GIORGIO GESSI
The endless adventure of glass engraving
by Fabrizia Buzio Negri
Between history and legend, during the first century AD, Pliny the Elder wrote in his Naturalis
historia how glass was accidentally discovered by some Phoenician merchants returning from
Egypt with a large load of “natrum” (sodium carbonate, also known as saltpetre) around 5000 BC.
They stopped for the night at the mouth of the river Belus, in Syria, and there they accidentally
discovered glass when, lacking the stones to support their boilers over the fire, they improperly
used some saltpetre blocks as substitutes. They saw a dense, viscous fluid coming out of the flame,
and in the morning they found an unknown, shiny and transparent solidified material. It was the
glass formed by the association of the saltpetre and the river sand that had burned at high
temperatures.
The endless adventure of glass art was enriched over the centuries with myths and “tales”, from
Ancient Rome to the Middle East, until the time when Venetian craftsmen enabled the expansion
to this kind of art.
Then came the period of Art Nouveau and Art Deco, which infused the glass art with an
extraordinary life thanks to the creativity and the renewed techniques of the time: painting, sculpture
and graphics on matière vivante and matière poétique of unparalleled beauty.
It should be considered that it took a great amount of time and effort before glass, always
appreciated for its ductility and the beauty of its features, could get out of its limited daily use and
manage to rightfully enter the world of art.
Its presence in the world of contemporary art is a recent achievement due to the charm of its
features – hardness and fragility, transparency and opacity – thanks to the creativity of international
artists who have exploited its potential with the use of increasingly sophisticated techniques.
Giorgio Gessi is part of a fil rouge of artists who use this expressive language based on the
relationship between artist and glass. In spite of the technical limitations of this material, there is a
special dialogue between the artist’s thoughts and his hand, a synthesis of knowledge and
experiences – all different and fascinating – which culminate in the work of art.
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