Category: Glass Page 1 of 2

Breaking the Mold, installation, and all images are courtesy of the Flint Institute of Arts.

Whenever I visit the Flint Institute of Arts, I always leave feeling that the FIA is a seriously under-hyped museum, not just because of the strength of its collection but also because its galleries are just downright cool spaces, each varied and perfectly suited for the time period and style of the artwork they contain.  A major expansion in 2018 added to these galleries a chic and suitably contemporary space to showcase the museum’s collection of modern and contemporary glass. Until April 2, many of these glass works join forces in the Harris-Burger Gallery (also a relatively new addition) with works pulled from storage to offer a visual survey, European Cast Glass, offering viewers an intimate single-room micro-exhibit that hints at the diversity and the surprisingly subversive beauty of the medium.

It’s a show entirely of European cast glass, offering a truncated survey of the medium while suggesting its enduring relevance. The method of using a mold to cast glass dates back to the 15^th century BC, long predating the development of blown glass, a first-century innovation. The 20^th century brought about a Renaissance of glassmaking in Europe, fueled by artists who began their careers in manufacturing but broke away from commercial glassmaking and focused instead on glassmaking as fine art.

Petr Hora, Czech, born 1949, Hadros, 2006. Cast and acid-polished glass 18 3/4 × 15 1/2 × 4 3/4 in. (47.6 × 39.4 × 12.1 cm). Courtesy of the Isabel Foundation. L2017.59. Photo Credit: Douglas Schaible Photography.

Vladimira Klumpar Czech, born 1954. After Rain, 2007, Cast glass. 33 3/4 × 23 1/2 × 8 3/4 in. (85.7 × 59.7 × 22.2 cm). Courtesy of the Isabel Foundation. L2017.67. Photo Credit: Douglas Schaible Photography.

Most of these works are abstract or non-representational, but not all. North Sea Waves by Slovakian artist Zora Palová is a vertically oriented column of gently undulating waves of glass. Unlike many of the works in the exhibit, which have clean, crisp lines, North Sea Waves has a very textural, rough surface, revealing the hand of the artist. In her choice of dark violet and white, Palová wanted to mimic the color of crashing waves of the North Sea, and in this work, she presents us with a seascape playfully flipped on its axis (having lived for a while in St. Andrews, Scotland, I can vouch with Palová that the North Sea can certainly get dark, and moody).

Many of these artists were simply exploring the capabilities of color, shape, light, and form, and their works seem largely the result of play and experimentation. The organic appearance of Vladimira Klumpar’s After Rain is delightful, vaguely organic in form, reminiscent of some kind of otherworldly plant gently bending from the weight of droplets of liquid glass. And the vertically ascending triangles of Vladimir Bachorik’s Escalation, to me anyway, read almost as an inverted stack of highly abstract nesting dolls.    Depending on the thickness or thinness of the glass, the color of these abstract works can alternate between rich and opaque or thin and translucent.

But some of the works in this exhibit are charged with surprising social and political relevance.  Stanislav Libenský and his wife Jaroslava Brychtová are both represented in this exhibit with several works. Heavily influenced by Cubism and Constructivism, their work stood as a subtle foil to the government-sanctioned Soviet-realist style so prevalent in Eastern Europe, something they had in common with other Czech artists. Together they innovated methods for casting monumental cast glass, and became renowned artists and teachers with an international following. Many of the artists in this show followed in their footsteps, and Sarah Kohn– the exhibition’s curator– likens this show to a sort of visual “family tree,” allowing us to see how these artists influenced each other.

Vladimir Bachorik Czech, born 1963, Escallation, 2005 Cast glass. 23 1/2 × 13 1/2 × 4 in. (59.7 × 34.3 × 10.2 cm). Courtesy of the Isabel Foundation. L2017.13. Photo Credit: Douglas Schaible Photography.

Stanislav Libenský Czech, 1921 – 2002 Horizon, 1992-2005 Cast glass, 33 × 43 × 11 1/2 in., 500 lb. (83.8 × 109.2 × 29.2 cm, 226.8 kg). Courtesy of the Isabel Foundation. L2017.74. Photo Credit: Douglas Schaible Photography.

