Monthly Archives: June 2012

Museum Expansion Work Begins

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If you’ve driven past the Museum recently, you’ll see signs of our expansion becoming a reality. We couldn’t be more excited!

Crane at the construction site to bring in a new Museum air handler

The work on our new 150-seat Hot Glass Show theatre, slated to open in July, is almost complete. We’ll be very happy to remove the plastic covering on the outside wall to showcase the full beauty of that space to the outside world. When the theatre is complete, visitors will be able to see hot glassmaking both inside the theatre and through the many open walls that will look into the theater.

150-seat Hot Glass Show Theater

Rendering of the new 150-seat Hot Glass Show Theater

The completion of this slightly larger new Hot Glass Show space will allow us to provide our popular Hot Glass Show glassblowing demonstrations without any interruption to our visitors during construction.  We’ll then tear down the old Hot Glass Show stage and begin the renovation of the former Steuben factory building into an additional (and amazing) 500-seat Hot Glass Show and hotshop space.

On the north side of the building, the fences went up last week to restrict access to the construction area. On Wednesday morning, a crane came in to change out air handling units. All buildings, and especially Museums, need good air handling.

Part of the old building on the north side will be demolished to make room for the new North Wing contemporary glass gallery. On that building stands a unit which our operations staff lovingly refer to as Penthouse 4 and which contains two working air handlers that will no longer exist once the building is demolished. The crane was here to remove some old air handlers, and replace them with a new, larger air handler.

Loading in the new air handler for Corning Museum expansion

Loading in the new air handler

GlassLab Travels to Governors Island in New York City

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Corning Museum of Glass mobile hot shop GlassLab passes the Statue of Liberty

GlassLab passes the Statue of Liberty

Blow glass on an island? No problem.

The Museum’s portable glassmaking units can go almost anywhere. Last week, our Hot Glass Roadshow unit took an early morning trip on a barge from Staten Island to Governors Island, a 172-acre island in the heart of New York Harbor.

Every weekend in July, the Museum’s portable stage will host GlassLab design sessions, featuring designers from the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum’s exhibition Graphic Design: Now in Production.

So, just how do you transport a 28-foot-long, 35,000-lb. fully equipped glassmaking studio and stage to an island off the shores of Manhattan and Brooklyn?

Mobile glassblowing hot shop GlassLab container at Millers Launch on Staten Island

The GlassLab container ready to launch

Our Hot Glass Roadshow, which was built in 2001, can be easily pulled by an 18-wheeled tractor trailer (yes, that’s our very own tractor trailer with the CMoG logo on it pulling the hotshop behind it). Our local trucking company, Dimon and Bacorn, drove the Roadshow from Corning, NY, to Millers Launch on Staten Island, where it was carefully driven onto a barge and secured.

The mobile GlassLab glassblowing hot shop is pushed by the tugboat Susan Miller

The mobile GlassLab glassblowing hot shop is pushed by the tugboat Susan Miller

Pushed by the tugboat Susan Miller, it made its way past the Staten Island ferries, the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island and downtown Manhattan, to the dock of beautiful Governors Island.

Corning Museum of Glass mobile hot shop GlassLab passes Manhattan in New York harbor

The GlassLab mobile hot shop making its way to Governors Island off Manhattan

From there, it was driven to the plaza of Pershing Hall on Governors Island, and our crew went to work to unpack, hook up gas and electric and finally to fire up the furnaces. The furnaces take 36-48 hours to come up to 2100° – hot enough to begin blowing glass!

This is the first time anyone has blown glass on Governors Island, and certainly our first experience loading the Roadshow and its truck on a barge and sailing through New York Harbor. This is the first of two islands we’ll be working on this summer. If you can’t make it to Governors Island, you can also find us on Nantucket Island in August.

It also is a reminder of how glassmaking came to Corning, NY. In 1868, Brooklyn Flint Glass loaded up a barge with glassmaking equipment, sailed up the Hudson River and through the canal system to relocate the company to Corning, NY, which was a developing young town. The company changed its name to Corning Flint Works, and thus began the legacy that makes the Crystal City what it is today.

