Silvia Decet

Ceramic artist

I’ve been involved with ceramics for over 20 years. I was drawn to it out of sheer envy of my talented friend Claudia Dorkenwald. She was my mentor in the beginning, but later on, as we explored this vast universe, she also became my partner in crime.

I taught myself how to pot from books and magazines in the BI era (i.e. Before Internet). It was a long and sometimes excruciating process by trial and error, chasing an elusive aesthetic ideal. Results were often unexpected, sometimes unsatisfactory, but always stimulated my creative juices.

Later on, while in the USA, I was lucky enough to attend workshops with such acclaimed artists as Lana Wilson and Lynne Meade, experiences that made me aware of the skillset that I had acquired over the years.

I have devoted the past few years of my work to exploring wheel-thrown and altered forms and to developing my ceramic sufaces, by slip-trailing and combining slips and glazes.

In the past few years I have focused on making my own stoneware glazes from raw materials. I am very proud of my beautiful satin surfaces.

From 2021 I give pottery classes for beginners and more advanced students in my Piazza Maggiore shop of Feltre.

Lampwork glass artist

My love affair with glass is a lot more recent. I was drawn to glass because of its proximity to clay and because of my attraction to the flame. I was self-taught in this area too. Only after a few years of lonely experiments did I approach the ancient Venetian tradition, and found myself in Murano, which is only 90 km from my home town. Davide Penso and Elena Rosso taught me how to torch beads professionally and especially how to blow beads Murano-style.

 Jewellery maker

Learning metalsmithing techniques was only a natural development for me at some point. Metals perfectly complement my glass items and made it possible for me to become a jewellery designer.