Let us celebrate a victory for Venice together: the Art of Glass Beads is UNESCO heritage: Venetian beads are World Heritage.
A great achievement for Venice and Venetian craftsmanship: UNESCO has officially inscribed the Art of Glass Beads on the list of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, recognizing the mastery of an art with ancient origins (the earliest evidence of beads produced in Venice dates back to the fourteenth century) and expanding opportunities for dissemination and exchange.
Hotel Aquarius in Campo San Giacomo dall’Orio celebrates the inscription of the art of glass beads on the UNESCO list with an exhibition and a series of events.
The “making of beads” on display
Wednesday, June 30 at 6 PM at Hotel Aquarius, Venetian genius is expressed through the performance Yes We Bead designed by architect Alessandra Gardin. It will be the first step toward Through, a work created with antique seed beads and fragments of copper mandrels, which will be installed on the portal of Palazzo Pemma-Zambelli in September 2021.
Following this, the Rosetta Award 2021, a recognition created by Alessandro Moretti, for individuals who have most distinguished themselves in the safeguarding, promotion, dissemination, enhancement, or transmission of the Art of Glass Beads.
The exhibitions, the films
With the photographic exhibition Di mano in mano – Handing at Hotel Aquarius, Manuel Silvestri’s photographs tell the story of the hands of Venetian creativity and an ancient craft that in Venice has continued for centuries to produce glass beads and precious jewelry. For the master beadmakers and glass artists, the exhibition is a gift of rebirth and confidence in the future of the city and its arts.
The film L’Art de la perle de verre, directed by Andrea Rizzo, created for the ICH nomination by the Venetian community Committee for the Safeguarding of the Art of Venetian Glass Beads together with the French community of Perliers d’Art de France, conveys all the emotion with which the long nomination process for the beads was carried forward and the indomitable spirit of the Impiraresse and Perlere.
Also on screen is the short film Anime, produced by the Association Arte-Mide and directed by Marco Rossitti, presented at the Venice Film Festival in 2019.
The nomination
Small works of art: for centuries, glass beads were a precious commodity for trade and export throughout the world for the Serenissima. In the city of Venice alone, there are more than 300 glass artisans, authentic custodians of an art that tells the story of Venice.
The nomination project was promoted by two European communities: the Community of Venetian Perlere, represented by the Committee for the Safeguarding of the Art of Venetian Glass Beads for Italy (lead partner) and the Community of French beadmakers, represented by the Association des Perliers d’art de France for France.
The teamwork began in 2013, and in autumn 2017 the formal nomination application was submitted to the UNESCO Commission in Rome. From that moment, work began on drafting the dossier by an international steering committee composed, for the Italian part, of: Eliana Argine, Claudia Cottica, Maria Teresa Sega, Luisa Conventi, Cristina Bedin, Cristina Sfriso, Muriel Balensi, and Marisa Convento.
The work received fundamental technical and scientific coordination from the Ministries of Culture, specifically from Service II – UNESCO Office of MiBAC (Dr. Maria Assunta Peci and Dr. Elena Sinibaldi). The entire process was supported by the Municipality of Venice (Dr. Ermelinda Damiano and Dr. Katia Basili) and the Veneto Region.
The process brought to light something that we Venetians know instinctively: the Art of Glass Beads conceals intangible facets of great ethical and social value, such as the specific language, memories, gestures, tools, and places dedicated to this art (for example, Calle delle Conterie in the Cannaregio district).
The bead community
The glass bead is in itself an object that represents the fruit of someone’s hands and heart. Its art received UNESCO recognition not from above but from below: it was a group of citizens, Perleri and Impiraperle, who brought the request to MiBAC and UNESCO.
The Committee for the Safeguarding of the Art of Glass Beads was the spokesperson for a request for humanitarian rights: to be considered the holders of precious knowledge and traditions, heritage and inspiration for the world.
This designation is an epochal event for the communities of Venice and France, which establishes the right to freedom, work, peace, friendship among peoples, and which underscores a bond of belonging, of identification with a tradition and a way of life, the practice of a craft that one loves, of distinction of one’s elements of local diversity, of transmission of the founding values of one’s community and of relationship with other communities that embrace our same ideals in a right to shared cultural heritage.
And strong is the sense of belonging, inclusivity, and cultural values of this craft, common to all Italian and French civil society, the innovations, the attention to sustainability through the reuse of materials, the fact that it is a way to stimulate creativity and contribute to the lasting, and therefore sustainable, development of the territory.