It’s likely that the barge sailed past this very spot on its way to Corning (although it would not have passed the Statue of Liberty, which was not in place until 1886).

Nearly 150 years later, direct descendants of that Corning glassmaking tradition are bringing glassmaking back through New York Harbor.

The GlassLab mobile hot shop making its way to Governors Island off Manhattan

A view from the boat as GlassLab makes its way to Governors Island

Celebrity Cruise Scholarship recipient Gayla Lee learns murrine making techniques at The Studio

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Gayla Lee was first entranced by glass at the age of eight when she encountered a glassblower at a Renaissance festival. Her fascination with the material eventually led her to an apprenticeship in a Baltimore glass studio at the age of 20. After a couple years of working with glass herself, she began making trips to Corning in order to take classes with artists such as Mark Matthews, Robin Cass, and Bill Gudenrath at The Studio.

Gayla Lee

Gayla Lee working at The Studio

After taking several classes, Gayla began to ask, “What can I do to be here more?”  Now she can be found in Corning half a dozen times a year or so to work as a teaching assistant for artists such as Mark Ditzler, Josh Simpson, and Yoko Yagi, as well as to teach classes in fusing techniques.

Gayla has had the opportunity to share her knowledge with others and to learn through working with other artists. She notes, however, that “it can be difficult for working artists to have access to professional development” due to time and financial restraints. Recently, she was awarded the Celebrity scholarship to take Davide Salvadore’s class, Creating and Using Murrine – her first glassblowing class in six years.

Gayla Lee and Davide Salvadore Creating and Using Murrine at The Studio of The Corning Museum of Glass

Gayla Lee and Davide Salvadore

In this class, students pulled cane to form simple components, which were then fused together to form a pattern, repulled, and cut into murrine. Rather than entering the class with a specific goal or concept in mind, Gayla was intrigued by learning nontraditional methods of making murrine and watching a true master put these pieces to use.  Gayla’s work often features geometric patterns and tessellations, and learning from Salvadore, she has been able to gather ideas and expand her skills in the week-long class.

 

“[Studio classes] are very conducive to creativity,” she explains, “everything you need, Corning provides,” from tools and glass to access to affordable food and lodging. “Everything you need to know is probably already here,” she says, referring to the wealth of information and inspiration at the Museum and the Rakow Research Library.

Though Gayla resides in Annapolis, Maryland, her close relationship with The Studio provides her with a comfortable creative outlet away from home. “I do a lot of my work up here,” she says, adding enthusiastically, “I’ve never been to a nicer glass studio.”

Learn more about the Celebrity Cruises Glassmaking Scholarship Fund, and others.

Industrial designer turned glass convert: Josh Owen at GlassLab

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Today’s post comes from Josh Owen, industrial designer and associate professor at The Rochester Institute of Technology.

Designer Josh Owen in a GlassLab Design Session, May 29 - 30 at The Corning Museum of Glass.

Designer Josh Owen

I was delighted to have been invited to participate in GlassLab this summer. Almost exactly one year ago, I visited The Corning Museum of Glass for the first time since my childhood. During this recent visit I was fascinated by the array of historical and contemporary archives that are so beautifully communicated on site. And I was immediately moved by the hot glass activities which are integrated into the life of the Museum. Having recently joined the faculty of design at the Rochester Institute of Technology, a short drive north of Corning, I was also intrigued by this new and exciting neighbor. A partnership between Corning and RIT seemed almost inevitable given RIT’s proximity, powerful teaching of design history, practice and technology, and CMoG’s vision for exploring design innovation with their unparalleled knowledge of the glass medium. So once I had met with the management at CMoG the Metaproject 02 became an exercise of shared goals. To make a very long story short, I spent 2010/11 learning and working through design and glass issues with a team of incredibly knowledgeable professors of glass, students of glass and of industrial design and the players at CMoG to push the envelope of possibilities for glass. When CMoG asked me to take off my professorial cap and put on my designer’s cap for GlassLab I felt as if I had a year of boot camp already under my belt.

