MARIA ROSA FRANZIN, Italy

MARIA ROSA FRANZIN – Italian contemporary jewellery artist, lecturer at Pietro Selvatico Insitute of Art in Padua, Chairman of the Italian Association of Contemporary Jewellery and the curator of various contemporary jewellery projects.
Although she initially studied painting at the Venice Academy of Fine Arts, she was inspired by the school’s lecturers to focus on jewellery, which the artist explains “the world of painting therefore transferred into a pictorial dimension based on making”. Maria Rosa was taught by Mario Pinton, an expert on contemporary jewellery and a professor at the Pietro Selvatico Art Institute in Padua.
The artist’s work was greatly influenced by the exhibition she had seen about the life of Etruscan and their “soul houses”, or small-scale houses – as places where the meaning of human beings and their lives were contained. The artist started to think of jewellery as small containers. Volumes described by a kind of “incorrect” geometry. A structure which is not defined by symmetry, but one that remains free in its form. On the other hand, the inside of the boxes is brought to life by the mixing of colours. The paint can occupy space and surfaces. Maria Rosa Franzin sees these small places as a culmination of vital actions – past passions that are hidden but not forgotten.
In her works, the artist uses materials and techniques typical of the Italian traditions. The pieces reveal an almost sketch-like appearance, that can be perceived in the pure gold strokes on oxidized silver surfaces, as if they had been made with a paintbrush. Using coral or synthetic elements that are made as if they had grown out and squeezed their way from below, creates a three-dimensional effect and giving the ornament a depth.
The artist emphasizes that anyone entering the world of contemporary jewellery should learn that, in the object, they have to search for its soul. That one should see a message that embodies a sense of self – and not emptiness or improvisation.
“Many years ago, I saw an interesting exhibition about Etruscan everyday life and the “soul houses.” I was interested in these small forms – like small homes – as places where the meaning of people and their lives was embedded. At that moment I realized it was time to focus on Case dell’Anima, or the SOUL HOUSE.

https://klimt02.net/jewellers/maria-rosa-franzin

https://www.agc-it.org/it/soci/38-maria-rosa-franzin.html

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