Glassmaking in Renaissance Venice

The Fragile Craft

W. Patrick McCray

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9780754600503
• eBook ISBN: 9781351933612
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: World History
• Index: History

The transformation of the Venetian glass industry during the Renaissance was not only a technical phenomenon, but also a social one. In this volume, Patrick McCray examines the demand, production and distribution of glass and glassmaking technology during this period and evaluates several key topics, including the nature of Renaissance demand for certain luxury goods, the interaction between industry and government in the Renaissance, and technological change as a social process. McCray places in its broader economic and cultural context a craft and industry that has been traditionally viewed primarily through the surviving artefacts held in museum collections. McCray explores the social and economic context of glassmaking in Venice, from the guild and state level down to the workings of the individual glass house. He tracks the dissemination of Venetian-style glassmaking throughout Europe during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and its effects on Venice's glass industry. Integrating evidence from a wide variety of sources - written documents such as shop records and recipe books, pictorial representations of glass and glassmaking, and the careful physical and chemical analysis of glass pieces that have survived to the present - he examines the relation between consumer demand and technological change. In the process, he traces the organizational changes that signified a transition from an older and more traditional manner of 'artisan' manufacture to a modern, 'factory-style' manner of production.

Chapter 1
Introduction

Craft: The name given to any profession that requires the use of the hands, and is limited to a certain number of mechanical operations to produce the same piece of work over and over again. I do not know why people have a low opinion of what this word implies; for we depend on the crafts for all the necessary things in life ... . The poet, the philosopher, the orator, the minister, the warrior, the hero would all be nude, and lack bread without this craftsman, the object of their cruel scorn.

Diderot, The Encyclopedia

Glass, Ceramics, and Society

It is difficult today to imagine the excitement and desire that glass and ceramics once stirred among people of all social classes in Europe. How can we appreciate this wonder when the shelves of every neighbourhood grocery store are filled with glassware of all types, and porcelain objects have long been relegated to curio shelves? Yet, there was a time when Chinese porcelain was a gift fit for princes and popes, when glassmakers from Venice were lured to other European cities, and when entrepreneurs such as Josiah Wedgwood deliberately manipulated fashion and taste for ceramics among the English aristocracy.

For centuries, the ability to make a clear, colourless, and defect-free glass was the "holy grail" of glassmakers. The Renaissance consumer or collector was interested in purchasing glass free from flaws and defects that displayed an artisan's virtuosity. It is ironic that in recent years more affluent American consumers are often less attracted to defect-free glass produced by machines and rendered defect-free by years of industrial development. Instead, kitchens and catalogues display handmade glass imported from Mexico, Thailand, and India and purchased from upscale vendors with multinational images. In lieu of "perfect" machine-made glass and ceramics, consumers frequently choose vessels bearing the marks and scars of the craftsman's hand and which originate in more "exotic" latitudes.

How will archaeologists and art historians five hundred years from now interpret such forms of material culture? Without understanding the desire of late twentieth-century consumers for goods that retain some element of artisan handicraft (even if it is crude, carried out at times under questionable labour practices, and sold by large corporate entities), explaining the existence of handmade glass and ceramics among the remains of middle- to upper-class American society will be challenging. Material culture, whether glass vases or hydroelectric dams, can have multiple roles and meanings over a variety of temporal contexts.

Certainly the consumers and producers of Renaissance Venetian glass in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries had a much different view than we do today of the fragile pieces of craftsmanship in their possession. Glass objects that have survived intact to the present are often regarded as masterpieces and are frequently encountered in the context of museums or private collections. Their incorporation into collections can sometimes remove glass pieces from their context of creation, their original use and our own life experiences. Glass pieces are often placed in a showcase as timeless examples of art, lacking context, and without an opportunity to tell the story of their origin and significance.¹

During the latter half of the fifteenth century, the glass industry of Venice, by now already established on the nearby lagoon island of Murano, witnessed substantial changes in organization, distribution, and production techniques in response to changing forces of demand and consumption. Venice's glass industry was significant in that it represented a transition from an older and more traditional manner of "artisan" manufacture to a mode of production that became closer to modern factory-style production. The glass industry of Venice was important as it represented an important time in the history of glassmaking when a European glass industry broke away from Levantine influences and established an independent regional technological tradition. Beginning around the middle of the fifteenth century, particular artistic styles in glass unique to Venice emerged. These designs were widely imitated throughout Europe and were arguably the most important influence on glass fashion until the development of English lead crystal in the late seventeenth century.

The craft of glassmaking in Renaissance Venice is a very rich topic for examining a broad and complex set of issues connected to the history of technology and the nature of technological change. During the Italian Renaissance, the glass industry of Venice developed artistically in a manner that was finally independent of other regional traditions. For the first time in centuries, the glass industries of Europe were creating traditions rather than following them. Venice was one of the most important cities in the development of this particular materials technology. Between the years 1450 and 1550, new glass compositions and decorative techniques were developed in response to consumer demand. Understanding the nature of this consumer demand and attitudes towards material culture such as glass is central to a fuller appreciation of the technological changes observed in the glass industry. The glass recipes and ornamental effects created in Venice were imitated and embellished by other glass industries in Europe. The effects of new artistic and technological trends originating in Venice continued to be felt for the next two hundred years in glasshouses throughout Europe.

