Submitted by the Museum of Glass
Museum of Glass is proud to present Chihuly Drawings. This new exhibition, organized across mediums—graphite, charcoal, and acrylic—will show work that directly represents the energy behind Dale Chihuly’s artistic process. He describes this energy as “spontaneous, fast, immediate,” and this thirty-five- year survey of over 180 drawings conveys this immediacy as never seen before. The excitement of Chihuly’s two-dimensional work is in its unpredictability and organic expressiveness—the same elements that distinguish the artist’s signature work in glass.
“We are thrilled to be the premiere venue for Chihuly Drawings,” states Susan Warner, Executive Director of Museum of Glass. “As Chihuly is a co-founder of the Museum, it is always wonderful to have the opportunity to have his work on view. Chihuly Drawings is a natural part of the Museum’s goal to explain the story of the Studio Glass movement as a part of contemporary art. We know visitors will be amazed by the work on display.”
Regarded in the art world as someone who has transcended the craft medium, the drawings show Chihuly’s evolution and range as an artist. Guest Curator Barry Rosen worked extensively with Chihuly to select the pieces for this exhibition.
An exhibition catalog featuring essays by Matthew Kangas and Nathan Kernan will also be available for purchase at the Museum Store.
Chihuly Drawings will be accompanied by an audio tour accessible to visitors with smartphones through the STQRY app, as well as docent-led tours of the exhibition and the Chihuly artwork in the Tacoma Museum District including the Chihuly Bridge of Glass.
The exhibit is sponsored by Wells Fargo and The Boeing Company.
Major Sponsors: The Ben B. Cheney Foundation and The Halvorson Family Fund, JoAnn McGrath Media Sponsors: KCTS 9 and CityArts
About Dale Chihuly
Born in 1941 in Tacoma, Washington, Dale Chihuly was introduced to glass while studying interior design at the University of Washington. After graduating in 1965, Chihuly enrolled in the first glass program in the country, at the University of Wisconsin. He continued his studies at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD),
where he later established the glass program and taught for more than a decade.
In 1968, after receiving a Fulbright Fellowship, he went to work at the Venini glass factory in Venice. There he observed the team approach to blowing glass, which is critical to the way he works today. In 1971, Chihuly cofounded Pilchuck Glass School in Washington State. With this international glass center, Chihuly has led the avant-garde in the development of glass as a fine art. His work is included in more than 200 museum collections worldwide. He has been the recipient of many awards, including twelve honorary doctorates and two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts.
Chihuly has created more than a dozen well-known series of works, among them, Cylinders and
Baskets in the 1970s; Seaforms, Macchia, Venetians, and Persians in the 1980s; Niijima Floats and Chandeliers in the 1990s; and Fiori in the 2000s. He is also celebrated for large architectural installations. In 1986, he was honored with a solo exhibition, Dale Chihuly objets de verre, at the Muse?e des Arts De?coratifs, Palais du Louvre, in Paris. In 1995, he began Chihuly Over Venice, for which he created sculptures at glass factories in Finland, Ireland, and Mexico, then installed them over the canals and piazzas of Venice.
In 1999, Chihuly started an ambitious exhibition, Chihuly in the Light of Jerusalem; more than 1 million visitors attended the Tower of David Museum to view his installations. In 2001, the Victoria and Albert Museum in London presented the exhibition Chihuly at the V&A. Chihuly’s lifelong fascination for glasshouses has grown into a series of exhibitions within botanical settings. His Garden Cycle began in 2001 at the Garfield Park Conservatory in Chicago. Chihuly exhibited at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, near London, in 2005. Other major exhibition venues include the de Young Museum in San Francisco, in 2008; the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, in 2011; and the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, in 2013. Chihuly Garden and Glass, a long-term exhibition, opened at Seattle Center in 2012.
