In this time line I pull quotes to illustrate a thread in popular and scholarly writing and criticism about glass. Here we will see current glass artists defending their art against the accusations and separating themselves from these stereotypes and, hopefully, find out how and where the now-common opinion was born. Fundamentally, the general thesis seems to be born of the question, What Is Art? This question I will leave to others to answer, here I am only documenting the written history of a popular way of thinking and a popular taste.
1995 Matthew Kangas:
"David Hickey, the winner of this year's College Art Association-Frank Jewett Mather award for art criticism, gave the keynote address, "Glass and the Beauty Thing." Alternatively rambling and humorous, with flashes of verbal brilliance, Hickey did his best to stake out his position vis-a-vis glass, beauty, and the status of American craft within the art world...Hickey went on to praise glass as a metaphor or emblem of civilization: it survives or is broken. He drew on its ties to the Age of Reason: it is 'reflective' and 'translucent' like Enlightenment throught and other 18th century landmarks using glass, such as the Salle des Glaces at Versailles and the windowlike view into Chardin's paintings of domestic interiors.
Concluding, Hickey restated a point made by many art critics who flirt with glass but are unwilling to commit to a real love affair: why have the crafts abandoned function at the very time when the fine arts have gone over to the vessel and the functional-appearing object? Ever since Duchamp signed a urinal and called it a 'readymade', function has had a siren-call effect on the fine arts. Picasso stressed found fucntional objects and was followed decades later by furniture sculptors Scott Burton and Richard Artschwager, minimalist Donald Judd's sculptures in the form of tables (tables in the form of sculptures?), and Rober Gobner, who proved that everything included the kitchen sink can be considered art.
At this point, Hickey's analogy of the 'craft world' and 'art world' passing like 'ships in the night--in opposite directions, to and away from function'--did not hold water. Could he have missed, through lack of exposure and research, the truth that craft materials have always had a tandem tradition of functional and nonfunctional art, right up through the 20th century? Why must the art world always relegate craft to pure function?
Regardless, by taking glass seriously and responding so articulately, Hickey raised the ante for other art critics who may have resisted the idea of glass art, let alone the idea of beauty."
American Craft. "Contemporary Glass: Seduction vs. Intellect." Kangas, Matthew. p. 10. October/November 1995.
1995 Robin Updike:
"Seattle art galleries have opened the new year with gusto, mounting shows of strong new work by established artists as well as some intriguing works by promising younger artists.
Also worth noting is that of the several major shows up this month, three are by artists who work in glass, wood or clay. While the discussion of art versus craft still is regularly aired in art circles, it's clear that the choice of materials has for some time not been a meaningful method of distinguishing art from craft. And judging from the well-heeled crowd at several of this month's openings, collectors are more interested in the ideas presented in the works, and by the aesthetics of their execution, than in an academic debate over the nature of art. (Unless otherwise noted, all shows are on view through the end of the month.)
The biggest crowd-pleaser is the dramatic show by glass artist William Morris at Foster/White Gallery. Morris, long associated with Pilchuck Glass School, is one of the luminaries of the international art glass scene. A former assistant to Dale Chihuly, he has been recognized as an accomplished artist in his own right since the late '80s. Several of his works are in the permanent collection of New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art, and he was recently awarded a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts.
His new exhibit, which includes some pieces at Foster/White's Kirkland location, is a continuation of his paleolithic series of pseudo-cave drawings on vessels, and bones, bodily organs and crude tools suspended from caveman-style frames. A new form is a sculpture he calls "Narwhal Tusks," a striking arrangement of long, slightly gnarled, twisted glass "tusks" leaning against one another like the frame of a tepee.
Most of the work was done last year or in the first few days of this year, and it's obvious that Morris has not run out of tantalizing ways to explore his fascination with petroglyphs, ancient rocks and shards, and the mysteries of pre-historic aesthetics."
Updike, R. "Art In The Craft: Galleries Open '95 On A Strong Note." The Seattle Times. January 17, 1995. http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=19950117&slug=2099758
1995 Robin Rice:
"In his second resident fellowship at the Creative Glass Center of America in Spring 2004, Dave Walters focused on two bodies of work. One was a continuation of his long-term interest in graphic images on blown glass vessels. The other was more sculptural and kinetic, incorporating elements from several media in addition to glass. These latter works sometimes resemble deconstructed human bodies. Glass brains, livers or stomachs hang like the elements of a wind chime—or a marionette, though not in a way which literally reproduces anatomic relationships. On occasion, these obliquely human, mobile elements are mounted on or in an openwork structure of forged steel.
