Fucina degli Angeli: Peggy Guggenheim and 20th-Century Artistic Glass

Organized by Cristina Beltrami

The exhibition casts a spotlight on one of the most groundbreaking chapters of postwar Murano glassmaking, telling the story of the Fucina degli Angeli, founded by Egidio Costantini in Murano in the 1950s. Through more than one hundred works including glass sculptures, paintings, drawings, and historical documents, the show traces its history from its earliest years up through the 1990s. This period spans the translation into glass of several famous ceramics by Georges Braque and Pablo Picasso, to collaborations with some of the leading artists of the twentieth century, such as Jean Arp, Jean Cocteau, Max Ernst, Lucio Fontana, and Paul Jenkins, as well as key figures of the Japanese art scene at the time, such as Tomio Miki, Katsuhiko Narita, Mikuni Omura, and Tadanori Yokoo. Guggenheim had a decisive role in the Fucina degli Angeli’s success, supporting its founder Costantini during crucial moments and contributing to its international expansion by establishing networks, commissions, and exchanges with the U.S. market. The exhibition will also examine the connection between works in glass and paintings and sculptures, many of which are in the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, by artists associated with the Fucina degli Angeli.

Image: from Pablo Picasso (1881–1973), Bacchus 2 (Red), 1954–1960, mouth-blown straw-coloured glass with hot-applied red and aquamarine, green and coloured glass, 37.5 × 30 × 20 cm; wooden base: 15 × Ø 17.5 cm. Kunstmuseum Walter, Augsburg.