After two days of work sessions together with master craftsmen at The Corning Museum of Glass as a part of the GlassLab project, Tina Oldknow, curator of modern glass, chose to accession three items from the sessions into the Museum’s GlassLab prototype collection. The items consist of three functional vessels that address specific domestic conditions in the bed and bath. The first item accommodates a more sustainable approach to distributing toilet paper, the second is a shallow bowl which manages bedside technology use and the third merges toothbrush holder with a drinking cup to create efficiencies in often cramped spaces.

The Toilet Paper Jar by industrial designer Josh Owen

Image courtesy Josh Owen LLC by Elizabeth Lamark

The Toilet Paper Jar 
makes use of a major advance in toilet paper where the rolls become tube-free. This modification is the first important change in the state of this product in nearly 100 years and considering that some 17 billion toilet paper tubes are produced annually in the USA, the implications are quite dramatic. I made the observation that with these new rolls, the toilet paper can be retrieved from the inside outward by pulling from the top rather than the way in which traditional TP tubes are used in the spindle arrangement, pulling off sheets from the side. The prototype I designed is simply a container for this new behavior which allows the item to sit on the floor, protected by the cup and saucer-like arrangement from any moisture. The ring detail near the top enables the user to easily lift the cover off to add a new roll.

The Bowl With a Slot by industrial designer Josh Owen

Image courtesy Josh Owen LLC by Elizabeth Lamark

The Bowl With a Slot
considers the problem of the charging cable. All cell phones have one of these to contend with and a problem that we all face is fishing the fallen cord from the floor or from behind a bookcase etc. This design allows the power-cord to stay located in the bowl which can easily accommodate any sort of phone which – in today’s world – is often kept at the bedside and used not just for communication but as an alarm clock etc. This design also promotes a culture of charging while sleeping which eliminates the problem of losing a charge during waking hours.

The Tooth Brush Holder Cup by industrial designer Josh Owen

Image courtesy Josh Owen LLC by Elizabeth Lamark

The Tooth Brush Holder Cup 
recognizes the fact that in many bathrooms, usable space around the sink is at a premium. Also, allowing the toothbrush bristles to dry is a constant chore seeking a good, hygienic solution. By employing a notch which is scaled to accept most simple toothbrushes, one can position the bristles over the sink to drip dry and keep two useful tools in one location.

I chose to prototype all three of these ideas in clear glass so that they offered an almost invisible, functional aid in performing their tasks. The transparency has no aesthetic purpose for me — it simply creates the most deliberate way of testing the functionality of the ideas. This leaves these products with nothing but their function to prove and allows them to act as perfect prototypes with all aspects visible.

The immediacy of the hot glass medium allows for remarkable live modification to design models. The notion of ‘rapid prototyping’ may be more pronounced in this approach than any other existing technology which is ironic given the significantly mature age of the technology involved. The bottom line with the plasticity of the hot glass is that when you have talented craftspersons executing your ideas, they have the ability to turn on a dime to modify plans as they materialize. As a designer, one has the great benefit of seeing a vision take form before one’s eyes. The inevitabilities of human-scaled relationships in products change when we see objects directly in front of us. As one who obsesses over what many would consider tiny details and nuances, I found myself modifying scale, edge-conditions and radius treatments as I watched the glass take shape. Any good design is a harmonious execution of the idea and what the material does well naturally. I have not experienced a more immediate proof of this concept in any other medium. As I have said to my friends at the Corning Museum – I’m a convert.

Uniting the worlds of glass and racing: Corning Museum crafts trophy for Watkins Glen International

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This morning, the Museum announced an exciting partnership with Watkins Glen International and unveiled the trophy for the 2012 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race.

Created by Museum glassmaker Eric Meek, the trophy both references the raceway and captures the nature of the Finger Lakes region.

“When you look at the side of the trophy, it almost looks like a waterfall,” says Meek, “That’s an important part of our region, going into the Finger Lakes there are many beautiful glens, gorges and waterfalls.”

Viewed from the top, you can see the trophy’s core which was hand sculpted to the outline of the racetrack. The blue is a match to the color of the racetrack’s guardrails.

2012 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series trophy for Watkins Glen International

2012 NASCAR Sprint Cup trophy

“The Corning Museum of Glass has provided Watkins Glen International a truly unique and beautiful trophy for our NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race in August,” Watkins Glen International President Michael Printup said. “This one-of-a-kind work of art captures the essence of our partnership, uniting the world of art and speed. I cannot wait to see it held high in Gatorade Victory Lane by 2012 Sprint Cup Series race winner for the world to see!”

