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Not only that the current exhibition in the Glass Museum Alter Hof Herding is conducted under this name, it also describes the concept of the renowned glass department of the Amsterdam Gerrit Rietveld Akademie, that enjoys a high reputation at international level and attracts young artists from all over the world.

Glass and the Rietveld Akademie are connected by a special common history: Since Sybren Valkema 1966 founded the glass department in the academy building, teachings and creation of arts have reciprocally influenced and fertilized themselves. Beyond doubt the role of the glass in the art has basically changed over the past 40 years. For a long period of time predominantly artists of the studio glass movement and the Free Design discovered the material, however, it has in the meantime found its way with all its possibilities and facets to the world of the „Fine Arts“. Besides other materials glass has also become a medium, an artistic concept to transform an idea and to visualize.

Glass as a visual medium? Just at this point the teachings start at the Rietveld Akademie: It wants to enable its students to bring their works in line with the complex demands of modern art and design. Therefore, the glass department of the Rietveld Akademie encourages an innovative, experimental and interdisciplinary use of the glass. Each student is facilitated in the process to unfold its special artistic and conceptual potential, to develop its own visual language and to reflect and challenge the work in context with the time in which we live. Glass is a difficult material so that technical skills and know-how must be acquired in order to work with it. The knowledge of material that every artist needs to materialize its concept and to create the artwork is presumed at the Rietveld Akademie.

The Foundation is delighted to present to you the works of 19 students and graduates of the glass department of the Amsterdam Rieiveld Akademie in the new exhibition „Jung, Frisch und Frei“. The young artists will be accompanied by Caroline Prisse, who has been running the glass department since 2003. The unusual free glass objects, sculptures and mixed-media installations are visualized stories, they bubble over freshness, unbiasedness, inventiveness and unexpected perspectives in the artistic community.

 

Photos:

Xandra Bremers, Morella, 2010 – Photo Paul Niessen

Frederic van Overschelde, Short stories – Trapped soul, 2008 – Photo Horst Kolberg

Sabrina Metselaar, o.T., 2010, Leihgabe Sabrina Metselaar – Photo Sabrina Metselaar

Mia Lerssi, Freedom belongs to the man who has the balls to take it, 2008, Leihgabe Mia Lerssi – Photo Alma Anselmi

Lamp glass – the somehow misleading sounding name epitomizes a special technology by which glass objects are shaped not on the furnace, but before the open flame of a gas burner as the so-called „Lamp“. Until the middle of the 19^th Century this was, in fact, an oil lamp that was provided with additional air.

Lamp glass is a very old technology with its origins going back to the ancient world. Traditionally, it is considered as an art of the small shape that enables to perfectly shape pearls, miniatures, decorations or small-size receptacles. Over the past years this type of glass has creatively been further developed by some artists and brought to completely new dimensions.

With free, plastic, partly also with big-size objects they have almost revolutionized lamp glass and opened up new possibilities for it in the modern art:

Mauro Bonaventura (*1965 in Venice) uses the nostalgic material Murano glass. He turns and rolls glass threads to spherical shapes until luminous, often spherical shapes, figures and details develop in luminous colors. The Israeli Dafna Kaffeman (*1972 in Jerusalem) also leaps over traditional techniques of the lamp work. She applies vast numbers of sharp glass thorns piece by piece on a silicon matrix: Her objects are fragile, vulnerable and also therefore extraordinarily attractive. Richard Meitner (*1949 in Philadelphia, USA) is one of the most successful artists who is being represented in the Ernsting collection since long. In his innovative, technically versatile work the „Allrounder“ living in Amsterdam has at all times also discovered and further developed the lamp glass for itself anew. He remains true to his style with humor and poetry. Steffen Orlowski (*1966 in Lauscha) plays in his works with the combination of two materials: He sets miniature figures cast from silver as protagonists in abstract spaces from glass. This interplay between abstraction and reality leads to scenarios that tell about feelings and relations. Olga Pusztay (*1958 in Hungary) works with lamp glass from the industry. For her filigree, permeable designed shapes and installations she forms glass tubes and small twigs to a harmonic unit: Symbol for relationship network between human beings and nature. The search for ease in a world full of dualism is the central theme for Nadja Recknagel (*1973 in Schmalkalden). Glass rods are „embroiled“ in the flame and set up netlike: Delicate and still extensive objects develop uniting light-heartedness and force.