Walters, who has worked as a gaffer for such luminaries as Dale Chihuly and Lino Tagliapietra, is able to blow glass into any form he desires to realize his designs. Some elements of his kinetic works have the thin walls and mathematical precision of scientific equipment. They endow mysterious apparatuses with a kind of scientific authority consistent with the bilateral symmetry of biological or organic forms organized into mechanical almost robotic systems. Are these objects pseudo-sentient? Elaborate experiments? Charicatures of research fashion?
Walters produces a line of functional glass; however, he is best known for unique vessels enameled with detailed narrative drawings which reflect his print-making background. Mythological and biblical stories provide material for imagery which he refocuses through a very personal prism. There are clear relationships between Walter’s work and that of printmakers like Albrecht Dürer or the more expressive William Blake, but two-dimesnional work on vessels also has strong links to the tradition of Greek vase painers. Another significant influence seems to be early Christian or Byzantine painting and mosaics, in which the surviving Roman tradition has evolved into a powerful linear emotional expression.
The Greek vase-painters depicted stories of the gods in limited colors. They and Byzantine mosaicists and other historic illustrators included text as Walters often does. The stories Walters tells, though, often take a grotesque and surreal turn which has earned him the soubriquet of “The male Judith Schaechter” (the much admired stained-glass artist with a propensity for depicting suffering, torture, and bloodshed). Unlike Schaechter, Walters works primarily with black and white and an occasional accent color.
He wanted to put most of his energy at CGCA into glass blowing: making vessels to be decorated with enamels which are applied and removed by scrafitto (scratching away) or sand-blasted after being fired. Combining additive and subtractive methods allows him to great freedom. However, while still at Wheaton, he could not resist experimenting with a recently acquired a pen which gives him a great deal control for stippling.
Walters designs vessels for specific images. He is working on ideas growing out of traditional children’s stories. “I find they are rich with possibilities and take me back to my own childhood—the monster under the bed.” He planned specific shapes to go with specific illustrations. For an Alice and Wonderland Tea Party, from a projected “Alice in Wonderland Series,” he planned a trophy-like representation of the “Drink Me” bottle topped with a tea pot.
His hammer-wielding Humpty Dumpty will be self-destructive, with only a broken, teetering ladder for rescue. “I like a tenuous relationship,” Walters admits. Buildings in his drawings are supported on thin stems; they “look solid but are only as permanent as what’s beneath.” Additional subjects proposed for the fairy tale series include Jack and the Beanstalk, Hansel and Gretel, and Rumpelstiltskin.
This artist brings his very impressive technical skills to bear on dark but archetypal subject matter. It will be interesting to see how—or if—he resolves his vision of the human body depicted in his kinetic works as a mechanistic, perhaps Cartesian entity with his more psychoanalytic graphic vision of the psyche."
1995 William Warmus:
The essay "The End?" reprinted in it's entirety. It can be found at William Warmus's website: http://www.warmus.us/ "Studio glass has its beginning and end in America, where the present situation offers opportunities in two directions. Looking back, historians have an obligation to write the history of studio glass and establish its key figures, its first wave. Looking to the future, artists have the opportunity to incorporate the technical legacy of studio glass into new narratives.
Most art movements last only a generation and the styles grouped together under the term studio glass are not exempt. Exceptional is the fact that new waves of studio glassmakers and collectors often behave as if their world will continue to evolve at the rapid pace set by the early innovators. This leads to the marketing of “innovations” that repeat, sometimes unknowingly, the early successes of the first wave. The terrain of studio glass is only now being charted, its circumference and boundaries measured, our susceptibility to imitations lessened. Criticism of glass exists, but is sporadic and tends to be published in specialized journals. We need forceful criticism as a gauge of originality and corrective to excesses, whether of taste, price, or commercialism. Forget the endlessly distracting quarrels over “Is it Art?” We need critics and historians to engage in the debates from which consensus will emerge about the key artists and objects of the studio glass era, even if some turn out to be industrial designers, some objects made by production studios. And we desperately need critics who will generously champion and defend the individuals they support.