Eric Meek, Michael Printup, George Kennard, and Ryan Mosher at the unveiling of the NASCAR Sprint Cup trophy

Eric Meek, Michael Printup, George Kennard, and Ryan Mosher

Watch the making of the trophy in this behind the scenes video on the process of creating this one-of-a kind glass trophy.

Luce Foundation Grant to Support Survey of American Glass Collection

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The Henry Luce Foundation has awarded a special grant in the amount of $25,000 to The Corning Museum of Glass to support the position of a curatorial assistant to survey the American glass collection.

Bottle with the Seal of Richard Wistar. Wistarburgh Glassworks, about 1745-1755. (86.4.196)

Bottle with the Seal of Richard Wistar. Wistarburgh Glassworks, about 1745-1755. (86.4.196)

With the most comprehensive collection of glass in the world, The Corning Museum of Glass is a recognized leader in the field of glass and glass studies. Of the Museum’s permanent collection of more than 45,000 objects, 18,700 form the American glass collection.

The American collection represents the history of glass production in the American colonies and the United States from the 18th century to present. The objects range from rare pieces hand-blown in the earliest factories, to mass-produced canning jars and bottles made in the second half of the 19th century, to art glass and cut glass pieces made in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and pieces made by contemporary glass artists in 2011.

Six piece place setting. Libbey Glass Company, United States, Toledo, Ohio, 1903-1904. Colorless, blown and engraved. H: 16.5 cm. Collection of The Corning Museum of Glass (69.4.33)

Six piece place setting, Libbey Glass Company, 1903-1904 (69.4.33)

Collection highlights include the wares of great American glass manufacturers, such as the New England Glass Company of East Cambridge, Massachusetts and the Libbey Glass Company in Toledo, Ohio.

The curatorial assistant will work with the Curatorial Department and the Registrar’s Department in researching and cataloguing the American glass collection, and will assist the curator of American glass in the preparation of a collection survey of American glass prior to 1900.

This research will be added to the American glass collection database and will be immediately available world-wide online at cmog.org, in an updated collections browser launched in early 2012. Online collections records contain in-depth information including provenance, Art & Architecture Thesaurus standard terms, and related objects, as well as related multimedia, publications and exhibition information.

Desk set. Boston & Sandwich Glass Company, United States, Sandwich, Massachusetts, ca. 1830. Light blue opaque, pressed. H: 7.4 cm. Collection of The Corning Museum of Glass (68.4.532)

Desk set, Boston & Sandwich Glass Company, ca. 1830 (68.4.532)

The Museum is seeking applicants with training in American decorative arts for this temporary, one-year position. For details, visit http://www.cmog.org/employment.

The Museum received the grant through the Luce Foundation’s American Art program. The Henry Luce Foundation seeks to bring important ideas to the center of American life, strengthen international understanding, and foster innovation and leadership in academic, policy, religious and art communities.

Introduction to the Collection Series: Trade Catalogs for Glass Research at The Rakow Research Library

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The Rakow Library is home to an extensive collection of glass company trade catalogs. Approximately 17,000 trade catalogs in various languages, representing firms worldwide, are housed in our temperature and humidity controlled secure stacks with preservation in mind.

19th century Silber and Fleming glass trade catalog. Bib. #89888

19th century Silber and Fleming trade catalog. Bib. #89888

A trade catalog is issued by a manufacturer, distributor, wholesales, or retailer with the intention of promoting business. Trade catalogs are invaluable resources for identifying manufacturer’s styles, patterns, dates of production, and original prices. They also provide background on economical and social circumstances for the times in which they were published.

Trade catalogs are primarily used for identification purposes by an audience of collectors, researchers, curators, and members of the public wanting to identify glass objects. For ease of access, we have categorized trade catalogs into the following subject areas: bottles and druggists’ glassware, cut glass, flat glass (including stained and architectural), laboratory ware (including industrial and optical), lighting glassware and lamps, tableware, tools (glass blowing and working tools), glass art, paperweights, and glass jewelry, among others.