Stanislav Libenský’s 3V Column, the exhibition’s literal centerpiece, was a direct response to Czechoslovakia’s Velvet Revolution, which Libenský witnessed firsthand from his studio window. The half-million protesters who in 1989 gathered in Wencelas Square and collectively brought an end to Communist one-party rule flashed their fingers in a Churchillian V Shape: a shape directly referenced by the horizontally oriented V-shaped cuts incised in three different places in the column. The column was previously displayed in the FIA’s glass gallery on a podium against a wall, but here it’s in the center of the gallery space, allowing viewers to appreciate it in 360 degrees, and view up close the thousands of minuscule air bubbles arrested within its form.

Breaking the Mold allows the FIA to flaunt highlights from its robust collection of glass art, including works previously in storage. It also re-presents the way some of these works are displayed, yielding a different viewer experience.  Even if the historical context or subject of a work of glass art is not readily apparent, glass still possesses an undeniable beauty that prevents it from being prohibitively esoteric; it’s art that anyone can enjoy. This is a small exhibit, so come for what it is, and while you’re there, explore the rest of the much underhyped spaces the FIA has to offer.

Breaking the Mold, installation image courtesy of the Flint Institute of Arts.

I want to thank the curator of this exhibition, Sarah Kohn, who was very generous with her time in discussing this exhibition with me, and fielding my many questions.

Breaking the Mold: European Cast Glass -October 29, 2022 – April 2, 2023, at the Flint Institute of Art.

Glass in Four Dimensions @ Flint Institute of Art in the Harris – Burger Gallery

Installation image – Glass in Four Dimensions, Image courtesy of Jonathan Rinck

When Albert Einstein advanced his general theory of relativity, he argued that there was a fourth dimension: spacetime.  According to theoretical physicists, spacetime has very physical properties: it can literally warp, bend, and even tear.  So can molten glass, of course, and the exhibition Glass in the Fourth Dimension, currently on view at the Flint Institute of Art through March 21, features a selection of glass works from the Studio Glass Movement (the 1960s through the present) which directly or indirectly speak to the concept of the fourth dimension.

The works in this single-gallery exhibition space collectively take playful liberties with the technicalities of what the fourth dimension actually is.  Some of these sculptures celebrate the intrinsic weirdness and plasticity of glass (itself described by some physicists as a “new state of matter”).  Others evoke Daliesque, other-worldly realms.  And some take a more literal approach, directly referencing both time and space.

Steven Weinberg, American, born 1954. Fluted Concentrics, 1995. Cast and cut optical crystal 7 3⁄4 x 7 13/16 x 7 13/16 inches. Courtesy of the Isabel Foundation, Photography by Douglas Schaible

Evocative of some sort of transcendent and other-worldly space, Steven Weinberg’s Fluted Concentrics, is a work of cast and cut optical crystal, inside which exists a set of abstract architectural forms.  Though Weinberg’s works are largely inspired by the forms of ancient Mayan architecture, here this little cubic micro-world seems suggestive of the counterintuitive universe of M.C. Escher.  Richard Ritter also gives us a sort of micro-world with his Florescence: Series #11, which visually reads almost like a sort of oversized petri dish, within which are emerging biomorphic, organic forms. And Czech artist Petr Hora’s Hadros visually reads like liquid suddenly arrested in time and space, its internal patterns (micro-bubbles that formed when the glass was molten) vaguely reminiscent of a Hubble image we might expect to see of the vaporous membranes of some deep-space nebula.

Petr Hora, Czech, born 1924. Hadros, 2006. Cast and acid-polished glass. 18 3⁄4 x 15 1⁄2 x 4 3⁄4 inches. Courtesy of the Isabel Foundation, Photography by Douglas Schaible

Some of these works subtly imply the passage of time through their form and structure, such as an ensemble of undulating Dale Chihuly bowls, which characteristically rest inside each other much like Russian Matryoshka dolls; the transition from small to large is suggestive of growth over time, or perhaps expanding ripples or sound waves.  Though Chihuly’s style couldn’t be more different, its effect responds well to Tom Patti’s Four Ringed Echo, a cuboid sculpture comprising layers of glass which contain a set of vertically stacked rings expanding upward and outward, again implying both time and movement, much like successive frames of stop-motion photography. Both works also directly speak to the ambiguity of the nature of glass, which straddles the boundary between liquid and solid.

