Full Circle Art & Process
We were introduced to Gianluca Franzese through a mutual friend and after visiting his studio in the Mission district of San Francisco, we immediately fell in love with his work. His masterful technique of layering precious metal leaf and applying his own paint mixture creates a unique luminosity of color and light. The result is a geometric pattern of shapes that is so mesmerizing and dimensional that it appears to jump off of the panel.
While visiting Gianluca’s studio we were drawn to many of the pieces that depicted a tubular, wormhole-like design. It reminded us of an eight or infinity symbol – both rich in symbolism. We selected the gold color palette to reflect that symbolism and enhance the shimmer of the light that reflects off the piece.
Full Circle initial sketch
18k + 22k Gold Leaf
Gianluca starts by layering 3” squares of 18k and 22k gold leaf onto the panel. Next, he lightly draws the shape of the object, creating its pattern and lines. He then masks off each section, adding paint and glaze to each one, this adds depth of color to each layer. Additional layers of gold leaf are added to select squares to give an extra shimmer. The final stage involves masking off the shape and painting the background black before a final varnish is applied to the entire piece. Scroll down for more pictures of the process.
Creating the label for this bottle required a lot of hours and many layers in Adobe Illustrator. In order to digitally reproduce the reflective luminosity of the original artwork, the final piece was photographed twice at different exposure levels and then combined. Once digitized, we traced every line of the object in Illustrator to create the layer needed to print the varnished lines that give the label its texture and feel – just like the original piece. The final label was printed on a black substrate with a silver foil layer added first. Then we used a four-color process flexographic press to run each color layer individually – cyan, magenta, yellow and black. The final pass through the printer added a high build varnish layer which enhanced the lines of the object.
Joshua adding gold luster embellishments to the Collector Edition bottles
Just like with our Prodigal Son and Quixotic releases, we created 22 Collector Editions backed by a digital certificate of authenticity on the blockchain (NFT). Each of the 22 editions comes with an archival print signed and numbered by Gianluca along with that corresponding bottle number. Inspired by the real gold leaf that was used to make this piece (and a few bottles of wine at dinner with friends) we decided to add 23k gold-lustered lines on each of the bottles. Our friends at Merritt Ceramics helped us bring this idea to life – and it only took two melted bottles to figure it out. Kristen and I drew on each of the bottles by hand with a metal quill filled with 23 karat gold borosilicate luster, designed specifically for fusion to glass. The bottles were fired to 1188 degrees Fahrenheit for roughly 8 hours. If you are interested in acquiring one of these very special bottles please reach out directly.
Full Circle Collector Editions include gold luster embellished bottles and corresponding signed and numbered archival print
