Incalmo e murrina by Riccardo Licata

Beginning in the 1930s — and throughout the postwar years especially — Venini & Co. played a leading role in the revival of Italy’s high-end glass industry, pairing innovative modernist designers with the skilled artisans who created extraordinary chandeliers, sconces and other lighting in the centuries-old glass workshops on the Venetian island of Murano.

While the company’s co-founder, Paolo Venini (1895–1959), was himself a highly talented glassware designer, his true genius was to invite forward-thinking Italian and international designers to Murano’s hallowed workshops to create Venini pieces — among them Gio Ponti, Massimo Vignelli, Finnish designer Tapio Wirkkala, Thomas Stearns of the United States and Fulvio Bianconi.

Paolo Venini trained and practiced as a lawyer for a time, though his family had been involved with glassmaking for generations. After initially buying a share in a Venetian glass firm — he and antiques dealer Giacomo Cappellin established Vetri Soffiati Cappellin Venini & C. in 1921 — Venini took over the company as his own in 1925, and under his direction, it produced mainly classical Baroque designs.

In 1932, Venini hired the young Carlo Scarpa— who would later distinguish himself as an architect — as his lead designer. Scarpa, working in concert with practiced glass artisans, completely modernized Venini, introducing simple, pared-down forms; bright primary colors; and bold patterns such as stripes, banding and abstract compositions that utilized cross sections of murrine (glass rods).

Paolo Venini’s best designs are thought to be his two-color Clessidre hourglasses, produced from 1957 onward, and the Fazzoletto (“handkerchief”) vase, designed with Bianconi in 1949. Bianconi’s masterworks are considered by many to be his Pezzato works — colorful vases with patterns that resemble those of a patchwork quilt.

Other noteworthy and highly collectible vintage Venini works include Ponti’s dual-tone stoppered bottles (circa 1948); rare glass sculptures from the Doge series by Stearns, the first American to design for the firm; Vignelli’s striped lanterns of the 1960s; the Occhi vases with eyelet-shaped patterns by Tobia Scarpa (son of Carlo); and, with their almost zen purity, the Bolle (“bubbles”) bottles designed by Wirkkala in 1968. 

With these works — and many others by some of the creative titans of the 20th and 21st centuries — Venini has produced one of the truly great bodies of work in modern design.

Find antique and vintage Venini chandeliers, serveware, table lamps, decorative objects and other furniture on 1stDibs.

Riccardo Licata was born in Turin, Italy, on 20 December 1929. Licata lived with his family for a short period in Paris. They then moved to Rome, where he remained until 1945. Since 1946, he has lived between Venice and Paris. In 1951, he had his first one-man show in Venice. After his studies at an arts high school and at the Venice Academy of Fine Arts, he received a scholarship in 1957 from the French government to experiment with color engraving and new techniques. The same year, he became Gino Severini’s assistant at the Ecole d’Art Italienne in Paris, beginning an impressive career as a teacher. In 1961, he married Maria Battistella, singer and teacher in the music of the Renacimiento. He started to teach at the Atelier de mosaïque in Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris. In 1969, he became a Professor at La Sorbonne and the Goetz Academy. From 1972–92, he was a Professor at Ecole Internationale de la gravure expérimentale in Venice and Ecole Américaine d'Architecture in Fontainebleau Painter, engraver, mosaicist, sculptor and set designer. Licata has participated in the biennials of Venice, São Paulo in Brazil, Tokyo, Paris, Ljubljana, Alexandria in Egypt as well as in the Rome Quadrennial and the Milano Triennial. He has had one-man shows in important cities both in Italy and around the world. Of particular importance are his large 1990 traveling show in Spain curated by Enzo di Martino and his retrospective exhibition at Venice’s Ca’ Pesaro Museum of Modern Art. His works are found in museums of modern art in Chicago, Milan, Florence, Mulhouse, New York, Paris, Warsaw, Stockholm, Vienna and of course in Venice. His work has been profoundly influenced by regularly attending musical events like those at Teatro la Fenice or the Venice Biennial’s Festival Of Contemporary Music. Licata's unmistakable pictorial-graphic writing that began to take shape in the 1950s was inspired by music.