Marco Toso Borella
Writing
MASTERS AND PAWNS
In his role as a writer and scholar, Marco Toso Borella has published historical essays, short stories, and novels, accompanying them with specially created graphic elements.
Among his most original and iconic creations is the collection of short stories inspired by the world of chess “Padroni e Pedine (scacchi a chi?)” Ed. Supernova 2005, a literary unicum in which each story features a protagonist who personifies a different chess piece dealing with an affair strictly interconnected with their characteristics as a “pawn” of the game. Story font, style, language: each story is a universe unto itself, a true literary “game.”
A theatrical performance was adapted from the volume, in which the author interprets the various stories that make up the work.
IMPOSSIBLE VENICE
Now in its third reprint, also translated into English and adapted into a film version, is the highly successful uchronia novel “Venezia impossibile 1989: il Serenissimo Principe fa sapere che…”, Ed. Supernova 2003.
This gripping uchronia novel is set in a Venice of an “alternative” 1989, in which the Serenissima Republic never fell and the Doge is a dictator. The protagonist is an investigator serving the Venetian State who finds himself investigating crimes concerning Murano.
The entire story is set in an urban context that presents itself to the reader exactly as the city must have been before the Napoleonic dominations, and therefore with its churches, palaces, and monasteries intact.
The volume is enriched with drawings specially created by the author depicting the reconstruction of some places where the story takes place, which are lost today.
A DICTIONARY ON MURANO FROM A TO Z
Marco Toso Borella has always collected, explored, and preserved the history of his island.
The Illustrated Encyclopedic Dictionary “Murano A-Z” is the work of a lifetime: a cyclopean task that spans everything related to the universe of Murano and its glass, a material understood as a natural consequence of its place of origin.
An artistic work and at the same time an in-depth historical-cultural study created by the master in the dual exceptional role of historical researcher and illustrator.
MURANO A-Z is an illustrated encyclopedic dictionary where all the elements that historically characterize the island are collected in strict alphabetical order to place it in its rightful position: History, Families, Sacred and Profane Buildings, Furnaces, Traditions... a gigantic work made of care, attention, and love, in search of the roots that have been sinking into this land for centuries, where glass is just one of the many fruits generated.
All illustrations and graphic reconstructions are created by the author.
A POLITICAL PAMPHLET ON VENICE IN THE TIME OF COVID
In 2020 he published “#FASEZERO. The Whole Truth about Venice in Nine Chapters” (Supernova ed.), a provocative and disenchanted political pamphlet on post-covid Venice.
A reflection – never dated – in 9 chapters on some of the unresolved issues of Venetian politics from the perspective of a citizen intellectual.
VIA CRUCIS: A GUIDE TO READING THE WORK
Installed since November 2016 in the Basilica of Saints Maria, Donato, and Cipriano in Murano, the Glass Via Crucis by Marco Toso Borella is a unique work in the world.
The work consists of 15 glass icons decorated “a graffito” on gold leaf and enamels depicting the 14 traditional stations of the Via Crucis plus a fifteenth.
The path of the Passion of Christ – from the condemnation to the crucifixion to the burial – is thus enriched by a final testimony, the most important in Christianity and the history of humanity: the Resurrection.
The volume created by the author contains all the keys to reading the work of art, both artistic and spiritual.
Guardian of the memories of Murano and Venice
His passion for studying sources and his activity as a historical analyst have led him to hold series of thematic conferences in collaboration with the Municipality of Venice and to publish essays and monographs such as Stemmi di Famiglie Muranesi, Lo Stemma della magnifica comunità di Murano…, and I Dossali di San Zuanne “…a percorrer la meraviglia”.
As an illustrator, he has collaborated on publications by famous Italian authors such as Le aventure de Pinochio a Venexia in venexian by Piero Zanotto, (Ed. Helvetia 2001), the novel Un elefante a Venezia by Luigi Rizzo (Ed. Helvetia 2002), and I muranesi nel settecento by Silvano Tagliapietra.
He is often engaged in conferences and public presentations in which he talks about the lost artistic and cultural heritage of Venice and in particular of Murano, such as the Scuola Grande San Giovanni Battista di Murano, which has disappeared today and of which only a few fragments remain.
