"Uomo e Donna" Murano Glass Sculpture by L. Gaspari circa 1960

“Uomo e Donna” (Man and Woman)
Sculpture in transparent glass enhanced with applications of gold leaf, Execution: Salviati & Co (Murano), model by Luciano Gaspari, circa 1960.
H. 45 x L. 28 x D. 10 cm.
Signed at the tip “Salviati” and “design L. Gaspari” on the bottom + Salviati & Co label, made in Italy, Murano on the back of the base.
The union between art, design and glass production in Murano - in the 1920s and 1930s, with the aesthetic innovations of Vittorio Zecchin and then Carlo Scarpa - developed after the war, but in a different. Completely new techniques were experimented with: “sommerso”, composed of multiple, often colored layers, “smoked” glass, corroded and iridescent surfaces, or even solid glass, gave birth to new forms. The idea that glass objects could be considered true works of art began to gain ground. Egidio Costantini founded the Centro Studio Pittori nell'Arte del Vetro di Murano in 1953, which Cocteau later renamed “La Fucina degli Angeli” (The Forge of the Angels). Different artists attracted by this glass activity are invited: Italians such as Virgilio Guidi, Renato Guttuso, Ricardo Licata, Gio Ponti, but also international artists, Braque, Calder, Chagall, Kokoschka, Le Corbusier, Léger, Moore, Arp, Picasso… The latter brought drawings which were then transformed into sculptures by master glassmakers. Luciano Gaspari (1913-2007), who was a painter, also entered into a particular symbiosis with this world of Venetian glasswork, from 1947. He studied the large collections, the techniques, and he established a close relationship with important contemporary master glassmakers such as Alfredo Barbini, Luciano Vistosi, Paolo Martinuzzi, Loredano Rosin, Livio Seguso, Pino Signoretto. In 1955, he became artistic director of the prestigious and ancient Salviati factory (in Murano since 1859), a role in which he devoted himself fully and tirelessly. His approach to glass reveals full mastery and innovative use of traditional techniques. He knew how to draw on the past, revitalize conventions, but also use the innovations of his time. He made sculptures as well as simple objects, plates, vases, glasses and bottles. In each of these creations, the quality of the colors, the balance between luminosity and transparency, between glows and shadows, reveal his abstract sensitivity and his painterly fantasy as well as his perfect understanding of the potential of glass.
Born in 1913 in Venice into a family of decorators, Luciano Gaspari studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Venice and Bologna. He was a student in particular of Virgilio Guidi and Giorgio Morandi. He began his career as a painter in the 1930s. In 1944, he had a personal exhibition at the famous Galleria del Cavallino of Carlo Cardazzo, center of Spatialism in Veneto. He joined this artistic movement without ever fully adhering to it. He began working as a designer at the Salviati glassworks in Murano in 1947, then became its artistic director between 1955 and 1968. He contributed to the creation of a fundamental part of the collection of this prestigious manufacture. In 1959, he also began another important artistic collaboration with another great glassmaker of that era, Livio Seguso. Between 1958 and 1966, Luciano Gaspari regularly presented original works in glass in the applied arts section of the Venice Biennale. In 1968, he retired from the artistic direction of Salviati and continued his career as a painter and designer. He returned to glass in 1981, for an important exhibition at the Palazzo Grassi, "Murano Glass Today", where he presented models for Salviati - the Zefiro bottles and the Sasso vases - which would again enjoy great success. In 1992-1993, a retrospective solo exhibition of his paintings was held at the Galleria Il Naviglio in Venice, and in 1995, many of his glass creations from the 1950s and 1960s were presented in a historic exhibition on the Murano production as part of the Venice Biennale. Luciano Gaspari died in Venice in 2007.