New Acquisitions 2016

South Africa, Japan, USA – and especially Australia! Talented artists from these far-off places exhibited award-winning works in Europe last year – reason enough for the Foundation to set off to experience these remarkable objects live in the hopes of enriching the collection with further multifaceted works of art.

Along the way, we noticed that artists from Australia are particularly well-represented on the European glass scene, perhaps because the history of glass art there traces its roots back to our own continent. The initial spark came in fact from the German artist Klaus Moje (1936–2016), who was summoned in 1982 to the School of Art at the Australian National University in Canberra to set up a study program for contemporary glass art. He rapidly succeeded in making glass a recognised artistic discipline in Australia. Today, many of his former students are enlivening the international glass art scene. One promising Australian newcomer is Marcel Hoogstad Hay, who works with traditional Venetian techniques and a fascinating spectrum of colours. Giles Bettison has long since made a name for himself in the art world. His beautifully crafted Murrini vessels follow in the tradition of Italian glass art while updating it with contemporary compositions that create unusual patterns.

Back home here in Lette, the appearance of our grounds has changed over the years, both outside the museum and in front of our glass depot, where H.-W. Horn’s float-glass sculpture “Spurensuche, I learn from disaster” has a commanding presence and glass objects titled “Flüchtigkeit des menschlichen Lebens” (Transience of Human Life) by Wladimir Rudolf seem to be suspended above the grass. Set before the museum, Torsten Rötzsch’s extraordinary installation “Valge” likewise proves that art and nature can converge almost magically.

Finally, we would like to draw your attention to two further exhibitions that we will be featuring following “New Acquisitions 2016”. In May we will present works by the legendary Polish artist Stanislaw Borowski, and in September we will welcome the new generation of students from the Belgian Instituut voor Kunst en Ambacht (IKA) in Mechelen.

We cordially invite you to treat yourself to some new encounters with the endlessly fascinating world of glass!

Photos:

Giles Bettison, Billett 09-6, 2009 – Photo AHH

Manuela Castro Martins, Impossible Jar I, 2012 – Photo Jorge Manuel Enes Soares

Yoshiko Okada, Three friends of winter – Bamboo, 2014 – Photo Ester Segarra

Vittoria Parrinello, The perimeter of air, 2014 – Photo Vittoria Parrinello