But at its most literal, the fourth dimension is a reference to the interconnectedness of both space and time, and some of these works address this directly.  Admittedly, all sculpture does this to some degree.  A painting or photograph can be taken in by the viewer instantaneously, but sculpture exists in three-dimensional space, and must be appreciated in 360 degrees; the viewer must move around it, incorporating the element of time.  But unlike many traditional sculptures, here, largely because of the reflective nature of glass, these works surprisingly transform as we move around them.

Some of these sculptures do this in dramatic fashion.  Just take a look at Czech artist Bohumil Eliás Sr.’s Silent Inhabitant.  It’s a cuboid composite of layers of square plates of glass; when viewed from the side, it’s a mostly transparent cube.  But slowly move 90 degrees to the front, and a blue, three-dimensional floral form enclosed within suddenly materializes, the result of thin layers of paint applied by the artist on each successive layer of glass.  A similarly dramatic transformation occurs with Slovakian artist Yan Zoritchak’s Space Messenger. Here we find a wedge of relatively empty and transparent glass that suddenly fills with surprising and counterintuitive shapes, forms and colors as we move around it.

Yan Zoritchak, Slovakian, born 1944. Space Messenger, 2002. Cast glass with copper patina and gold leaf. 19 9/16 x 16 15/16 x 5 1/8 inches. Courtesy of the Isabel Foundation. Photography by Douglas Schaible

As for the theoretical physics behind Einstein’s revelations regarding spacetime, I’ll never understand them, though I do find the fourth dimension fascinating with the help of a good NOVA documentary. Glass in the Fourth Dimension, however, is both welcoming and accessible.  And much like the rest of the permanent works on view at the FIA, this exhibit makes abstract art enjoyable to those who might not generally consider themselves fans of abstract art.  There’s an undeniable craftsmanship and polish on display, and all these works are undeniably beautiful. Furthermore, the time-based element to this show emphatically makes the case that art is best viewed firsthand (and over time), and not just instantaneously as an image online or in a book– a compelling reason to come see this exhibition in person.

Glass in Four Dimensions @ Flint Institute of Arts through March 21,2021

A New State of Matter: Contemporary Glass at the At the Grand Rapids Art Museum

Norwood Viviano (American, b. 1972). Recasting Detroit, 2017. Kilncast glass, 3D printed pattern, and found object, 16.5” x 13.5” x 11”. Photo: Tim Thayer/Robert Hensleigh

Glass defies definition; it’s neither liquid nor solid, and as such it’s been described by physicists as “a new state of mater.” At the Grand Rapids Art Museum (GRAM), a visually dazzling exhibit of glass art makes the point that skilled artists can make this enigmatic mater look like pretty much anything.  Glass, A New State of Matter comprises work by an international body of nineteen artists who skillfully manipulate glass in concert with a diverse array of other media: wood, plants, and even  uranium.  The first major exhibition of glass art in the GRAM’s history, the show highlights the stunning versatility of glass, and however it’s used and in whatever form it assumes, the beauty of the physicality of the glass itself is always paramount.

Glass is an ancient substance, dating back to the ancient Egyptians of about 3,000 BC, but the overwhelming majority of the works on view are emphatically modern, and many were created with the aid of emerging technologies.   An ensemble of works by Norwood Viviano applies 3D printing in glass to render cityscapes of actual cities which also allude to their respective histories.   A 3D rendered map of Detroit, ground zero of the auto industry, has as its foundation a cast-glass automobile engine block.  And a map of Grand Rapids, bisected by the Grand River, rests atop a wooden table, an appropriate emblem for a city known for its historic 20^th Century contributions to the furniture industry.

Norwood Viviano (American, b. 1972). Recasting Grand Rapids, 2020. Kilncast glass, 3D printed pattern, and found object, 22 x 17 x 29 ½ inches. Photo: Tim Thayer/Robert Hensleigh

Addressing the 21^st century phenomenon of social media is Charlotte Potter’s Pending, a complex work which, when viewed straight on, assumes the form of something like a firework blast.  Hundreds of small glass cameo portraits burst out into the viewer’s space, dangling from wires affixed to the gallery wall.  It’s a work which visualizes the artist’s pending Facebook friend requests.  Potter rendered the profile pictures of each request in blue and white glass, colors reminiscent of a Victorian-era shell-cameo necklace or broach.  The length of the wire from which each cameo dangles corresponds to the number of mutual friends Potter shares with each individual.  Her rendering of Facebook profile pictures to look like shell-cameos works as subtle commentary on the often-airbrushed and fastidiously curated digital versions of ourselves that we tend to present on social media, which ultimately serve the same ennobling purpose as a Victorian-era cameo.

