ongoing

STORIES OF FACTORIES. STORIES OF FAMILIES.:

Donation by Carlo and Giovanni Moretti 1958-2013

From 6 December to 30 June 2025

Glass Museum

Fondamenta Giustinian, 8, Venice

Closed now: open at 10:00

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An exhibition to celebrate the experience and history of an enlightened creativity, to remember two glass gentlemen, Carlo and Giovanni Moretti, their entrepreneurial adventure that has managed to leave an indelible and immediately recognizable mark still today.Curated by Chiara Squarcina, Mauro Stocco, and Marta Moretti, the exhibition will allow for the first time to present to the public the majority of the important and substantial donation of over 400 works from the Carlo Moretti company, received by the Glass Museum in 2020, which allows to retrace in a rich, punctual, and exhaustive way the historical events of the company created by Carlo and Giovanni Moretti in 1958 and the evolution of its successful production, until 2013, when the company changed hands.An adventure that begins, as tradition dictates, with the creation of transparent glasses and colored glasses, characterized by the constant search for clean and essential lines, combined with technical innovation and the development of processing tools. Their intention was clear from the start, namely to leave a mark capable of dialoguing with contemporaneity, transcending the boundaries of the island and seeking an international breath.Two different but perfectly complementary personalities: Carlo with refined and cultured taste, proceeding by subtraction until reaching a formal essentiality that soon became his signature, the stylistic feature for which he is still known worldwide; Giovanni, on the other hand, sensitive to market trends and intuitive anticipator of tastes and needs, capable of creating the narrative that could best accompany their products, infecting interlocutors and customers with his enthusiasm. In the early sixties, Carlo Moretti began production of the first series of two-tone glass articles (internal milk glass and external color) and subsequently the successful series of Satin glasses, destined for the Bloomingdale's department stores in New York. This marked the beginning of the company's affirmation on foreign markets. The stylistic feature of Carlo Moretti is the adoption of simple and basic forms and essential lines for chalices and cups, mostly composed of geometries based on cylinders and spheres. The seventies represent the period of greatest innovation for Carlo Moretti, which is also manifested in technical research aimed at improving the quality of raw materials and in the desire to affirm a precise expressive language. During these years, the traditional Murano crystal was reintroduced in the company, becoming a true trademark for Carlo Moretti, identified with the elegance and lightness of its products. Extraordinary projects were born, such as the Octagonal glass of 1974 and the Oval of 1976. A turning point in the formal repertoire occurred in the eighties with the glasses that best identify the company's production and its stylistic feature: sober crystal objects, of great refinement, often finished with grinding only, such as the Millemolature and Banded molate series of 1984.The exhibition will also feature the famous series of Collectible Goblets, launched for Christmas 1990, the result of an intuition by Giovanni Moretti. Renewed every year in colors, shapes, and decorations, the Goblets immediately achieved great commercial success. From the perspective of more artistic creations, the Monolith project also dates back to the nineties, heavy glass sculptures inspired by the nighttime urban landscape of Manhattan, created with a special fusion technique in the thermal oven.A large part of the production from the 2000s is characterized by glass paste, where each object is hand-signed with a diamond point, making it unmistakable and unique. Now as then, in their creations emerges the soul of Venice, its extraordinary ability to be both liquid and solid, transparent and opaque, to be a culture and a society that is preserved and, at the same time, contaminated. Fluid like the alternating motion of tides, like the crafted breath of glass.

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	opens - closes	last entry
monday	10:00 - 18:00
tuesday	10:00 - 18:00
wednesday	10:00 - 18:00
thursday	10:00 - 18:00
friday	10:00 - 18:00
saturday	10:00 - 18:00
sunday	10:00 - 18:00

STORIES OF FACTORIES. STORIES OF FAMILIES.:

Donation by Carlo and Giovanni Moretti 1958-2013

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