The market for studio glass matured from roughly 1979-1989, led by legendary dealers, notably Ferdinand Hampson and Douglas Heller, who in many ways took the place of art critics as promoters of the “new glass”. In my mind, the key innovation in this market was the development of a close knit and highly involved community of collectors on a national (not regional) scale, unlike anything in the artworld, who for many reasons found that they enjoyed each other’s company, enjoyed taking glassblowing lessons, founding philanthropic societies to support emerging artists, etc.. Many were couples who collected as a means of enhancing a relationship, and many collectors were successful business people who brought a benignly competitive approach to acquiring studio glass.
Since 1990, stagnation has been evident. Many of the founding collectors have built large, mature collections and consequently are less active. Impersonal forces, primarily discounting and studio sales, drive the nineties market and have taken the lead away from pro-active dealers and collectors: who are the new Hampsons, Hellers and Saxes of the nineties? What are the bold moves, such as opening a gallery in SoHo or energizing a major art museum (Toledo) to renew its support for contemporary glass? There are certainly signs of optimism, as some members of the new generation of studio glassmakers have been able to raise their prices by showing in a fine arts context where prices are traditionally higher. But should we be optimistic that the studio glass community and market is increasingly driven by external forces, and no longer by its own internal momentum, which now seems dissipated?
Will another 2,000 years be required before the word new can again be applied to glass making? The confused and incomplete styles of art we see emerging from glass studios today are indicative of experimental, transitional, rococo and mannerist work that, in moving away from studio glass traditions, has yet to establish its own identity. Some of the best work has simply taken its place in the art world in general and is unrecognizable as studio glass: Christopher Wilmarth, never a studio glassmaker, led the way in this direction.
Despite the success of Duchamp’s “Large Glass,” glass as a material for art has never been comfortable in association with the avant-garde or its pathological successors (even Galle, the sickliest of glassmakers, asserted the vitality of nature through his symbolism). Art glass that imitates the look and actions of the avant-garde appears immature and kitschy or stale and pompous. Maybe glass is too inherently healthy, glassmakers too accepting of diversity, to fully participate in the current art scene. Tiffany and Galle may yet emerge as more central to glass than Duchamp or neo-expressionism.
Perhaps the most promising glassmakers are now renovating venerable glassmaking traditions by producing vessels and figures within a narrative art that has links to traditional storytelling. Maybe the word renovation will come to replace the word deconstruction as a mantra for the nineties. The interest in narration, in narrative art, is significant for renovation: retelling is a means of renewal. Narration promises to be the tool that is added to the “technical” tools developed by studio glassmakers over the last 30-odd years, a tool that is necessary for retrieving lost legacies and for opening up future horizons. As Paul Ricoeur, the essential philosopher of narrative, wrote: “Making and narrating have become the two sides of one process.”
Today, making glass and narrating are the two sides of one process. Yet narrative studio glass should not be weakened by narrowing its definition to a sort of three-dimensional storytelling or by appropriating to itself the roles of painting and sculpture as documentarians of the pathological and the unhealthy. The role of narrative in glass, like the role of telescopes in astronomy, should be nothing less than the humanization of time and space, so that we can make a home in the expanding universe. This project promises to establish for glass a role independent from the other arts.
William Warmus
Ithaca
June, 1995
This essay appeared in Glass magazine, Autumn, 1995. It was reprinted in Glashelder, #5, January 1996. Precursors have appeared in Design Visions, the exhibition catalog for the Australian Crafts Triennial, 1992, where I am grateful to Robert Bell for his encouragement, and in an exhibition catalog for the New Jersey Center for the Visual Arts earlier in 1992. Lost Legacies Salvaged: In the Aftermath of Studio Glass was published in Glasswork magazine in Japan in 1993, with the support of Koji Matano. The quote from Littleton is from a letter to the author dated August 26, 1993. For those who would question the role of the factory in the development of studio glass, I suggest they consider the definition of a factory in Webster’s Unabridged: “an establishment for the manufacture of goods” where manufacture means to make “by hand, or especially, by machinery.” For those interested in approaches to studio glass as a community, I suggest New Communitarian Thinking edited by Amitai, Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1995."