Charlotte Potter (American, b. 1981). Pending, 2014. Cameo engraved glass and metal, 156 x 360 x 96 inches. Courtesy of the artist and Heller Gallery, New York

Charlotte Potter (American, b. 1981). Pending, 2014. Cameo engraved glass and metal, 156 x 360 x 96 inches. Courtesy of the artist and Heller Gallery, New York

There’s a literal savage beauty in Etsuko Ichikawa’s luminous blue and green spherical orbs which glow in a dark corner of the gallery suite like little marbled earths.  The unlikely inspiration for Leaving a Legacy was the Fukushima nuclear disaster caused by the disastrous tsunami which struck Japan’s coast in 2011.  After learning that nuclear waste can be contained behind glass in a process called vitrification, Ichikawa created spherical orbs which contain (in every sense of the word) traces of uranium, which causes the orbs to eerily glow when lit by a black light, and they speak to the uneasy proximity with which we coexist today with nuclear energy and nuclear waste.

Etsuko Ichikawa (Japanese/American, b. 1963). Leaving a Legacy, 2017. Hot-sculpted uranium glass, 33 x 72 x 48 inches. Courtesy of the Artist and Winston Wächter Fine Art, Seattle

In contrast with some of the high-tech and ultra-modern works on view, April Surgent’s Portrait of an Iceberg comes across as an homage to traditional painting; her serene photo-realist work even takes the form of a triptych, which has deep roots in art history. Working from original photographs, Surgent meticulously engraves images of the natural world in glass, and her finished works are evocative of the painted blurry photographs of Gerhard Richter.  They’re beautiful, but they also gently speak to the need to restore wounded ecosystems and address climate change.  And her slow working method of engraving into glass is a performative act of defiance that pushes against the aggressively rapid pace of the digital age.

Flaunting the versatility and trompe l’oeil capability of glass, Tali Grinshpan’s Hope is a work that mimics with arresting believability the soft and paper-thin fabric of a Baroque-era ruff-collar.  Fragility is a recurrent motif in her work, and Tikun (To Mend)  comprises dozens of charred and crumpled brittle-looking vessels in varied states of ruin and (dis)repair.  Like a Mark Rothko painting, the work uses the language of abstraction to convey deep feeling, in this case, a meditation on the breaking and mending we inevitably experience in our lives.

Tali Grinshpan (Israeli/American, b. 1972). Hope from the series Of Innocence and Experience, 2016. Pâte de verre, 10 x 10 x 5 inches. Courtesy of the artist.

Tali Grinshpan (Israeli/American, b. 1972). Tikun (To Mend) from the series Rituals, 2016. Pâte de verre, 100 vessels, 3 x 3 x 3 inches each. Courtesy of the artist.

Complimenting Glass A New State of Matter is an auxiliary one-room micro-exhibition, Looking (at-into-through) Glass, featuring glass as it appears in works from the GRAM’s permanent collection.  Paintings and photographs reveal some of the varied and many ways artists use elements like windows, mirrors, and reflections in their work.  Bruce McCombs’ painting Ed’s Easy Diner is a watercolor tour de force which renders the shiny and reflective glass facade of a dive restaurant with the same exacting photorealist detail we might expect from a Richard Estes painting.  Also on view is Tir (from the Conversion series by Iranian artist Monir Shaharoudy Farmanfarmaian), which was recently purchased by the GRAM; the luminous arabesque patterns on this multifaceted geometric glass sculpture reflect shards of light into the gallery space much in the same way stained-glass windows diffuse light onto a cathedral floor.

Glass, A New State of Matter is a crowd-pleasing exhibition in the best possible sense.  It brings together an  eclectic and visually exuberant ensemble of international artists whose work addresses issues as varied as identity, environmentalism, PTSD, and even the Avian Flue (Rachel Moore’s rendering of surgical masks tarnished by their wearer’s breath has certainly accrued an uncanny  resonance and timeliness over the past several weeks).  The eclectic nature of this exhibit perhaps might initially seem to lack a specific point of focus, but that can easily be forgiven; after all, it’s ultimately the varied potential (and indeed the innate beauty) of glass that remains the whole point of the show in the first place.

Glass, A New State of Matter is on view at the GRAM until April 26.