 

Photos:

Mauro Bonaventura, The Human Condition, 2010 – Photo AHH

Steffen Orlowski, Erkenntnis, 2006 – Photo Steffen Orlowski

Nadja Recknagel, Beziehungsweise(n) 3, 2004 – Photo Horst Kolberg

Olga Pusztay, Tasche, 2008 – Photo Zoltan Szalai

Richard Meitner, Au Contraire!, 2010 – Photo AHH

Dafna Kaffeman, Wolf 03, 2004 – Photo Galerie Lorch + Seidel

“Glass is the only material that brings out color from the depth. I try to develop this third dimension of the color“ – Udo Zembok has been dedicating to this challenge since he started his artistic work with glass. His monumental sculptures and installations glow in intensive shades.

They develop from complex layers that optically merge like the colors and transcluent inks on a painter’s pallet. Light effects and the transitions between the colors generate depths in the glass objects in which color appears to materialize. His objects eradiate an almost transcendental force. They attract the viewer magnetically calling for a dialog. One wants to press into its deep interior and comprehend it, however, they remain incomprehensible and retain their last secrect for themselves.

Udo Zembok, born 1951 in Braunschweig, has been living since 1978 as freelance artist in France. After taking courses in graphic arts and painting he started working with the material glass for the first time in 1976. Orders followed very soon for public buildings and sacral buildings. Several times he was awarded international prizes for his work. He received, for instance, in 2003 the French State Prize for Art and Handicraft, 2006 the 2^nd prize during the award of Coburg glass prize.

Whether in the autonomous or in the applied arts Udo Zembok remains as an artist true to himself. He is a painter, he paints on glass and with glass and it enables him to paint with light and to generate a depth that is only possible with the medium glass. Like nobody else he understands to preserve his color and forming language at all levels of his work – an universal idea combines his free sculptures and architecture-related objects.

This special strong point makes him pathbreaking for other artists. For many years he has been teaching as a desired lecturer at universities and institutions in Europe and the U.S. on the subject color tree and light in smelting glass technologies.

The new exhibition shows his current works including two monumental sculptures. In the one anybody may go in and stride through, the other, the most recent work is exclusively designed for this work show being matched with the architecture of the Glass Museum Alter Hof Herding.

Welcome – Bienvenue!

 

Photos:

Udo Zembok, Coeur, 2008, Leihgabe Udo Zembok – Photo Udo Zembok

Udo Zembok, Bleu 2, 2007 – Photo Henri Gaud

Udo Zembok, Noir-Orange, 2010 – Photo Udo Zembok

Udo Zembok, La Porte étroite, 2010, Leihgabe Udo Zembok – Photo AHH

With about 60 objects the exhibition New Acquisitions 2010 is this time also a mirror of the international art in the glass sector.

Visits to many art centers (exhibitions, galleries, artist studios and studios) revealed once again: Germany is insofar as glass is concerned strongly on the go and more than a good address for artists all over the world. Thanks to its path-breaking and lasting development and thanks to its outstanding glass factories and glass workshops Germany is in the process of becoming a downright melting pot for those who commit themselves to the material glass.

That artists consider the metropolis Berlin as a setting for the art is plain-talking and that Berlin will now also become a location for the glass is rather a recently emerging development. With Julius Weiland the Glass Museum presented already in 2009 a representative of this genre. New in the collection is the work “Freedom“ of the Australian artist Scott Chaseling, who has been living and working in Berlin for some time. For his expressive work the story-teller and philosopher received several international prizes during the past years. And another new arrival from Berlin: Wilken Skurk with his work “Quingelwingelqui“, the expressive power of which excites the fantasy once more.

Even travel to other regions was not exactly unfruitful for the Glass Museum. An extremely vivid young glass scene is found, for instance, at the Rietveld Akademie in Amsterdam, on the Burg Giebichenstein in Halle and at the Hochschule für Gestaltung in Karlsruhe, where we came to know Laura Jungmann and the Spanish Berta Riera Pomés. Both are represented through works which were developed in the workshop “Designing by Making“ at the French Center International d´Art verrier (CIAV) in Meisenthal. The students experiment together with experienced glass manufacturers using extraordinary materials and methods. For both sides the cooperation was very fruitful and led to unimagined results. In view of the exhibitions in this year the Glass Museum wishes you many exciting aha glass experiences: In spring-time you will see the Dutch artist Barbara Nanning in an individual exhibition, in summer current Danish glass and in autumn/winter works of students oft he art academies in Prague, Zlin and Ústí nad Labem.