1923 McKee Glass Company cut glass lamp trade catalog. Bib. #28854

1923 McKee Glass Company trade catalog. Bib. #28854

19th century F. and C. Osler glass chandelier trade catalog. Bib #92821

19th century F. and C. Osler trade catalog. Bib #92821

The Rakow Library is committed to acquiring and preserving these materials and pursues expansion of the collection. Sheila Tshudy, in charge of trade catalogs, contacts firms, works with rare and second hand book dealers, and searches eBay to find new additions. The ever-growing collection is also supplemented by gifts from generous donors.

Though our trade catalogs do not circulate, they are all available for use in the Library and we do loan microform copies, if available, through Interlibrary Loan. A large part of this collection was microfilmed and we have over 1,000 microform catalogs which were filmed with permission while on loan to us from other institutions and private individuals. The earliest dated catalog is a price list from 1722, from the firm Manufacture Royale des Glaces de France (Saint-Gobain) entitled Tarif du prix de glaces de la Manufacture royale.

Digitization of select trade catalogs from the collection allows us to provide access to these unique resources via our website. The digital collection is continually growing, and currently more than 200 trade catalogs are available digitally to be viewed in their entirety. We encourage you to visit The Rakow Research Library and consult these valuable resources.

This is the third installment of the Rakow Research Library’s Introduction to the Collection Series.
<< Prints & Drawings | Article Index >>

The Rakow Research Library is open from 9:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m., Monday – Friday
Telephone: 607.438.5300 | Email (general inquiries): rakow@cmog.org

Corning Museum of Glass North Wing Expansion Groundbreaking

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Wendell Weeks, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Corning Incorporated, noted how he is “amazed by the strength of glass, its stability, versatility and complex engineering,” this Thursday morning at the groundbreaking for the North Wing expansion of The Corning Museum of Glass. “No other material provides such a perfect marriage of form and function.”

Weeks was joined by Marie McKee, president of the Museum, Jim Flaws, Chairman of the Museum and Chief Financial Officer of Corning Incorporated, and Karol Wight, executive director of the Museum, in giving remarks on the expansion project and exciting changes in store here at the Museum.

wendell weeks providing remarks at the north wing expansion ground breaking ceremony

Wendell Weeks joined in officially launching the Museum’s expansion.

Designs for the new building were on view, including renderings of the new 100,000 square foot contemporary gallery, with 150-foot long window overlooking a new football field-sized campus green. Architect Thomas Phifer’s design for the space introduces a daylighting system for the expansion that will make the Museum the first anywhere to have a large-scale installation of contemporary glass using natural light.

New contemporary gallery featuring daylighting in the corning museum of glass north wing expansion

Rendering of the new contemporary gallery featuring daylighting in the North Wing expansion.

The 11am ceremony took place at the Museum, in an adjacent parking lot that will be converted to green space as designed by landscape architecture firm Reed Hilderbrand Associates. In 2014, those standing in this space will have a view of the contemporary gallery, and just to the right, into the new glassmaking venue with capacity for 500 people. Jim Flaws talked about the need for added space in his remarks. “Drive past the parking lot full of busses and cars on a summer afternoon and you can see for yourself just how popular the Museum is. It’s the most-visited museum in Upstate New York, and ranks among the top 50 visited museums in the country.”

Cross section of the corning museum of glass north wing expansion

Cross Section of the North Wing Expansion.

More than 200 people were in attendance to celebrate the groundbreaking of this major project. Assemblyman Phil Palmesano, Senator Tom O’Mara, and Mayor Richard Negri joined Karol Wight, Wendell Weeks, Jim Flaws, and Marie McKee in turning the soil.

Groundbreaking for the North Wing expansion at The Corning Museum of Glass

Palmesano, O’Mara, Wight, Weeks, Flaws, McKee and Negri turn the soil at The Corning Museum of Glass North Wing expansion groundbreaking.

The Museum will remain open during the entirety of the expansion project, which is scheduled for completion in 2014. For more information visit www.cmog.org/expansion.

