The Toledo Museum of Art presents Color Ignited. Glass 1962–2012, an exhibition on view June 14–September 9, 2012.
The Museum is renowned for its extensive glass collection and for being the site of the historic 1962 Toledo Workshops. Those workshops, led by Harvey Littleton at the invitation of then-Museum Director Otto Wittmann, nurtured the artists now considered pioneers of the American Studio Art Glass movement and, through extension, helped to rejuvenate studio glass in post-war Europe.
Dan Dailey, Pistachio Lamp. Illuminated Sculpture, 1972. Hand blown glass. Gold plated brass. 14”H x 10”W x 10”D ©2011 Dan Dailey
To commemorate the 50th anniversary of the birth of studio glass, TMA presents Color Ignited: Glass 1962–2012, an enticing “coming of age” look at the medium. International in scope, it showcases works by Toledo Workshops participants as well as by the major artists working in the medium since. The exhibition focuses on the role of color—from the conceptual to the political to the metaphoric—in artistic expression. More than 80 objects from private collections, galleries, other museums and TMA’s own collection are shown, including works by Littleton, Dominick Labino, Marvin Lipofsky, Dale Chihuly, Dan Dailey, Judith Schaechter, Ginny Ruffner, Fritz Driesbach and Klaus Moje.
Jutta-Annette Page, curator of glass and decorative arts at the Toledo Museum of Art, and Peter Morrin, director emeritus of the Speed Art Museum in Louisville, Ky., curated the exhibition.
Many of the Toledo Workshop participants were schooled in pottery, and as a result, many early works were vessels, some stylized, some with rays of color, some opaque and some transparent. There are vessels by Tom McGauchlin and Edith Franklin from the original workshops, as well as fused glass, neon glass, mirrored pieces and sculptures.
Color Ignited is the inaugural exhibition in the Museum’s new Frederic and Mary Wolfe Gallery of Contemporary Art. The Wolfe Gallery space was the home of the Museum’s glass collection until 2003, when construction began on the Museum’s Glass Pavilion.
A fully illustrated exhibition catalogue, with essays by Page, Morrin and Robert Bell, senior curator of decorative arts and design at the National Gallery of Australia, will be available in the Museum Store.
The Museum is located at 2445 Monroe Street at Scottwood Avenue, just west of the downtown business district and one block off I-75 with exit designations posted. For general information, visitors can call 419-255-8000 or 800-644-6862, or visit www.toledomuseum.org
