With his still ongoing solo exhibition, Kristalline Wunderkammer at the Ingo Maurer’s showroom in Munich,
glass artist and craftsman Simone Crestani is going to be making an official appearance to the design
industry insiders and enthusiasts who have gathered in Milan for the most awaited week of the year. Here
he will be presenting new projects for this specific occasion, as well as a series of original creations made
exclusively for Milano Design Week.
During the Fuorisalone the talented young artist/craftsman/designer, master of the glass-blowing
lampworking technique, will be showing his poetic creations – inspired by the charm of nature and its vital
strength, in perpetual equilibrium between fragility and strength, fleetingness and energy – within the
Milano#Dakar exhibition at SIAM’s miFAC, located at Via Santa Marta 18 in the 5VIE district; as part of
Stranger Pinks, an exhibition curated by Artemest and held at the TED Milan showroom at Via Randaccio 5
(Arco della Pace area); and inside the The Merchant of Venice boutique – an artistic perfume brand and
cultural project, emblematic of the art of Venetian perfumery – located at Via Brera 4 in the heart of the
Brera design district.
For Milano#Dakar – an art and design exhibition which offers an original and harmonious vision of the
work of Italian and African artists, designers and makers, with the goal of promoting the added value of
diversity and supporting the idea of creativity as a symbol of integration – Simone Crestani is displaying his
new Serpentine table objects collection composed of liqueur bottles, martini glasses and ashtrays. Inspired
by the iconography of the snake – symbolic representation of temptation, whose venom possesses, in
addition to its evident lethal toxicity, therapeutic and mind-numbing effects – the collection reinterprets
reptilian features in their elegant, suave,
yet at the same time dangerously enchanting sinuosity, as they were represented in ancient 18th-century
prints. Moreover, in the SIAM location, the artist/craftsman will be unveiling another new work, the Scarabeus
jewelry collection, a set composed by a pendant necklace and a ring, plated in white, yellow or rose gold;
emblematic of the ancient Egyptian scarab/khepri – a symbol of rebirth, transformation and eternal
renewal – it is considered a powerful apotropaic amulet to encourage happy events and protect the
intuitive and spiritual faculties. In Scarabeus, the craftsmanship of Simone, a true modern homo faber, is
able to delineate the outer shell of the insect by sculpting a solid piece of glass while hot, a peculiar
characteristic which provides each jewel with highly unusual and extremely suggestive play of light.
For Stranger Pinks – an exhibition/homage dedicated to the feminine world, set up by Artemest inside a
villa designed by Giò Ponti which is now the location of the TED Milan showroom, featuring a refined
mixture of furnishings/accessories and decorations on display inside the building and on the outside terrace
– the artist will be presenting an original work, part of his Glass Bonsai series. A concentrated source of life
force, strength and energy, the bonsai is the natural element which best represents Simone Crestani’s
poetics and the profound dedication to glass which he has nurtured since the very beginning of his career.
The glass artist and craftsman has created a Bonsai Sakura for Milano Design Week – this creation is an
homage to the refined elegance of the Japanese cherry tree with its delicate blossom, whose short yet
beautiful existence is symbolic in Oriental cultures of human fragility and rebirth, as well as the beauty of
existence itself.
Inside the The Merchant of Venice boutique – the artistic perfume brand and cultural project, emblematic
of the art of Venetian perfumery – located in the heart of the Brera district, Simone will be revealing an
example of his design creation: Eterea, a console in which the solidity of the tabletop, in bookmatched
Italian walnut, appears to be supported by the infinitely delicate, ethereal presence of wakes of glass
bubbles which, almost like air bubbles in water rising to the surface and spreading out, in turn resting on a
base which is the precise mirror of the tabletop. The effect is a dynamic interplay of forces at the limit of
the mysterious: the equilibrium between the tensions and the strength of the connections, the distances to
maintain and the full spaces, equal to the empty ones, reveal themselves to be fundamental for each
individual part of the object, as well as for the whole work. Finally, the console is joined by another new
element: the perfume decanter which expresses the same, soft dynamism of bubbles – here present in a
smaller scale, at the same time enriched by the dual tonality of the material, both pink and clear glass –
another original creation specially made by the artist/craftsman for The Merchant of Venice on the
occasion of Milano Design Week.
Simone Crestani @Fuorisalone 2018
Serpentine collection + Scarabeus collection
Milano#Dakar
Italian & African Art & Design exhibition
miFAC Gallery – Palazzo SIAM
Via Santa Marta 18, Milano (5VIE art + design)
General Opening April 17-22 April | 10:00 – 20:00
Opening Party April 18| 18:00 – 23:00
Glass Bonsai
Stranger Pinks
Enchantment is useless, but as indispensabile as pink
showroom TED Milano
via Giovanni Randaccio 5, Milano (zona Arco della Pace)
Press Preview April 16 | 14:00 – 20:00
General Opening April 17-22 | 10:00 – 19:30
Eterea + parfume decanter
The Merchant of Venice boutique
via Brera 4 Milano (Brera Design District)
General Opening April 17-22 | 10:30 – 19:30
Special Event April 20 from 19:00
Press info: DOROTHYLAB | international press office + strategic partnerships – press@dorothylab.com – www.dorothylab.com
