Juried exhibition of stained glass set to open in June in Chicago — Washington D.C. in July

FILED UNDER: Announcements, Exhibition, Opening

“American Glass Now: 2016, ” a juried contemporary stained glass exhibition organized by the American Glass Guild will take place in two venues this summer. From June 17th to July 11th, the Logan Center for the Arts at the University of Chicago will host the fifth annual survey show, which will then move to the Washington National Cathedral, where it will be on view from July 17th through September 28th. A reception for the artists will be held in Chicago on Friday, July 8th, from 7 PM to 9 PM, with the date and time of a similar Washington D.C. reception yet to be determined.

Thursday April 14, 2016 | by Andrew Page

OPENING: Tacoma youth share personal stories through glass works inspired by Bangladeshi textiles

FILED UNDER: Exhibition, New Work, Opening

"Common Threads: A Glass Exploration of Kantha Embroidery" is the title of a new installation by Hilltop Artists students. An opening reception will take place at the W.W. Seymour Botanical Conservatory in Tacoma’s Wright Park tomorrow evening, April 15th. Kantha embroidery is a textile artform from South Asia that Hilltop Artists students learned about when Cathy Stevulak and Leonard Hill, co-producers of the documentary film Threads, visited the program to discuss their film, which profiles a self-taught artist who trained poor women in Bangladesh to translate their life experiences into Kantha. The Hilltop Artists students were encourage to translate what they learned into allegorical works of glass art.

Wednesday April 6, 2016 | by Andrew Page

Rethinking the Littleton myth, Koen Vanderstukken explores alternate glass-art histories in new book

FILED UNDER: Announcements, Book Report, News

The head of the glass studio at Sheridan College in Ontario, Canada, Koen Vanderstukken was driven by curiosity to delve deeper into the evolution of glass as an art medium than the concise story that Harvey Littleton was singlehandedly responsible. This inquiry, which he undertook in 2008, led him to ponder the intrinsic complexity of the material of glass that drew artists such as Larry Bell and Robert Smithson who had little connection to the Studio Glass movement as led by Littleton, and evolved into a book project. (Disclosure: GLASS is planning to run an excerpt from Vanderstukken's new book in the Fall 2016 edition. Also, editor Andrew Page is the author of an essay that appeared in a Black Dog Publishing book.) Taking notes, researching, and writing, on his own time, he has completed the manuscript and sourced images to illustrate his points. The 288-page book is scheduled to be published in September 2016 in partnership with U.K.-based Black Dog Publishing but Vanderstukken needs to finance half the printing costs, and has turned to crowd-sourcing, where in less than 24 hours, he's raised 20-percent of his goal of $15,000 US. The GLASS Quarterly Hot Sheet spoke with Vanderstukken about the book project and his fundraising initiative. Excerpts from our telephone interview below:

Tuesday April 5, 2016 | by Andrew Page

OPENING: Glass designed by masters of Viennese Modernism at Le Stanze del Vetro

FILED UNDER: Announcements, Design, Exhibition, Museums, Opening

On April 18th, a new exhibition entitled "Glass of the Architects. Vienna 1900-1937," organized by Le Stanze del Vetro, will open at this center of glass scholarship and exhibition in Venice, Italy. With the cooperation of the MAK — Museum of Applied Arts in Vienna, Austria, Le Stanze has assembled key works in glass designed by seminal architects and designers of a unique era of innovation including Josef Hoffman, Koloman Moser, Joseph Maria Olbrich, Leopold Bauer, Otto Prutscher, Oskar Strnad, Oswald Haerdtl, and Adolf Loos. Running through July 31, 2016, the exhibition, which is curated by MAK curator Rainald Franz, includes more than 300 individual works notable for their embodiment of the period's restless search for new form that marked the turn of the 20th century through the escalating conflicts that led to World War II. Even before this movement was labeled "Modernism," there was a widespread feeling that established styles were out of date and something new was needed.

Tuesday April 5, 2016 | by Andrew Page

HELP WANTED: North Lands seeks chief executive to run glass center

FILED UNDER: Announcements, Help Wanted

North Lands Creative Glass, the center for glass art on the northeast coast of Scotland, has announced a search for a chief executive. Reporting to the board of directors, the successful candidate will be responsible for this Caithness, Scotland, not-for-profit's overall strategy and development, managing and maintaining its finances, and fundraising. Working with the part-time artistic director of North Lands, the chief executive will be responsible for the organization and management of the well-known master classes, conference, and residency program.