The Museum’s newest teen program: Junior Scientists

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Ever wanted to learn more about the science of glass? Here at the Museum, a group of area students are doing just that in the Junior Scientists program, new this year.

Junior Scientists at the corning museum of glass

Junior Scientists learning about the properties of glass

The small group of students from local Corning middle and high schools are in grades 7 through 9. The program began in March, and is wrapping up on June 12. Through hands-on experiments and behind the scenes tours of the Museum and Corning Inc. labs, the students are learning about science through the process and properties of glass.

Seventh-grader Pearl describes why she wanted to become a Junior Scientist:

Pearl making a Prince Rupert's drop at The Studio with the Junior scientists

Pearl making a Prince Rupert's drop

As a visitor to The Corning Museum of Glass, I have been amazed by the glass artwork. When I was younger, I always thought glass was super fragile since I broke glass dishes often. Now I know that this isn’t always true, and that it can be very strong. For example, fiber optics are super thin glass that can bend without snapping. I think this is outstanding and proves my old belief, that glass is nothing but an easy-to-break decoration, wrong. There are many different types of glass and they are used for different things. To illustrate, glass is found in everyday objects such as tables, windows, cell phones, and jars. Not only is glass pretty, but it is useful.



Students in the program are learning all about glass and what it can do by investigating the material through experiments and research. The focus of their research this year is stress and tension in glass. In their weekly after-school meetings, the Junior Scientists have toured the Innovations Center at the Museum, watched a special glass breaking demonstration, and gathered information for their research at the Rakow Library.

In an experiment that quickly became a favorite experience for many of the students, the group had a hands-on workshop at The Studio where they made – and more importantly, destroyed – their own Prince Rupert drops.

Each Junior Scientist was tasked with designing, creating, and carrying out their own experiment over the course of the program. To assist in their research, the students met and worked with scientists from Corning’s Sullivan Park on the concepts for their experiments. The Junior Scientists will present their findings at a finale event on June 12.

See the Hot Glass Show in a new light-filled theater, open this summer

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One of the most common questions we hear at the Museum  is “Where do we see the live glassblowing?” The tradition of glassmaking has been a part of the Museum campus since the opening in 1951. Our glassblowers put on more than 15 Hot Glass Show glassblowing demonstrations a day, and even more show times are added in the summer. With the North Wing expansion soon underway, one of the first major changes is a newly renovated theater to continue our daily schedule of the Hot Glass Show.

Hot Glass Show at The Corning Museum of Glass

Hot Glass Show at The Corning Museum of Glass

The new theater will be located just above the Museum Admissions Lobby, in what used to be the Museum’s orientation film theater. The space was originally designed by architects Smith-Miller + Hawkinson, who revisited their 1999 design to transform the theater into a new venue suited for glass demonstrations. Watch this clip of architect Laurie Hawkinson talking about the use of glass in architecture.

 

Renovations began in January, right after the removal of Brian Clarke’s The Glass Wall. The theater will open this summer to ensure that construction on the North Wing will not affect the schedule of our popular live glassblowing demonstrations. In fact, one day you’ll see the Hot Glass Show in its current space, and, if you came back the next day, you’d be able to see it in this new space.

The Hot Glass Show is so popular that we’re adding more space. An additional 50 seats are being added to this new theatre, and stadium-style seating ensures that there won’t be a bad view in the house. You’ll be able to sit right up front and feel the heat from the new all-electric furnaces, or sit further back, relax, and enjoy the show and the view of Corning through floor-to-ceiling windows.

View of the new hot glass show theater under renovation

The renovation in progress.

A major part of the renovation project is the removal of the eastern interior wall. Once completed, the theater will almost resemble our outdoor Courtyard stage. The open sides will allow you to see out to Center Way (the road in front of the Museum) from inside the theater, or watch the show as you wander by on the way to the Glass Galleries. You’ll also be able to see a live video stream of the Hot Glass Show in the Admissions Lobby.

rendering of new hot glass show theater

Rendering of the new Hot Glass Show theater looking toward the stage.

The theater is scheduled to open early July. Come see a show then, now, or later – the Hot Glass Show happens all day, every day and now open until 8pm. See a full schedule of the Hot Glass Show: http://www.cmog.org/visit/calendar.