When I asked him [Luigi Brugnaro, the mayor of Venice] on Twitter about the issue of mass tourism in Venice, he shot back: “non lascerò che alcuni “intellettuali da strapazzo” continuino a denigrare #Venezia dicendo di amarla.” Or in plain English, ” I will not let some “hack intellectuals” continue to denigrate Venice while saying he loves her.” It is now a badge of honor to be considered an intellectual hack by the mayor of Venice. We hacks see the devastation that the cruise ships and …
Articles
The Unbearable Lightness of Scarpa
A review of Venetian Glass by Carlo Scarpa: The Venini Company, 1932-1947 (Nov. 5, 2013 – March 2, 2014), written by JoAnn Locktov. “Scarpa had this thing for detail that would kill you with pleasure.” Ida Barbarigo Cadorin, painter (b 1925, Venice) The Unbearable Lightness of Scarpa To understand the glass that architect Carlo Scarpa created for Venini one must travel back in time—before 1906, the year of his birth in Venice, before Napoleon and …
Punk: From Chaos to Couture
John Lydon (Johnny Rotten of the Sex Pistols) remembers the primary advantage of safety pins. He had no money and didn't know how to sew. It was the seventies, and punks were the disenfranchised, bitter and poor kids of London and New York. They would show up with paint splattered clothing, garbage bags cinched at the waist, hacked off hair, safety pins piercing skin and cloth. Their ideology allowed for the remarkable notion that they could dictate their own taste, no matter how subversive. …
The Measure of a Man, Carlo Scarpa by Robert McCarter
In Robert McCarter’s Carlo Scarpa monograph Austrian architect Peter Noever tells an illuminating tale. In 1974 he and Scarpa visited the Adolf Loos-designed American Bar in Vienna. The moment they entered Scarpa started appraising the space. He ordered champagne for the ladies...... who were present and a measuring tape for himself. Scarpa then proceeded to measure everything down to the exact millimeter. When finished he proclaimed the space to be of "singular spiritual and emotional …
Carlo Scarpa and Cleto Munari: A Sonnet in Silver
On a spring evening in 1972 I was introduced to the person who would change my life. Cleto Munari remembers the meeting well. It took place in Vicenza, the Palladian city north of Venice, where both he and Carlo Scarpa worked. In Scarpa the architect, Munari found friend, teacher and collaborator. Munari, then 42, remembers their compelling relationship, The first two hours of the day we would spend discussing design. The rest of the day was devoted to architecture, history and art. I …