Tuesday March 29, 2016 | by Andrew Page

OPENING: Annual tea pot exhibition in Pittsburgh set to debut Friday

FILED UNDER: Announcements, Exhibition, Opening

For the tenth year running, Morgan Contemporary Glass Gallery will host its annual teapot invitational exhibition, an event celebrating the timeless form as interpreted by contemporary artists working in craft media including glass. Opening this Friday, April 1st, and running through May 28th, the "teapots!" exhibit will feature more than 60 artists working in ceramics, fiber, metal, wood, and glass. For those who follow the show, many glass artists reappear with further meditations on the form.

Thursday March 24, 2016 | by Andrew Page

EXHIBITION: Recent RISD MFA grad has solo exhibition in New York City embassy

FILED UNDER: Announcements, Exhibition, New Work

Phillippines-born artist Christina "Goldie" Poblador is currently exhibiting a multi-media interactive installation at the Phillippine Center Gallery, her first solo exhibition in New York City. Running through April 15, 2016, the exhibition entitled "Venus Freed" uses interactive blown glass objects, flowers, and found materials to examine the Philippine myth of the ylang ylang, a distinctly shaped and scented flower used in many perfume formulations but rarely identified or sourced from the Phillippines. Earning her MFA in glass from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2015 Poblador finds rich metaphoric associations in the complex Colonial history of her native country, and employ the unique scent and shape of this distinctive and mythic flower as an object specific resonance for the exploitation of Phillippine women.

April Surgent, Boathouse, 2014. Fused glass, cameo-carved.

Tuesday March 22, 2016 | by managingeditor@glassquarterly.com

OPENING: To celebrate 10th anniversary of the TMA Glass Pavilion, a survey show

FILED UNDER: Announcements, Architecture, Exhibition, Museums, News, Opening

To celebrate that 10th year since its Glass Pavilion opened, the Toledo Museum of Art will survey Studio Glass with a new exhibit opening in April. "Hot Spot: Contemporary Glass from Private Collections" will be on view in the exhibition gallery of the Glass Pavilion from April 15th through September 18th, 2016, and will feature work from North American, Asian, Australian, and European artists. Since it opened in 2006, the 74,000-square-foot Glass Pavilion has housed not only glass exhibitions, but artist studios, demonstration areas, and special museum events. The new building across the street from the historic art museum was ground-breaking in its use of glass not only for exterior walls, but for interior walls as well. Designed by the Pritzker-Prize winning architecture firm of SANAA, Ltd., the unique structure was chosen for its light imprint on the park it occupies, as well as an architectural marvel that celebrates a material so connected to the institution founded in 1901 by industrial glass magnate Edward Drummond Libbey, whose Libbey corporation continues to operate in the city of Toledo.

Preston Singletary, Journey Across the Fire, 2016. H 28 in. courtesy: traver gallery

Monday March 21, 2016 | by Andrew Page

OPENING: Preston Singletary to debut new work at “Journey across the fire” exhibition

FILED UNDER: Announcements, Exhibition, New Work, Opening

Opening April 7th, and running through the end of the month at Traver Gallery in Seattle, a new exhibition by Preston Singletary will unveil new forms that marry traditional Northwest Coast Native American imagery with new glass shapes. Entited "Journey Through the Fire (and in to the World)," the exhibition's work employs Modernist vessel forms as three-dimensional canvases for the artist's ongoing study of Native American iconography — specifically Tlingit Formline art.

Tuesday March 15, 2016 | by Andrew Page

OPENING: Corning to exhibit the lesser-known invertebrate sculptures by the Blaschkas

FILED UNDER: Announcements, Exhibition, Museums, News

The father-and-son team of Leopold and Rudolf Blaschka, famous for their lampworked glass flowers that make up the Ware Collection at Harvard, were better known in their day for their models of sea creatures. While their flowers are what gives them the most contemporary attention, such as the recent "Lifeforms" exhibition of realistic work at Pittsburgh Glass Center in which the German model-makers are cited as inspiration for a juried show, a new exhibition opening in May at The Corning Museum of Glass will put the focus on their models of sea creatures. More than 70 Blaschka invertebrate sea creatures, drawn mostly from the collection of the Cornell University Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, will be on view, as well as numerous drawings and instruments used to craft these finely detailed objects.

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