Lessons from Venice: Day 5

Today marked the midpoint of our week in the mosaic studio and I just can't get enough!  I still have a monumental amount of work to get done on my piece, but I am now cautiously optimistic that I'll get to take it home finished.  When I entered the studio today I found just Antonella waiting for us.  She looked over my shoulder at the progress I had made the night before and commented on how I hadn't finished the row of blue background across the bottom of the picture.  I sighed and got right to work.


A few minutes later, Antonella was back to help Astrid with something on her eagle and I turned around to watch the maestra at work.  It amazed me how easily she maneuvered the hammer--the woman can take a TINY piece of glass and make a precision cut so the piece fits the opening it is intended for perfectly!  Like my students, I was curious about my teacher so I began to ask her questions to try and get to know her a little better.  As it turns out, Antonella has been making mosaics for thirty years.  From what I could gather, she said something about being a difficult teenager and her father decided she needed to get a job.  It happened that her father knew Lucio Orsoni's father, and her brother worked in the furnace at Orsoni, so it was soon settled that Antonella would learn the art of making mosaics.  I was surprised when she said that she was very unhappy when she started ("I cried", she told me) but at some point she came to love the craft in which she is so evidently talented.  You could tell by the smile on her face that mosaic work is her true passion.  Apparently the talent runs in the family, because Antonella's seven year old son is also learning the craft from an early age!


A bit later, Antonella consulted me about some English grammar as she wrote a reply to a student on Facebook and we got to talking about her English skills.  After only ten lessons and a crash course with students in the studio, I let her know that I was quite impressed with her abilities.  She let it slip that she is very shy, and that English is really difficult for her.  Knowing this one small fact helped me to understand why I was having such limited interactions with my teacher.  It also inspired me to follow through with my dream of studying another language.


Early each morning, long before we arrived in the studio at 9am, Antonella was hard at work preparing filati (rods of glass that are thinner than uncooked spaghetti) for two classes she is teaching in the States in May.  After explaining the process to me in the studio, she promised that she would show me how to pull the filati once Mirta arrived, so off we went to her workshop (located just above the furnace where the glass is made).  There were sketches of mosaics waiting to be created and a couple of pieces in process, but it wasn't the warm and creative space I was imagining.  Pulling the filati obviously took a great deal of practice and skill and went something like this:  She took pieces of mother tint (essentially chunks of glass) and placed them in a specially designed metal vessel (like a sphere with 1/4 of the metal gone so as to make a large opening).  Then she fired up the torch and heated the sphere and glass until the glass had the consistency of a thick, sticky glob.  I should note that my "captain safety" reflexes kicked in somewhere during the time that glass pieces were popping and sputtering out of the metal vessel in the direction of the person melting them!  All I could say was, "Where are her safety goggles?!"  The molten glass was stirred and wrapped around a screwdriver-like tool forming a big bead.  To pull the thin strands, she grabbed a pair of tweezers, pinched a bit of glass, and pulled the glass into a strand as it passed through the torch flame.  When the filati had the diameter she was hoping for, the strand was broken off and another was pulled.  I was in awe of how easy she made this process look and that her strands were of uniform thickness!  Although I'm a chemist and I use a Bunsen burner regularly, I don't think I have the guts to get that close to molten glass and a torch flame...without safety goggles or a labcoat!   When I had seen the finished micro mosaic samples, I thought I might be interested in giving it a try but after watching Antonella in action I decided that definitely was not the medium for me.  Best to focus on one technique at a time!

Maestra Antonella pulling filati!

Back in the studio, I continue to plug away at my piece.  With Mirta there to translate for her, Antonella was a little more hands-off.  Mirta, being naturally outgoing, was there to give praise as we worked and she assured me that if I worked hard I would finish.  I was sad that the sparkling woman I had seen just a few hours before had been drawn back inside but hoped we would see her again the next morning.  I wondered if my students thought the same about me...I know that I'm not little miss sunshine in my classroom every day and I started to become curious about how my students perceived my demeanor (more about this in tomorrow's lessons).

Lunchtime already and still so much to do!

Today during lunch mom and I decided to enjoy the sunshine and walked the main street the emanates from the bridge.  After our failed attempt at locating the mask shop I thought I would never find an authentic Venetian mask (one of the few things I wanted to take home as a souvenir).  Luckily, Monika had stayed in this neighborhood last year and knew just the place...right down the street.  I wish I could have taken pictures of the hundreds of beautiful options hanging in the shop, all made by one of the master craftsmen who worked there.  I ended up choosing a fun and flirty floral mask that could be easily carried in my backpack on the journey home.  We grabbed a quick bite to eat, and headed back to the workshop.  From 1:30pm until 6:30pm everyone worked diligently on their pieces.  From time to time we would get up to stretch our legs and admire what the others were working on. 

Monika's Grecian inspired piece using all of the variations of gold tiles.

Astrid's eagle taking shape.

My many reject tiles that were cut unsuccessfully:(.

Lucia's piece inspired by a Klimt painting.

With evening falling, all five of us decided to go to dinner together.  Several of us were craving pizza and we found a cute little restaurant across the canal to eat at.  We sampled gnocchi, pizza of various types, and calzone...everything was delicious!  I was even able to order pizza without sauce (I know, this sounds ridiculous, but the fact that I could eat almost anything I wanted in Italy and not get sick was a huge triumph for me).  Heading back to the studio, we all acknowledged what a unique experience this was and how lucky we were to have such a great group to share it with.  As I thought about the list of sights that we weren't going to have time to see, and reflected on the memories I was making with these ladies in just three short days I realized this:  the true beauty in travel is found in the people you meet and connections you make, not the sights you see.  Don't get me wrong, I love sightseeing, but I wouldn't have traded a minute spent with these ladies to visit a museum?

We all worked late in the studio tonight.  Monika and Lucia called it quits first, but Astrid, mom, and I were determined to make progress and make our teacher proud!  Mom and I stopped for some treats on the way back from dinner and the three of us worked, told stories, snacked on delicious pastries, and rocked out to ABBA tunes until the wee hours of the night.  By one or two am mom headed to bed, but Astrid and I pushed on!  At that point we were completely punch-drunk...everything was hilarious, including the fact that the man in the furnace was probably watching us sing and dance around.  Maybe we should have asked him to join us?!  Here's what my piece looked like when I finally decided to go to bed (around 3am).  Oh what a night!!

Almost finished with the blue background!