To many, this vase embodies the essence of Venini’s post-war production — complex technique in a simple form. Paolo Venini was a man in possession of a rare genius; he understood the minds of artists and what people wanted. As a lawyer from Milan, he started a modern design business in Murano — the most exquisitely traditional and professionally xenophobic place in Italy — and made it one of the greatest art and design firms in history. His instincts seemed to never fail him, and his company changed the direction of Murano glass history. As a designer he proved to be as good as the best in the world, and he worked with a subtlety and grace that was awe-inspiring. The Mosaico Tessuto pieces were expensive and difficult to make; Gio Ponti praised them in the pages of Domus (April 1955). Paolo understood his public, the market, the times in which he lived, and still managed to make and promote exquisite objects-as-art. When he died in 1959, the world lost a particular and significant talent. But Paolo’s legacy is still alive — his designs have a surprising directness. One looks at them and wonders how anyone could make something so beautiful, so modern, such a tight encapsulation of human object-making. This is especially true of the Mosaico Tessuti— complex technique in a simple form. Like a seashell, a leaf, or a feather, it is an irreducible object of beauty which speaks for itself.

This Mosaico Tessuto—a complex technique in a simple form—is an irreducible object of beauty.