The dossier highlights the different processing practices, specifying some: the bead called “a lume” (lampwork), a technique dating back to the seventeenth century obtained from a solid (non-perforated) cane heated over a flame (or “lume”), then wound onto a manually held and constantly rotating metal wire; the “canna” bead made by cutting and grinding perforated glass canes; the stringing of tiny glass beads (conterie); or the furnace production of glass canes.
The Art of Glass Beads is an intimate bond of prosperity within a territory, capable of highlighting knowledge handed down through centuries of deliberate and calculated procedures with handmade tools. The nomination reveals that this art protects and encourages the love and passion of “savoir-faire” as a social and cultural condition, not focused on the created object.
It is important to remember that this art is a living sentiment inherent in every Venetian. This is noted by Cristina Bedin, President of the Committee for the Safeguarding of the Art of Venetian Glass Beads:
“In the Venetian territory, the art of glass beads accompanies our lives. In many families there is a perlera, a perler, an impiraressa, a grinder, or a glass master. Their gestures, memories, particular language—often related to sewing and cooking—and the places dedicated to the art of glass beads permeate the daily life of all Venetian society.”
The Impiraressa and her history
The term Impiraressa, literally bead-stringer, derives from the Venetian verb impirar, to thread, and indicates a particular profession—exclusively female—in the production of necklaces and bead ornaments. The work of the impiraressa consists of stringing small glass beads, called conterie, to produce necklaces, flowers, pendants, glass lace, and decorations.
In Venice, the word conterie indicates the beads, but also specifically refers to the place in Murano where these artifacts were produced. The processing phases of these beads were complex and multiple, generally performed by male labor, but the final phase, that of stringing, was the domain of women.
Marisa Convento is one of the most authoritative narrators of this story of Venetian genius
Creative and generous in telling the story of beads in the world, Marisa creates jewelry with beads and represents the indomitable perseverance of a true creative artisan. Her workshop is in the eclectic Bottega Cini, in the heart of the Art Mile, and the place where she promotes and supports the cause is her website Venetian Dream and her very rich Facebook page.
The Venetian term impiraressa exists only in its feminine form. The delicate and refined expression of glass in bead production constitutes an incredible and unexpected creative form: the Venetian bead was yesterday an instrument of exchange, today it is an original expression of a work of art and an ancient craft still alive.
That of Venetian beads represents an important production whose origin goes back centuries: as early as 1338, a shipment in barrels from Venice of paternostri di vitro (glass beads for rosary crowns) is documented.
Historically, lampwork beads, conterie, and the Rosetta bead were highly sought after in the Venetian colonies of West Africa, the Americas, and India. Brought to these distant countries by foreign companies aboard ships, they were used as precious trade beads. With them, one could purchase gold, spices, and valuable materials.
The masters of the Art of Glass Beads of Venice
The craftsmanship of Venice, a heritage always in fashion. The contribution of Venezia da Vivere is to tell every day the profound love for this unique city. Our commitment is to communicate its beauty, its creativity, its being a center of production, an engine of ideas and projects, enhanced by the most precious heritage: its citizens.
Finally, we present some friends, Masters of the Art of Glass Beads of Venice, Venetian genius:
– Marisa Convento
– S.U.V.
– Muriel Balensi
– Luisa Conventi
– Perlamadre Design
– Attombri
– Sorelle Sent
– Ercole Moretti
– Sunset Yogurt
– Atelier23
The discovery of Venetian beads that reached America before Columbus
In a recent archaeological discovery at Punyik Point in the U.S. state of Alaska, history is being called into question thanks to the finding of several Venetian glass beads from Murano dating to before Columbus’s arrival in America.
A surprising testimony made by Mike Kunz and Robin Mills, archaeologists from the Bureau of Land Management, dates the expedition between 1440 and 1480, that is, 50 years before Christopher Columbus’s voyage. It is believed the journey to the Americas was made overland via the Silk Road, already traveled by the Venetian Marco Polo two hundred years earlier, and then across the Bering Strait.
Pictured: Marisa Convento, Perlamadre, Atelier23, Suv Venetian Beads, Attombri, Luisa Conventi, Sunset Yogurt, The Venice Glass Week by Op-Fot. Photos by Sertimo Cannatella, Laura Scarpa, Octavian Micleusanu, for Venezia da Vivere.
