Born in Verona, Italy in 1955, artist and designer Giorgio Vigna makes sculpture, home furnishings and exhibitions, but is especially known for his glasswork and jewelry. Designing jewelry for film, theater, and opera, besides special collections for fashion designers, he celebrates the raw beauty and hidden potential of natural materials.
Vigna established his eponymous studio in Verona in 1975, before moving to Rome a few years later. He worked as a stage designer and director through the ’80s and, in 1986, learned engraving techniques at CalcoGRAFICA, the national institute for graphics in Rome. He moved his studio to Milan in 1990. In 1997, Vigna began an ongoing collaboration with the Venetian glassworks Venini, which has resulted in a variety of unique design objects, such as Fuochi d’acqua (2002), Fuochi Astrali (2010), and Fuochi Bianchi (2011), as well as jewelry designs, including the first Venini glass jewelry collection, Talismani (1998). In 1997, Vigna was invited by the International Glass Research Center in Nuutajärvi, Finland, to conduct a workshop on glass jewelry. While there, he was introduced to the Finnish company Iittala, for which he designed the glass Birds collection (2007), the sculptural Piilo home furnishings collection (2010), and the company’s first jewelry collection, Piilo Amulet (2010).
His work has been exhibited in major institutions, such as Palazzo Fortuny and Museo Correr in Venice; Musée Maillol in Paris; Centro per l’arte contemporanea Luigi Pecci in Prato; Designmuseo in Helsinki; Castelvecchio Museum in Verona; and the World Jewellery Museum in Seoul. His designs are included in the collections of the Museum of Arts & Design in New York; the Indianapolis Museum of Art; the Museo degli Argenti in Florence; and Museo Internazionale delle Arti Applicate Oggi in Turin, among others.