 

Photos:

Bertil Vallien, Janus II, 2009 – Photo G. Örtegren

Laura Jungmann, Carbonize II, 2010 – Photo Laura Jungmann

Ivana Houserova, Solar wind, 2009 – Photo Tomas Hilger

Wilken Skurk, Quingelwingelqui, 2006 – Photo Jan Röhl

The acquisition of three autonomous works of the Dutch female artist Barbara Nanning for the glass collection in the year 2009 also implicated to get personally acquainted with the artist. The way how Barbara Nanning apprehends the medium glass in a wide variety of series of works impressed the Foundation so that it decided to pay attention and to show respect to her in an individual exhibition. Now it is achieved: The Foundation is extremely pleased to present to you Barbara Nanning’s brand-new works in the exhibition “Eternal Spring “.

Barbara Nanning, born in The Hague in 1957, initially made a name for herself in the international art scene with unusual individual ceramic works following her studies at the Amsterdam Rietveld Akademie. After that, she turned to glass under an order from the National Glass Museum and the Royal Glass Works Leerdam. With it, the passion for this material aroused and the artistic career took a new direction. For Barbara Nanning the nature with its manifold, often widespread world of shapes and colors is an almost inexhaustible source of inspiration. Therefore, her works are filled with contradictions and unite amorphous and rigid structures, liberty and rank, manual perfection and the use of unexpected materials.

A real priming that inspired her to do the new works was experienced by the artist in 2010 during her trip to the stronghold of the glass industry Nový Bor in the Czech Republic, where she has been working for many years with professional glass blowers in their projects. On the way she called on Meissen in Saxony and visited there a porcelain exhibition and immediately the spark ignited to transform this white splendor and beauty to glass. That way works with high aesthetics, brightness and haptic charm – all of them being messages of Barbara Nanning’s Eternal Spring. Barbara Nanning‘s new repertoire filled with varieties includes wall and floor installations as well as solitary and group objects and also humoresque pieces like the small red kiss mouth of the wall work “Kiss Kiss Kiss“, among others.

 

Photos:

Barbara Nanning, Bernsteinfarbener Seetang, 2011 – Photo AHH

Barbara Nanning, Verre d´eglomise, 2007 – Photo Tom Haartsen

Barbara Nanning, WV 1, 2011 – Photo Horst Kolberg

Barbara Nanning, Meeresschwämme 1-3, 2011 – Photo AHH

Danish Design is a brand that enjoys an outstanding reputation worldwide. Whether in the architecture and industrial production, in the handicraft or arts and crafts up to the art nothing is possible without design in Denmark. Diversity, openness and fresh colors characterize this country consisting of big and small islands, precious, perfect in form and timeless it shows its art, especially from glass. Because its tradation in glass processing is long and famous so that an original and good quality glass scenery could establish itself in addition to the touristy paths of the small glassblowing shops. Design and free art mix together unbiased to form a kaleidoscope of creative possibilities of development.

On its journey through the Danish „Glass landscape“ the Foundation came to know the concentrated force of the Danish potential. And it also enters virgin soil: Six artists with six different positions on this material represent a cross-section of the current Danish glass: Lene Bødker, Trine Drivsholm, Micha Karlslund, Pipaluk Lake, Tobias Møhl and Steffen Tast are ambitious artists having international reputation. In the nineties they achieved their artistic breakthrough and obtained numerous national as well as international prizes.

Lene Bødker develops her monochromous sculptures from geometric shapes the outlines of which are mostly closed with basically spacious depth like plasticity in the surface treatment. Trine Drivsholms artistic starting point is the shape of use of the glass. Its functionality alienated by her in the context of sculptural combinations. Micha Karlslunds bizarre objects are inspired by the microcosm of the cells. They enable an insight into the otherwise concealed incredible diversity and depth of life. Pipaluk Lake experiments innovatively with the possibilities of the glass during the melting process as well as in connection with metal: Her glass sculptures are snapshots of this transformation. Tobias Møhl is designer par excellence – using the most sophisticated Venetian techniques he designs minimalist Danish design from organic and very sensual shapes. Steffen Tast, a master of the details, creates with utmost precision hanging space installations and objects from numerous float glasses having the same shape and size, fiber glass and metal. He borrows his subjects from the nature.

