Erwin Eisch Glass Head-Inward Gaze, 2000 Blown in mold, manipulated while hot, with enamel decoration 18 5/8 x 11 3/4 x 10 3/4" Barry Friedman Ltd., New York, NY Sold at SOFA CHICAGO 2004

ERWIN EISCH

Erwin Eisch is considered the “father” of European Studio Glass.  In 1962, the same year the American Studio Glass Movement began in Toledo, Ohio, Eisch (b. 1927) met Harvey Littleton.  Eisch had been making his own glass sculpture for several years in his family’s factory in Germany.  For Littleton, Eisch was a revelation.  In an interview conducted by the Archives of American Art in 2001, Littleton said, "Erwin Eisch was absolutely unique. And he wanted to be an artist. He had no limitations.... I saw his work and I realized that he was doing what I wanted to do—play with the glass, to make forms that had no other reason for being than that he wanted to make them. Function was something to be used or not used. Totally free. Free with glass." ^I Eisch lives in Germany and his freely blown, poetic and often wonderfully bizarre works reside in many of the world’s finest museums and private collections.

Howard Ben Tre First Vase, 1989 Cast-glass 43 7/8" x 55 3/4" Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of the James Renwick Alliance

HOWARD BEN TRE

Often compared to Constantin Brancusi and Isamu Noguchi, Ben Tre is widely regarded as a pioneer in the use of cast glass as a sculptural medium.  A master technician in industrial manufacturing, Ben Tré decided to make sculptural forms using traditional glass molding techniques.  Critic and scholar, Arthur C. Danto said, “His body of work which began by celebrating the machinery and the dignity of industrial labor, has evolved into a tribute to forms of life more primitive than our own by far, based on spirituality and ritual, and for whom no fitter emblem can be imagined than the translucent substance of which its structures are made.” ^II The recipient of many awards, including three NEA Fellowships, Ben Tre’s work is in numerous private and public collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; and The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto, Japan, among others.

Michael Glancy [American, b. 1950] Lapis Star X, 1982 Blown glass, industrial plate glass, and copper 7 x 8 x 8" Barry Friedman Ltd., New York, NY

MICHAEL GLANCY

Glancy began working with glass in 1970, and studied with Dale Chihuly in the mid 70s at Rhode Island School of Design (RISD).  Drawn to the plasticity of glass in its cold state and an equal love of metals and physics, Glancy is world-renowned for his Byzantine compositions of raised glass, metal grooves and grids, and copper-spattered, landscape bases. ^III His work is the permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, The Corning Museum of Glass, and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.  Glancy is Adjunct Faculty in the Jewelry and Metalsmithing Department at RISD.

Marvin Lipofsky Bezalel Group #2, 2005 Glass - Blown at Bezalel Academy of Art & Design, Jerusalem, Israel with help from Boris Shpeizman, Miri Greenson and students of the Academy 11 x 14 x 13" Photo: M. Lee Fatheree Holsten Galleries, Stockbridge, MA

MARVIN LIPOFSKY

Lipofsky earned his MFA in Sculpture from the University of Madison, Wisconsin, where he was one of Harvey Littleton's first graduate students working in glass.  He went on to introduce glass as an art form into the Design Department of the University of California at Berkeley, and to found and head the glass program at California College of the Arts.  The recipient of numerous international awards, his work can be found in many collections, including the Museum of Arts & Design, New York, The Corning Museum of Glass, National Museum of Modern Art in Kyoto, Japan, and the Stedelijke Museum in Amsterdam.  Lipofsky is also represented at SOFA NEW YORK by Holsten Galleries, Stockbridge, MA.

