OPENING: 50 years later, 1962 Toledo Workshop pieces come home as Studio Glass artifacts

Edith Franklin and Tom McGlauchlin, Vessels from the First Toledo Workshop, 1962. Blown # 475 Johns-Manville glass marbles. H (tallest vessel) 3 5/16 inches. collection: Toledo Museum of Art, left to right: Gift of Edith Franklin, 2011.110, 2011.109, 2011.108; Gift of Pat McGlauchlin, 2011.105; Gift of Edith Franklin, 2011.107. photo: richard goodbody

Following the artists’ residency it hosted earlier this year, the Toledo Museum of Art has announced its new exhibit “Color Ignited: Glass 1962-2012” in celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Studio Glass movement. The exhibit, which opens June 13th at the Glass Art Society conference kick-off, will feature works of world-renowned Studio Glass artists and, notably, seven vessels from that seminal March 1962 workshop.

With ten attendees and their respective backgrounds in ceramics/industrial design and glass making technology, workshop leader Harvey Littleton and technician Dominick Labino encountered some difficulties in their first attempts at studio glassblowing. As a result of inadequate annealing, little material evidence of these attempts survived, let alone been exhibited to the public.

In a prepared statement Museum director Brian Kennedy said, “Considering the historical importance of the Toledo Workshops, these pieces are rare relics of the humble beginnings from which the international Studio Glass Movement developed.” Indeed, the pieces are relics, both in import and appearance. Their rough shapes speak to how far Studio Glass had to go; as a whole, “Color Ignited” speaks to how far it has come.

The pieces, whose greenish tint is derived from Labino’s #475 Johns-Manville marbles, came to the Museum from two participants of the first workshop. Tom McGlauchlin, who passed away in 2011, became one of the more prominent faces of the Studio Glass movement. He instructed and influenced countless other glass artists at the University of Iowa and more notably at the University of Toldeo, in addition to producing work of his own. Two of the pieces were donated by his wife, Pat McGlauchlin.

The other five are from artist Edith Franklin, who at the time the workshop took place was already an exhibited artist in her own right. Though she continued to work in ceramics, her work has been called “strikingly similar” to that of Littleton and McGlauchlin.

“Color Ignited” will also include works by renowned Studio Glass-influenced artists Dale Chihuly, Dan Dailey, Laura de Santillana, Marvin Lipofsky, Heinz Mack, Klaus Moje, Yoichi Ohira, Ginny Ruffner, and Judith Schaechter.

—Isabella Webbe