During the last Cersaie in Bologna (Italy), held from September 23-27, Ceramiche Refin presented GLINT Variation, a collection of unique ceramic pieces created together with QUAYOLA, inside the renovated exhibition Gallery in the company headquarters. This was the last stage of the journey undertaken with the artist as part of the REFIN DTS - Daring Art Explorations project.

After the presentation at the Fuorisalone of the GLINT masterpiece last April, a site-specific installation designed by Quayola for the Refin Studio spaces in Milan, the experimental journey between the company and the artist continued and led to the creation of Variation: a collection of sculptural pieces in porcelain stoneware, an evolution and reinterpretation of the work presented in Milan and a pure expression of the technical and material contamination between the artist and the Refin laboratory.

The GLINT project is the protagonist of the DTS area within the company spaces, in an exhibition that narrates the journey undertaken by the company with Quayola: from the work of art already presented in Milan, to the experimentation of the Refin laboratory with the artist, up to revealing Variation as the final result of this project. With the latter, the company inaugurated the new REFIN DTS - Daring Art Explorations path of artistic collaborations curated by Valentino Catricalà, which will be renewed annually with internationally renowned artists.

Glint Variation is the collection of unique ceramic pieces resulting from the four-handed experimentation undertaken by the company with Quayola.

A celebration of the Masterpiece work presented last April, and directly inspired by it, Variation represents the technical and material contamination between the artist and the Refin Laboratory, expressing the audacity in exploring new worlds and experimenting with new possibilities for porcelain stoneware.

As Quayola explains, “Glint is first and foremost a research, a process. Both the sculpture Glint and the Variations document my study of the relationship between light and complex geometries. My idea was to crystallize the light effects on the surface of the water in a physical and tangible object."

The research path for the development of the Glint ceramic variation was complex and extremely stimulating. The real challenge for Refin was to be able to reproduce a structure that recreated the geometry developed by Quayola to represent the ripples of water on the surface of the porcelain stoneware.

To do so, the company undertook a long process with the artist made up of tests, trials, and continuous comparisons to explore new production techniques, and a special ceramic mold was designed that allowed for the pressing of a bas-relief structure.

"Glint Variations are like several works in one - there is no precise dimension. Being modular, the different pieces can be assembled together, arriving at a scale, if you like, immersive," says Quayola. "Glint is an object with a static geometry, of course, but its level of light reflection and geometric complexity mean that it can create very different light effects. It is an object that you cannot capture well, it changes shape and appearance depending on the light conditions and the point of view from which you observe it, and this is what makes it special in my opinion."

"It was an interesting synergy," he adds. "On one hand, my slightly naive and dreamy approach, and on the other, their ambition to go beyond the limits and succeed in finding solutions that could generate this result."