Joel Philip Myers Dr. Zharkov's Silver, 1971 Blown glass with applied elements 22 3/8 x 8" Barry Friedman Ltd., New York, NY

JOEL PHILIPS MYERS

A Professor Emeritus from Illinois State University, Myers established the studio glass program there in 1970.  He lives and works in Pennsylvania and Denmark.  In 1963, Myers became director of design at the Blenko Glass Factory in Milton, West Virginia, where he freely experimented with new processes, form, and concepts. A central figure in the American Studio Glass Movement, his career has been marked by a fervent independence and exploration of shape, color and texture in glass.^IV  His works are in the permanent collections of Musée Des Arts Decoratifs, Paris; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Los Angeles County Art Museum, and many more.

Richard Meitner A Hemispheric Question, 2003 Blown and enameled glass, carved wood, book, paint 16.5 x 9.5 x 6.5" Photo: Ron Zijlstra Galleri Caterina Tognon, Bergamo & Venice, Italy Sold at SOFA CHICAGO 2003

RICHARD MEITNER

American born, Richard Meitner lives and works in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.  As well as teaching at Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam for 19 years, he has taught at universities and in workshops throughout the US, Europe and Japan.  Meitner’s highly intellectual and ever evolving work reflects a variety of influences and ideas—from Japanese and Italian artwork to that of science, animals, age and decay; often clear surfaces are covered with mixed materials such as rust, enamel, bronze, tile, paint and print.  His conceptually groundbreaking work in glass is in more than 40 public
collections. ^V

Tina Oldknow Curator of Modern Glass Corning Museum of Glass Corning, New York

TINA OLDKNOW

Moderator of the Emergence panel, Oldknow has been the Curator of Modern Glass since 2000 for The Corning Museum of Glass, Corning, New York, and is responsible for all curatorial aspects of the glass collections from 1900 to the present.  During her time at The Corning Museum, Oldknow has reinstalled the Modern Glass Gallery and the Sculpture Gallery, and has curated eight exhibitions. Her most recent, with organizer Helmut Ricke of the museum kunst palast in Düsseldorf, Germany, is "Design in an Age of Adversity: Czech Glass, 1945-1980." Other recent curated exhibitions include "Czech Glass Now: Contemporary Sculpture, 1970-2004,"  "The Italian Influence in Contemporary Glass" and "Decades in Glass: The '60s."  Prior to joining the Corning Museum, Oldknow held curatorial and advisory positions at several museums on the West Coast, including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, where she was a curator for eight years, the J. Paul Getty Museum, the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, the Henry Art Gallery at the University of Washington, and the Seattle Art Museum.

Tom Patti Compacted Red Echo with Green, 1992-93 Fused, hand-shaped, ground and polished glass Photo: George Erml Heller Gallery, New York, NY Sold at SOFA CHICAGO 2003

TOM PATTI

In the 1970s, Patti explored the sculptural potential of glass, pioneering the use of architectural and industrial glass. His early works were non-functional objects that could be held in the hand and studied— experiments where the viewer was on the "outside looking into" the glass. Since the 1980s, Patti has continued to refine his artistic and technical skills, creating small, sculptural works that are at once geometric and ethereal. ^VI His work is in the permanent collections of many world museums including The Art Institute of Chicago; Corning Museum of Glass; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York ; Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris; Museum of Modern Art, New York; and Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

Toots Zynsky Equatorial Chaos, 2003 Fused and Thermo-formed glass threads Barry Friedman Ltd., New York, NY Sold at SOFA NEW YORK 2003

TOOTS ZYNSKY

Toots Zynsky was seminal in establishing the renowned Pilchuck Glass School in 1971 and the second New York Experimental Glass Workshop (now UrbanGlass) in New York.  A Rhode Island School of Design graduate, Zynsky developed the technique of filet-de-verre (fused and thermo-formed glass threads), by which she creates her renowned colorful vessel forms. She was the first contemporary glass artist to have a piece directly commissioned by the Museum of Modern Art, New York.  Recent acquisitions include the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and the Koganezaki Glass Museum in Japan.  After living in Europe for 16 years, Zynsky divides her time between her studios in Providence, Rhode Island and Amsterdam, The Netherlands.