 

Photos:

Tobias Møhl, Glassweaver Vessel, 2011 – Photo AHH

Lene Bødker, Cylinder, 2007 – Photo Horst Kolberg

Micha Karlslund, Cells, 2003 – Photo AHH

Pipaluk Lake, Reticulate, 2009 – Photo Jesper Palm

Trine Drivsholm, Green Vessel, 2011 – Photo Horst Kolberg

Steffen Tast, Screw-screw, 2011 – Photo AHH

Prag – Ústí nad Labem – Zlín: Three renowned Czech universities present at the same time in our new exhibition works of students and graduates of their glass departments – an exciting cross-section of young glass made in the Czech Republic. In Czech universities you will discover today a vivid and faceted dealing with the medium glass. Many young artists from all over the world are moving to the Czech Republic to learn here or to work together with the first-class Czech glass studios. For ever glass was regarded as an international figurehead of Czech art and designs. Bohemian glass had already been an attractive export item for decades. Czech artists also discovered in the fifties the artistic power of expression of the material: Glass art became an autonomous type of art with worldwide aura. Even in the world of the Czech design the creative work with glass today head for new, extremely successful paths.

The Academy for Art, Architecture and Design in Prague has a long, changeful history. It started 1885 when according to the wishes of Gottfried Semper, an asserter of a synthesis between art and technology, the significant Prague School of Arts & Crafts (briefly UMPRUM) was founded. In 1947 it was reorganized with the status of a university. Head of the glass studio since 2008 is the internationally coveted top designer Rony Plesl. Ilja Bílek, whose works find recognition worldwide has been head of the glass studio at the Jan-Evangelista-Purkynĕ-Universität in Ústí nad Labem since 1996. The objective of the studio founded in 1992 is a wide-ranging artistic, craftsman and technological training of students who already have completed a glass school. Since its foundation in the year 2008 the renowned artist Petr Stanický has been head of the glass atelier at the Tomáš-Bat´a-Universität in Zlín. In order to develop an authentic artistic position, the students here are required to conceptual thinking. Glass does not end in itself, but act as a medium to artistically reflect social themes.

 

Photos:

Kateřina Handlová, The Black Hole 1, 2010 – Photo Kateřina Handlová

Tereza Anderlová, Cup for ice cream, 2010 – Photo Tereza Anderlová

Anna Minxová, Watermelon enterprise, 2011 – Photo Horst Kolberg

Luba Bakicová, Oxymoron 1, 2009 – Photo Ilja Bílek

February 04 – April 15, 2012

“Glass is like an idea – it can occur in different shapes as heavy as a block or as tender as the wing of a butterfly. Its transparency permits an insight into the hidden interior of the things and the balance between the visible and the invisible world“. In poetic terms the Estonian female artist Kairi Orgusaar describes her perception on the glass. And if one considers the 60 new acquisitions of the collection then you are very close to this philosophy. With Kairi Orgusaar the Foundation made its first meeting with Estonian artists who are comparatively unknown in Western Europe, however, developed themselves independently offside the traditional glass strongholds attaining outstanding performances. Their works generate a deep intuition for material qualities of the glass, for instance, Mare Saares touching tender Pâte de verre object “Casting Shadow“ or Ivo Lills ground object “Lace 1“ and his clear aesthetic language of shapes.

The Foundation conscientiously searched for well-known artists anew: Very impressive are the current works of the French female artist Anne-Lise Riond Sibony, which confront the view with common items incorporating unusual emotions. Only apparently the three dimensional lifestyle “Mangez le Omega 3“ is an abundantly arranged fish platter that brings the current health trend (“Eat Omega 3 fatty acids“) to the point. Actually, the modern (food) culture however degrades the vital creature and even the whole nature to an inanimate object that we thoughtlessly use for our modern lifestyle.

The Belgian artist Giampaolo Amoruso attracts with his “Dandy“ figures active attention that play lovingly ironically with the attributes of the manliness. Extravagant clad, but a little bit introverted enriches one of them, “Ernesto, le Dandy“, the collection.

You´re welcome to an inspiring expedition to the world of the contemporary European glass!

