibition.

 I really liked the Polish pavilion. It was the last one we went to and it only "worked" 4 times a day.

 A big sound exhibition by Konrad Smolenski, He took an idea that I had while in Florence and made it reality. He took the sound from two ringing bells and processed it in real time with a delay and played it back on these huge speakers and on giant woofers behind the metal plates that shook the whole pavilion! Sadly, the volume had to be lowered after the first month of the piece showing because residents on a nearby island were complaining about their houses shaking. The piece was closed for about a month while alterations were being made but now it is open and it only shows with the doors closed and people warning you about the noise.

 The speakers were massive the bells sounded great and the 15 minute soundshow was fantastic! To see more about this go here...

http://www.labiennale.art.pl/#start

 We got out of the Polish Pavillion and the biennale just in time to catch the sunset.

We wandered back on over to our hostel to grab our stuff and get some dinner before catching the train back to Florence. While passing by some glass shops near Piazza San Marco we saw what looked to be the work of Dino Rosin.

We caught the train back to Florence and we were back in Florence before too late, in time to eat a second snack dinner and get ready for bed. It was a good weekend in Venice, our favorite city in Europe!

Venice Day 2

                   Ok, so day two in Venice was much cloudier than day one. I saw this on the weather and dressed accordingly but weather in Venice can be very unpredictable and it was sunny by the end of the day, (Weather Guessers called for rain). The clouds really affect the temperature and it was even cooler than the first day. We started out today with a tour of the city by our great history professor Lorenzo and Andrew, a very knowledgeable drawing teacher. Ali and I went to Murano as well with a friend Matteo.

As we were crossing the bridge to get out of the Academia neighborhood, Lorenzo told us about how the Venetians were traders and traveled all over. Marco Polo (a Venetian), walked to China, it took him 6 years! He wrote about his travels and nobody believed him. As a result from all of these travels (and a prime shipping location and situation) Venice developed as a blend between the East and the West. This is very evident in the architecture and the domes which almost look like mosques from southwestern Asia.
            Lorenzo informed us that most of Venice was built around the 1470s but the town was originally settled in the 400s by Romans trying to escape the invading barbarians when the Roman empire collapsed. They came here to Venice which at the time was a near inhabitable swampland right on the ocean. The water was salty and the soil was muck unfit for building on. The Venetians would find clever solutions around these problems.

To build on this swampland, The Venetians took pine logs 10 meters tall (30 feet), and tied them together. They then sank these straight down into the mud. This made a solid foundation from which they could build off of. The trees would become completely submerged and as a result were air tight. This means that although the trees were submerged hundreds of years ago, they never rot and only a few have had to be replaced over the years. With style of foundation however, every bell tower in the city (there are over 90 churches in Venice) has a lean to it. Not quite as much as the leaning tower in Pisa, but they are definitely leaning.

 We got back to Piazza San Marco and there were pigeons everywhere! Our professors told us that in feeding the pigeons used to be legal here and there were people selling bags of pigeon food for the tourists all over in this square! If you notice, many of the beautiful white buildings aren't so white anymore and this isn't just because of pollution in the air, it is also because of all of the pigeons pooping on the buildings! They must have figured that they weren't making enough money selling pigeon food to clean all the buildings so they stopped. These people were feeding the flying rats and they would land on you and you would be covered with Pigeons! The carriers of the modern plague. No thanks, I will pass on this one.

 Our professors had some interesting things to say about the Duomo of Venice, St. Marks Basilica. Back in the 800s, Mark the Evangelist died in the city of Alexandria in Egypt and he was buried in Alexandria. He didn't stay there for very long however, as some Venetians came and dug up his body and took it back to Venice! The mosaic all the way to the right in the front of the Basilica depicts how the Venetians got his body past the customs in Alexandria. At the time, most people in Alexandria were muslim and they were forbidden to eat meat. Knowing this, the Venetians hid Marks corpse in a basket full of meat and covered it up with some cloth. When the muslim customs men asked what was in the basket, the venetians showed them the meat and as you can see, the custom guards were repulsed and didn't want anything to do with it. When they got Marks body back to Venice, they built this Duomo on top of it. Pretty neat!

 This mosaic was all the way to the left of the front of the Basilica. You can see the differences in style as this one is very eastern. Even the mosaics are very eastern and in the west they would have all been Frescoes.

These four horses on top of the main entrance to the Basilica used to be solid gold (hollow on the inside   to relieve weight). When Napoleon came to Venice, he took those horses. They have since been replaced by some not so expensive copies.

Speaking of Napoleon, when Napoleon was in Venice, he thought so highly of himself that he had a statue of himself put in the center on top of that building. When Napoleon left, the Venetians tore down his statue. They did not like Napoleon. The statue that is missing was Napoleons statue.