At the same time, the craft of Renaissance glassmaking must be considered in its larger cultural context. Glassmaking was not just a decorative art in Venice but was also part of the local industrial system. The glass industry was not isolated, other than geographically, on the island of Murano. Instead, it was part of a larger industrial system, and technological changes in glassmaking had implications for other local industries, such as soap-making, pottery and majolica production, optics, scientific instrument making, and the manufacture of pigments.² Some of these industries shared the same raw materials while others, such as the pigment and optic industries, depended on products from the Venetian glass furnaces.

The Renaissance Venetian glass industry exhibits patterns of technological change and innovation that became common decades later in the ceramic industries of Europe and America. It has been suggested that innovations such as specialized labour roles, the entrepreneur as experimenter, state support, and appeals to current fashions were first developed in the ceramic industries of France and England.³ Many of the features of modern industrial organization, especially for the production of ceramics, had their roots well before the eighteenth century in places such as the glass factories of Venice.

Historically, the glass craft of Renaissance Venice presents a case study of the resurgence, maturation, and decline of a regional industry which, for its time, was considered to be quite sophisticated and "high-tech." This industry, in terms of its organization, experienced a transition from an older form of production centred primarily around guilds and artisan craftsmen to one that began to embody features of modern "factory-style" production, such as monopolies and patents, industrial experimentation, and extensive state support.

Technological change in Venice's glass industry suggests an alteration in the ways artisan knowledge was produced and organized in the early modern Europe. Venetian glassmakers modified their compositions in response to consumer demand and variations in product type, making use of organized empiricism and experimentation to do so. Craftsmen and other authors of technological treatises began to record their methods so that they would not be forgotten. The stirrings of empirical research and the codification of knowledge in a standardized manner is evident in this new craft organization. As glassmaking slowly made the transition, beginning in the Renaissance, from a purely craft-based activity to one based on more "scientific" forms of knowledge, glassmakers gradually relinquished their adherence to medieval technological traditions.

The Nature and Limitations of Available Sources of Information

Venice was not the only Italian city that had a flourishing glass industry during the Renaissance. Other regions and cities, such as Tuscany and Alt are, had glass workshops and long-standing traditions of glass manufacture. So, why Venice? What was unique about the Venetian industry and its products that made it a major centre of innovation in glassmaking technology and design? A large part of this answer lies outside glassmaking itself and is connected to the larger context of which the industry was a part. In Venice, and Renaissance Italy in general, significant changes were taking place in social and economic life, not the least of which were emerging patterns of capitalism, consumerism, and the increased consumption of luxury goods. Glass and glassmaking were part of these phenomena.

The Renaissance Venetian glass industry was incredibly diverse; an amazing array of products were manufactured at Murano. These include vessel glass, beads, mirrors, mosaic glass, lenses, enamels, glazes, and glass for scientific apparatus and pigments. All of these different segments of the industry underwent change during the Renaissance. While many items for practical applications proliferated, the most notable and significant technological and cultural changes occurred in conjunction with the production of luxury glass. These are the elaborate and visually appealing wineglasses, bowls, and plates that were found in Renaissance-era homes and which now reside in museum showcases and private collections. For these reasons, this book focuses on the production of luxury glass.

The available sources on the Venetian glass industry are diverse and eclectic. These include material and information obtained from archaeological investigations in the Veneto and elsewhere; pictorial representations of glass in Renaissance-era art, including paintings and mosaics; documentary evidence such as that found in archival records, shopping lists, shop inventories, recipe books, and personal diaries; and finally, studies of the glass itself by physical and chemical examination. The broad range of source material available on the Venetian glass of this era makes it a perfect subject to investigate using a range of methodological tools including those of the archaeologist, the materials scientist, and the historian of technology. I use all of these tools in this book to arrive at a comprehensive understanding of how consumer demand and technological development interacted in Renaissance Italy. Information exists on glass production concerning other regions and other cities within the Italian peninsula; however, the quantity and variety of sources pertaining to glassmaking in Venice make it a logical choice for examining this craft.⁴ Because some readers may be unfamiliar with the possibilities and limitations inherent to the mélange of sources from which this story has been constructed, some comments are offered below. In addition, there is a short note on written sources at the book's end.

