Marco Balderi the Artist
by Marco Balderi
Marco Balderi was born in versilia in 1958 He approached the goldsmith's
art after trying other forms of artistic expression such as clay, drawing
and photography. As a matter of fact, he didn't receive a scholastic degree
which characterized his training with classica rules, but he rather pursued
a kind of research, a challenge with metals and precious or poor materials
which he blends in a harmonious way. That has actually been his school:
the research about shapes and materials, so that theory consolidated together
with direct experience of making. Hand and mind learnt to move in unison
dragging inside the object such a feeling able to turn it into a jewel.
Therefore, his creations blossom in a spontaneous way, recoiling from
cold designs. He has a preference for the ancient working systems, like
the ""cire perdu fusion". By this technique he gives birth to his real
first collection "Buds of the Wood", a collection he constantly renews
with strictly unique pieces, where Branches, Shoots, Faggots of golden
shrubs create a nest holding the precious "Gems" ' ranging from the raspberry
red of rubies to the sky blue of aquamarines.
And then other stones, not so well-known, but drenched with a charm that
makes them equally precious. The rutiled quartz, the fire opal, the dendrític
quartz or the amethyst. Another collection, almost born for fun, but which
greatly satisfied, is that one using less precious materials like silver
, copper and bronze as a sort of challenge.
`Tribal Shadows" is a collection with a strong and firm impact where materials undergo the special and secret treating of patinas,or light and shadow of the partial polishing or other contrivances that only a keen eye can notice. After this successful collection, the utilization of really precious materials was added. In this way it's yellow gold which mates with white gold, or silver. It's in this way that stones find their shelter between the wrinkled surfaces of these jewels. Further projects and prototypes are present in his workshop in via Mazzini. One experiment , for example: to use noble wood combined with metals. So rings and bracelets in Ebony and Gold were born, as well as pendants in silver and exotic woods. M.B. therefore keeps balancing io ci between the craftsman (artisan) and the artist, without setting limits or aims, keeping in his mind that everything undergoes a transformation and that the full stops are only the basis on which to build up. Today you might smile, remembering the time he used his mother's chains -which she ignored - to have an experience or cuttie-bone as our ancestors did for his home made fusions, taking no care of the horrible smell flooding ali the neighborhood. After wasting, as he says, and fusing instead of soldering, when the goldsmith worktable experience in the garage was becoming a passion, he felt the need to deepen. And then, it wasn't school to bear fruit, but the artisan firms in Arezzo and Valenza with their ederly skill and tricks. His first business is in Forte dei Marmi, but Pietrasanta attracts him in a particular manner, and so he moves there. This proved a happy choice. Actually, it's here that you can breath Art, and M. finds, at last, the right way to personalize his own style. It's sill here that starts, first before ali the others, the collaboration with a great artist: Igor Mitoraj. And afterwards wíth other artists such as Do Konig, Vassilakis, Ivan Thimer Sofia Vari, Tomek. And others whose names have slipped from the mind for the moment because not so wellknown, but always with the same common denominator: sensibility to beauty that Art embodies. A great satisfaction is to be able to expose the works of some of these artists and in his shop windows in Via Mazzini, you can admire the jewel sculptures realized by Do Konig, Vassilakis and Igor Mitoraj Great interest deserves the new initiative M. is going to promote: to reserve an exhibition space, inside his studio, where can find their piace the works of artists interested to give birth to a continuous exchange and a cultural enrichment. The works of the Korean artist leon in Kang will start this new initiative, just at the end of October.