LIGHT BLOWING
2017 Edition
creative direction: Ilaria Ruggiero, Samantha Punis
client: Murano Gallery LUab 4.0
graphic design: Think Work Observe
photography: Cristina Galliena Bohman
press office and media relations: AtemporaryStudio
2018 Edition
creative direction: Ilaria Ruggiero, Samantha Punis
client: Light Blowing
graphic design: Think Work Observe
photography: Cristina Galliena Bohman
illustrations: Daniela Giraldi Studio
press office and media relations: AtemporaryStudio
sponsor: Venice Palaces
technical partners: Borgoluce, Italesse, La Dogaressa, Livio Felluga, Natura Buona, Phoenix Audio, Several
insurance broker: Sinegraf, Valverde
special thanks: Valorizzazioni Culturali
Launched in 2017 for the opening of the Murano space, Murano Gallery LUab 4.0, Light Blowing — a project conceived and developed under the creative direction of Ilaria Ruggiero and Samantha Punis (co-owner of AtemporaryStudio) — brought together creative, curatorial, organisational, communication and long-term strategic vision skills.
The project’s success was made possible thanks to a structured network of partners and supporters who came together to organise a complex event held over two editions in the heart of the Venetian lagoon, in Murano and Venice.
Light Blowing was created to promote the richness of blown glass lighting design today, enhancing its potential through experimental and original productions, the result of a combination of traditional techniques and the use of mixed techniques.
The project aimed to bring together very different production dimensions and tell their story. Murano and Czech glass, the authorship of great masters with the visions of famous designers, exclusive and limited productions, brands that know how to powerfully impose their own personal creative language.
A multi-voiced dialogue, therefore, to present the complexity and richness of glass production through the works of Bomma / Simone Crestani / Esther Patterson for Curiousa & Curiousa / Doris Darling / Fabio Fornasier / Jaroslav Bejvl jr. for Preciosa / VI+M Studio and Karim Rashid for Purho / Studio Furthermore / Zaha Hadid / Nendo and Nao Tamura for WonderGlass.
The second edition in 2018 — hosted in the extraordinary spaces of Fondaco Marcello overlooking the Grand Canal — marked an important turning point by focusing its investigation on unpublished projects, site-specific installations or limited edition products created specifically for the Venetian event.
A plurality of voices presented the complexity and richness of contemporary glass production through the works of Serena Confalonieri for Mason Editions / Ochre / Filippo Feroldi for Purho and Colleoni Arte / Soffi / Matti Klenell / Katja Pettersson / Simon Klenell / Åsa Jungnelius / Ludvig Löfgren / Stina Löfgren / Gabriella Gustafson / Monica Backström / Mattias Ståhlbom and Carina Seth Andersson for The Glass Factory in collaboration with The National Museum in Stockholm / Cristina Celestino for WonderGlass.
After the first two editions and given the immediate positive feedback received by the project, Light Blowing‘s destiny seemed happily sealed: to become a stable, biennial format, punctuated by research and consulting activities aimed at stimulating an increasingly intense dialogue between design and blown glass in open dialogue with the Murano glassmaking tradition and the most important international glass production centres.
Unfortunately, this aspiration remained just that due to the global health crisis, which put a definitive stop to its development in 2020.
