Of Secret, Silent Tears

Collection of poems by Mario Luzi printed on Japanese Atsu Shi paper and bound by hand. Murano glass goblet with mouth-blown glass drinker, hand-crafted milk glass stem with hot applications of glass in chromatic gradations.

  • Design: Ettore Sottsass
  • Author: Mario Luzi
  • Limited Edition: 49 copies
  • Materials: Mouth-blown Murano glass. Japanese paper Atsu Shi

«There is no object more absolute and sacred than the lacrimal vessel: no other object expresses the human condition so intensely. Laughter and smiles do not produce objects suitable for their material preservation, they do not have such peremptory emblems as tears do." Mario Luzi

Delle Segrete, Silenziose Lacrime is the theme of the reflection proposed to the poet Mario Luzi and which became the title of the collection of verses that Numa publishes in a small volume in a limited edition, bound by hand.

The collection contains, among others, a poem dedicated by Luzi in the summer of 2004 to this project and which has remained unpublished until now. The volume includes five others, already published, which Luzi collected at the time to form a small group of verses, complete poems or fragments suitable for the Numa project in which Roberto Zani invited him to participate.

For the collection of poems Of secret, silent tears, Ettore Sottsass designed a lacrimal chalice in Murano glass, fragile and very delicate like the poet's verses which, together with the book, becomes part of the 2006 Limited Edition collections.

Mario Luzi's collection of poems is printed on Japanese Atsu Shi paper and bound by hand. 
The chalice is made of Murano glass with a mouth-blown glass bowl, a stem in hand-crafted milk glass with hot applications of glass in chromatic gradations. 
Processing steps:

  1. The object is made up of 3 pieces:
  2. The Murano glass drinker, mouth blown into a wooden mold, cut with a diamond tip and hot trimmed.
  3. The milky glass stem, hot-stretched to the dimensions determined by the design.
  4. The foot in dark glass, hand-crafted.
  5. The three pieces are worked separately on different squares. They are then joined together while hot, at the same temperature so that tensions are not created which could damage the object.
  6. An application of molten glass, colored in chromatic gradations, is carried out on the stem to form spaced rings.
  7. When the temperature of the glass drops, to a degree that allows the object to remain standing without risking deformation, the glass is placed in the oven for 8 hours, so that it can gradually reach room temperature, thus eliminating the possibility of thermal shock and cancel the internal tensions of matter.
  8. Each glass is finally signed and numbered by hand.

NB The lacrimal chalice was entirely handmade in the Gino Cenedese & Figlio furnace, Murano (VE)

For further information: http://firenzepermarioluzi.chiavidellacitta.it/luzi-le-lacrime-delle-cose/

Delle Segrete, Silenziose Lacrime