Ivonne Capecchi left her native Venezuela after 38 years of directing her own art workshop. The unsustainable situation in the country forced her to leave her family, home and friends. “Putting my life in a suitcase to start from scratch in a new country has been one of the most difficult things I have done in my life,” says Ivonne, who comes from a family of artists - her grandmother was a painter, her mother a sculptor , painter, musician, and had her own workshop in her home. “For me, going through that door and entering that world of tools, paints, clay, molds and enamels, was better than any toy, and my mother allowed us to use everything and create in total freedom,” recalls the artist. With the passage of time, he tells us, he fell in love with the great works in glass and with the peace transmitted by the passage of light through its colors. It was then that he decided to study art while living in Sao Paulo and one of the techniques he learned was the making of stained glass. "From that moment I fell in love with glass to this day, and forever."
In his native Venezuela, and in normal times of his country, how is the stained glass window in terms of promotion and acquisition. Is it really a work of access to the pocket of the common citizen?
Stained glass was always very elite and since there was never a glass or stained glass industry in Venezuela, acquiring it became a luxury that few really had access to; the raw material was imported and that increased the cost. On the other hand, we had very few professional stained glass artists in the country, nor were there any specialized schools in the handling of glass.
Now that you have been living in Miami for a year, how do you plan to locate your pieces already made in stained glass?
To locate my work it is important to have contact with architects and real estate remodelers, so that people get to know my work and be able to enter the market here. “One of the advantages of my work, adds Ivonne, is that my stained glass windows have a different technique from the one already known with lead and since I don't use it, many of my glasses are made by me, that makes my work unrepeatable and only".
The stained glass technique is ancient and has played an important role in great Cathedrals, Palaces and Abbeys.
Ivonne considers that the world of glass in the United States is fascinating and that there are great masters, artists and specialized galleries in terms of fusing, but stained glass as such is not seen much in art rooms since it is created for a space existing (windows, doors, ceilings, room dividers, etc. "However, he limits, when I make a fusion between the stained glass and the fused glass, I make pieces that do not deserve a pre-determined space but are works that can also be placed as decoration.
What do you want people in Florida to know more about you as an artist?
I would like to invite you to meet me, see my work and career on Instagram @ivonnecapecchi, my work in anti-impact glass, and that they comply with all security measures. I have a different, contemporary, magical technique, full of light, color and passion.
“I want to be again what I always was, an artist who lives to create, who dreams of having in her life what was my daily oxygen -art- and being able to feel that all this effort was worth because the essence of the artist is conserves even in the most difficult situations. "
Currently, Ivonne Capecchi is the president of @soschildrenfoundation, a foundation that helps Venezuelan children living in extreme poverty in Venezuela and has existed since she lived in her country of origin. "The persecution of those we helped was impossible to bear, in addition to thousands of reasons that together weighed so much that we made that difficult decision to leave." concluded.
Today the Foundation operates from the USA, where they want to be able to make their new home.