 We walked through some of the narrow crowded streets of Venice that lead to the Rialto bridge (the equivalent of Florence's Ponte Vecchio, but also a key way to get from one neighborhood to the other neighborhood). Lots of tourists go to the rialto bridge and you can imagine how many shops there are selling masks, "murano" glass, bags, and all sorts of other touristy junk. But it makes people happy.

 I mentioned before about how the Venetians had a hard time getting fresh water because they are on a swampy island right on the ocean and all the water is salty. This is a Venetian well, they are found in pretty much every campo and in Piazza San Marco and there may be one or two or sometimes more in a campo.

There are collection points for rain water to get into the well.

Perhaps the most ingenious feature with these wells is the inside of them is lined with a layer of clay. this clay filters out the salt in the sea water and lets fresh clean water accumulate in the well. The Venetians were creative problem solvers.

Another problem faced by the Venetians was the wet salty ocean air. When they had chimneys, they would always have problems with the smoke not rising enough to go out of the chimneys and as a result, the Venetians have special chimneys to accomadate the ocean air. Chimneys are often decorated very nicely and some people like to show off and show that they have the best chimney. 

 Our Professors then took us to the Jewish Ghettos in Venice. Originally, the term, "ghetto" was used to refer to the part of town where all the metal working was done. Obviously the meaning has changed several times throughout history. Persecution of the jews went on throughout history as well and Italy doesn't really have too big of a jewish population.

In Venice, persecution of the Jews started around the 1500s and obviously, during 1940's with the Nazi   Party in power in Germany and Mussolini allied with Hitler, things got really bad here in the Jewish ghettos and they were sealed. As a result, the buildings in the jewish ghetto are 1-2 stories higher than in the rest of the city. With nowhere else to go, Jewish families just built upwards as new generations and new families struggled to find a place to live. The small jewish ghetto got a bit over crowded for awhile until the SS started sending people away. Much of the things that sealed the ghetto in have been removed but they have left one wall with barbed wire still on it as a reminder to the atrocities of the time.

We then started walking back to the "Acadmia" neighborhood of Venice. We passed many beautiful canals. Venice is like Cinque Terre in the sense that everywhere you look, it is beautiful.

In Venice they seem to have lots of these outdoor fruit stand markets and even fish stand markets set up in Campos. There are more local stores too and not as many grocery stores as in Florence.

When we got back to L'Academia, Andrew told us that we were going to go on a boat ride around the canals and that we should get lunch really quick and get ready and meet back in about a half hour. 

 I didn't know what to expect after riding the bus taxi Vaporetto boats a bunch. I certainly didn't expect a smaller private taxi boat like this! We were so close to the water, it was like standing on the water. It was a whole new way to see the city. I took lots of photos......

 Thats the Rialto bridge. Its spans the Grand Canal. To the right you can see a Vaporetto stop.

 This looked like a much larger outdoor fruit market. I later learned that this is a big market with fish and things and it is the "Rialto Market". The big green boat with a crane is a cargo boat. Everything is a boat in Venice. There are even ambulance boats, police boats and UPS boats!

 We passed the train station and to a somewhat more modern part of Venice and we saw this cool bridge.

 Here is another cool bridge!

 I love how the steps just lead out into the water on many buildings. This is still low tide in Venice. if you look at the dark color on the walls of the canal, that is where high tide is. Its pretty wild and as boats create lots of waves at high tide, water spills over the edges and onto the edges of the sidewalk every day! Venice has a big problem with flooding when storms come. It is true that the city is sinking a millimeter or so a year. In 250 years the city would be in big trouble but they are working on a huge system of dikes to save the city. Similar systems are already in place in places in Northern Europe. With the Italian government not having money, and the speed of construction around here, I would say in about 80 years, the dike will be done and the Venetians won't have to worry anymore.

 Piazza San Marco from the canals. Before Venice was linked to the mainland by the long bridge, the only way to get there was by boat. Everyone entered the city through those 2 pillars and into Piazza San Marco. The islands around Venice still can only be accessed by boat.

 I like this church. Its really big and looks neat.

 Peggy Guggenheim has a house and museum here right down the canal from the last church. Today some of the Guggenheim collections are shown here and exhibits are held as well to go along with the Biennale.

I took a quick photo of our boat as we were getting off back in Academia. 

After the boat tour we were free as birds for the next few hours. We just had to meet back at the hotel by 4:00 to grab our bags and catch the 5:30 train back to Florence. Its always good to leave plenty of time for everything in Venice.

And with that Ali and I went straight to the Vaporetto to find out how to get to Murano. Our friend Matteo who is curios about glass decided to tag along. 

After riding on line 1 to get to the, "Ferrovia" (Train Station, literally translating to "iron travel"), we caught line the orange line 3 that goes straight to Murano with a bunch of tourists. A short boat ride and Ali and I couldn't believe where we were!

Like in Venice, Murano is all canals, Murano is part of Venice. The streets were lined with touristy glass shops but there were more better glass shops than in Venice and not all of the glass shops were terrible selling "Murano Glass" from China.