 

Photos:

Ivan Mares, Rope Egg, 2008 – Photo O. Kocourek

Kairi Orgusaar, The Kiss, 2010 – Photo Kati Kerstna

Anne-Lise Riond Sibony, Mangez des omegas 3, 2011 – Photo Jean-Marc Gourdon

Giampaolo Amoruso, Ernesto, Le Dandy, 2010 – Photo Horst Kolberg

The Artist Nabo Gaß is a storyteller – he discloses his tales through paintings made out of glass. He gets his inspiration from experiences and encounters with people, but also from harrowing news and inconsistencies in our sophisticated world. The transparency of glass allows him to tell his stories layer by layer, in which he is unrivalled. He takes milled glass, makes it doughy with glue, and paints his image motifs with a brush or a spatula onto a support glass. The outcome is an ambiguous, multi-faceted overlapping of the various image layers – similar to the interplay of our thoughts and perceptions which, detached from chronology, overlap incessantly.

Nabo Gaß, born in 1954 in Ebingen (Baden-Wuerttemberg, Germany), lives and works in Wiesbaden. Following a vintage training as a stained-glass artist he studied at the Free Art School in Wiesbaden and at the University of the Arts in Berlin in the 1970s. In order to implement his ideas he developed new techniques of glass design: in 1989 the photo-accurate sandblasting technique, in 1994 the painting with stained-glass powder.

In addition to his freelance works, Nabo Gaß deals with nature-related glass design of public and private buildings. In 1999 he was distinguished by the Corning Museum of Glass (NY, USA) for his pillars on the Via Publica in Wiesbaden. More than ten years ago he began to artistically integrate photovoltaics into architecture. For that he obtained the Innovation Award of the glasstec Düsseldorf. His breakthrough came in 2010 when he received the order, by Ernstings Bau & Grund, to put a new façade of solar panels to the new high-rise warehouse at Coesfeld-Lette.

The Foundation has used this as an opportunity to present Nabo Gaß’s broad repertoire and his virtuoso handling of the medium glass in an exhibition. What is more, the Foundation has been familiar with him for quite some time. In 2006 it acquired three works from his work series “Short moments”. In his latest exhibition Nabo Gaß accepts the challenge of entering into a lively dialogue with his work and the Foundation´s collection.

We invite you to meet this exciting intercommunication of artworks and tales!

 

Photos:

Nabo Gaß, Das Kleid, das sie nie wieder trug, 2010 – Photo Nabo Gass

Nabo Gaß, Short moments, 2006 – Photo Horst Kolberg

Nabo Gaß, Balance 1, 2010 – Photo Nabo Gass

Nabo Gaß, Maria-Maria, 2008 – Photo Frank Widmann

They come from the Czech Republic, they are professors and their artistic medium is glass. However, is it everything that unite them. Though the great glass tradition of their native country is the source of their inspiration each of them follow its own path in style, technology and content. If one looks at the history of the Bohemian glass, you will understand its artistic origin since in the world of art and design Czech glass has been an international trademark since long. Bohemian glass had already been a desirable export item before centuries and it was Czech artists who recognized the artistic expressiveness of the material in the fifties.

As professors Bílek, Plesl and Stanický pass on their skill also to the next generation: The works of their students have already been presented by the foundation in an own exhibition during the winter 2011/12 in the glass museum – now we introduce to you the craftsman behind that: Ilja Bílek has been managing since 1996 the glass studio of the Jan-Evangelista-Purkynĕ-University in Ústí nad Labem. His sculptures from glass are free of poses and visual effect-catching – with their concentrated geometric shape language they follow rather an own deeper logic. Despite the almost ascetic restraint in shape, colour and processing of the material from time to time Bílek’s works communicate a strong internal dynamics.

Rony Plesl has been since 2008 director of the glass studio of the Academy for Art, Architecture and Design in Prague as well as since 2011 director of the department for applied art. As an internationally popular and award-winning top designer he has been working since long together with big glass design firms – not until 2011 he was honoured in the Czech Republic as “Designer of the year“. Characteristic for his works series is the shape. It is clearly contoured and mostly bearing a refining grinding technology. Both together merge into a symbiosis that can only be realized with the medium glass.

Petr Stanický has been in charge of the glass atelier of the Tomas Bata University in Zlín since its foundation in the year 2008. For him glass is not an end in itself, but a medium in order to artistically reflect social themes and the relation between human beings and nature. With a free, casual shape language he combines glass also with metal or wood.

Haló – Ahoj, Ilja Bílek, Rony Plesl und Petr Stanický!

 

 Photos:

Rony Plesl, Samurai, 2011 – Photo Jaroslav Kviz

Petr Stanický, Factory building I, 2011 – Photo Lubomír Ančinec

Rony Plesl, Guard 1+2, 2010 – Photo Jaroslav Kviz

Ilja Bílek, Annäherung, 2010 – Photo Ilja Bílek