Venice presents a unique problem to the archaeologist. The combined effects of tidal action, floods, and human activity in the Venetian lagoon over the past 1400 years have introduced formation processes that make interpreting the archaeological record quite difficult. There is also the fact that many areas of interest are under water at different times of the month or year. Furthermore, sites on the island of Murano where Renaissance glass was made have been repeatedly disturbed by human activities. Such places are an active part of current city-life making large-scale excavations there untenable. Another difficulty is related to the local mythology of the city itself which asserts that the region was first inhabited by Roman nobility seeking refuge from invading barbarian peoples. This mythic sense of history can have adverse effects on the study of Renaissance glass and the practice of scientific excavations in Venice is in the relatively early stages of development.⁵ This is in contrast to other regions of Italy, such as Rome or Tuscany, where formal and extensive excavations have been undertaken for centuries.

Self-reflection and examination within medieval archaeology certainly have implications for the study and understanding of medieval material culture, including Venetian glass.⁶ There has been extensive research documenting glass production in Tuscany, Lombardy, Emilia Romagna, and other regions of Italy.⁷ Emphasis in other Italian regions is on more elaborate and extensive excavations with attention paid not just to luxury glass pieces but also to simpler, common wares. Researchers examining glass production in other parts of Italy have also taken greater advantage of scientific examinations of their finds, including chemical analyses of the glass and raw materials.⁸ Iconographic and written documents are also frequently used to strengthen points of view. Finally, there have also been attempts to place the glass found at the different sites into a broader context of material culture as well as to understand the lives and social relations between the producers and consumers of glass in the Renaissance.⁹ A good deal of effort is needed to reach the same level of understanding for the craft of glassmaking in Venice, compared to that seen for other regions.

The mythology both of Venice as well as its glassmaking activities has, to some degree, hampered a more complete understanding of the industry. One of the features surrounding Venetian glassmaking is a noticeable "material culture mythology." The modern glasshouses of Murano do little to help change this reinforcement of mythology and indeed contribute to it. My first trip to the different shops of Murano in 1993 was remarkable in that I learned that each of the bottegas was "the oldest on the island ... the only one that has been in continuous production from old days ... and the only one that still makes glass in the original style." The reasons these shops promulgate these stories and quasi-history is evident in the daily boatloads of tourists that frequent the island. Of course, Venetian glassmaking is by no means the only ancient craft to have a large amount of hyperbole and mythology associated with it. Research on the subject of Greek painted pottery, for example, has recently begun to unmask a much more realistic picture of these objects (historically called "vases" in connoisseur circles) and their makers in ancient Greek society.¹⁰

Similar myth-making also permeates stories regarding the glassmakers of Murano, especially the Barovier family. The Barovier family attained a legendary position in the pantheon of Muranese glassmakers, in part due to the publications of researchers in the nineteenth century. Moreover, some members of the Barovier family have undergone an apotheosis simply because the great majority of Renaissance glassmakers lived and died in anonymity. Unlike artisans in other media (painting, sculpture, etc.) few, if any, names can actually be attached to particular pieces of Renaissance Venetian glassware. The tendency of some early glass scholars to attribute certain pieces or decorative techniques to individual shops (the famous Barovier Cup in Murano's Museo Vetrario is the best example) might be seen as an attempt to compensate for a lack of a "cult of personality" in Renaissance glassmaking. Perhaps it is also an attempt to elevate glass artisans to the level of identifiable and famous artists in a manner similar to what Giorgio Vasari did for Renaissance painters, architects, and sculptors. Finally, the success of the industry and its continuation until the present time may have contributed to this feature of Renaissance Venetian glassmaking - the fog of half-truths that has sometimes pervaded and obscured the industry, its makers, and products.¹¹

Another type of evidence that can be used in a number of ways to provide information about past material culture such as glass are depictions of glass in paintings and other media.¹² Pictorial representations can be used to supplement arguments concerning chronology and primacy. In this manner, evidence from paintings complements other methods, such as the recovery of glass from archaeological contexts and the study of museum pieces. For example, the presence of a particular glass type in a painting of the 1520s may serve as evidence that this glass existed, was in use, or was popular at the time. Finally, the pictorial representations can illuminate the culture and behaviour associated with particular objects. For example – How is glass shown in dining scenes? Is it shown? What types of objects are represented in still lifes?

There are drawbacks to the use of pictorial evidence. The artist may have depicted whatever glass was available in preparing the painting. The object in question may have been an "antique", long out of fashion, that was included in the picture anyway. In addition, there may be symbolic or social motivations, perhaps less easy to discern, for the inclusion of particular objects. For example, the use of a glass vessel with light streaming through it has a symbolic dimensio...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Illustrations
• Tables
• Preface
• Maps
• 1 Introduction
• 2 "Masters of the Gold of Christendom": Renaissance Venice, the World Economy, and Luxury Goods
• 3 Master Aldrevandin's World: Glassmaking in Pre-Renaissance Venice
• 4 Demystifying the Demand for Renaissance Glass
• 5 Desire Fulfilled: The Technology of Glassmaking in Renaissance Venice
• 6 Consumers and Competitors: The Distribution of Glass and Glassmaking Knowledge
• Epilogue: The Innovations of Renaissance Venetian Glass
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index