Ali and I had to go here. Our teacher Fred Tschida always had a giant "Venini" binder that was full of these amazing glass creations. Only 1000 of that binder were made but it was full of amazing glass creations. Ali and I couldn't believe we get to see them in person. Almost everything in this gallery we saw in Fred's book. We loved seeing them in person!

 Glass Bird!

 This is just so cool! I want to blow glass into metal like that.

 These are awesome vessels with perfect incalmo stripes of color. They might be my favorite in the entire place but then again, they all are just so amazing!

 These are really neat and I don't remember seeing them in the book.

 I also don't remember seeing these flowers.

 These murrine vessels are neat. I want to try something like this.

These were in the binder as well. We looked at some of the books they had there but none of them seemed as good as Fred's binder. Venini was started in 1923 I believe..... Maybe for their 100 year anniversary they will make something special. We asked what Venini was and how it all got started and the lady said that a lawyer from Milan really liked the glass from Murano so he commissioned all of these Master glassblowers to start making some of their best ideas and the Venini gallery resulted from those works. It is probably my favorite glass gallery in Venice.

We were heading into the center of Murano to find the Carlo Dona tool shop and we were also looking for "Pesce" street to try and meet a master glassblower, Dino Rosin, who our professors told us about. The people working at the touristy glass shops were clueless and didn't know anything. I don't even think they are from Venice.

We saw this sculpture along the way and decided to check it out. It looks really neat!

 I think it lights up at night. it would be really cool to see it then! It was really big!
      After some more searching, and more asking, we finally asked an old man, "Dove e Carlo Dona? Ferramenta di vetro?" (Where is Carlo Dona? Glass tool shop?). After a bit more talking, he told us to follow him and he led us right to it. We were so happy to be there!

 Ali was so excited! So many glass tools! We met Roberto Dona, Carlo Dona's grandson. Carlo still works with his father and grandfather to hand-make every tool. Glass tools aren't mass produced because there simply isn't enough demand for them. Carlo Dona tools are some of the best in the world. We explained to Roberto that we were students at Alfred University and we both blow glass. We talked with him for probably about a 45 minutes or so. We also bought some glass tools.

Ali, me, and Roberto Dona. Roberto spoke english and he had heard about Alfred University and both of our professors. He met them all at GAS (Glass Art Society) conferences. Ali and I want to go to one of these. Roberto informed us that all the real Murano glass shops are only open on the weekend and sometimes saturday mornings and that Dino would be closed. All the touristy shops stay open. He said that if we came back on a weekday, he could call Dino for us and take us right to Pesche street! Roberto was very nice and we were glad to have met him. We also both really want to go back to Murano on a week day! 

 After awhile, we said goodbye to Roberto and headed to grab a quick bit to eat before catching the boat back to Venice so we could meet back with the group and catch the train back.

 While heading back to the boat for Venice, we went by Cesare Toffolo's glass gallery and it was open. Ali and I both know Toffolo is a flameworking glass Maestro so we decided to stop by. These little goblets in the window were TINY!

 Toffolo's stuff was incredible! It is pretty big for a flame worker and I wonder how big his torch is. I would like to see him in action. My glass teacher Aric says he has actually been living in Baltimore for the past few years! He speaks only Italian but now that I know some Italian, I may want to track him down and get in touch with him.

The classic "Dragon Stem"

Once again, the detail on these was just phenomenal! I really want to watch Toffolo blow glass. He makes me really want to learn lamp working. It is much more affordable than the hotshop glassblowing than Ali and I do.

Heading back to Venice. What a great day!

We had seen this statue many times in front of this building, across the canal from Piazza San Marco. When we got close to it on the boat, we could see that it is actually inflatable! NeatO!

 The Vaporetto ride back to the Ferrovia, (train station) was extremely crowded. In Venice, you shove your way onto the Vaporetto.

In the front of all the gondolas there is this metal symbol. In the front there are 6 notches, one for each of the, "neighborhoods" or sections of Venice. The notch on the back is for Giudecca (the long group of islands between Venice and the sea).

Back on the train. It was a bummer to see cars again but alas we must leave the magic city. I loved Venice. It is definitely my favorite city in Europe so far. Not to mention, the glass Mecca Murano is there, AND one of the greatest international art exhibitions is there so Venice is the place to be for Ali and I. I am so behind on my blog posts because of midterms coming up, and Ali's mom being here and my Mom, Grandma Dottie, and Aunt Patty being here. I went back to Venice the following weekend with my Mom and Grandma Dottie and Aunt Patty. I also went back to Murano. That deserves a blog post right there! However, I have no time. I will be taking my midterms in a few hours, then hopping on a train to Pisa where Ali and I will fly to Paris early tomorrow morning. We will be spending 9 days in Paris and I am going to try and keep the blog updated as much as I can! Im loving it here in Europe and Ali and I NEED to go back to Murano and Venice!