Collection Search | Corning Museum of Glass

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Object Name:

Sculptural Vessel

Title:

Untitled, African Dream Series

Maker(s):

Zynsky, Toots (American, b. 1951), Artist

Place Made:

United States, NY, New York City

Accession Number:

84.4.109

Dimensions:

Overall H: 12.2 cm, W: 38.2 cm, D: 37.1 cm

Location:

Not on Display

Date:

1983

Web Description:

During the 1982 exhibition at Theo Portnoy Gallery in New York, a Dutch acquaintance, Mathijs Teunissen Van Manen, came from Amsterdam to visit New York and he saw Zynsky’s show. Curious about how Zynsky made her work—because he had never seen glass treated that way—Van Manen went to the New York Experimental Glass Workshop to see what she was up to. “I had two teams of people pulling thread all afternoon for me,” Zynsky recalls. “Mathijs took one look at this, shook his head, and said, ‘This is medieval!’” Within 24 hours, Van Manen had constructed a contraption that fed a glass rod through a flame, turning it into a glass thread. Over the next few years, Zynsky and Van Manen collaborated on the development of the glass thread-pulling machine. Now incorporating sophisticated electronics and custom software, these unique machines, which make thread in a manner not unlike how glass optical fiber is made, are still used by Zynsky. African Dream was created using the finer glass threads produced by the glass thread-pulling machine.

More Info

Department:

Postwar and Contemporary

Series:

African Dream Series

Provenance:

Theo Portnoy Gallery, Former Collection

1982

Category:

Color:

Technique:

Material:

Inscription:

signature

Description

Primary Description:

Lavender neodymium glass; fused and thermo-formed glass threads (filet de verre). Wide, low, circular shallow dish formed of layered parallel lengths of thin glass threads, lengths gradually become smaller towards sides creating uneven rim of threads ends, rim has been manipulated while hot to form asymmetrical rippling; no base.

Exhibitions (3)

Masters of Studio Glass: Toots Zynsky

Venue(s)

Corning Museum of Glass 2011-04-02 through 2011-12-04

A pioneer of the studio glass movement, Toots Zynsky draws from the traditions of painting, sculpture and the decorative arts to inspire her innovative, intricate vessels. Masters of Studio Glass: Toots Zynsky, featured 12 works representing the varied techniques and inspirations from throughout Zynsky’s career. Zynsky attended the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), where she was one of acclaimed artist Dale Chihuly’s first students. In 1971, she was part of a group of Chihuly’s friends and RISD students who founded the influential Pilchuck Glass School in Washington State. There, she made installations of slumped plate glass, and later experimented with video and performance work with artist Buster Simpson, incorporating hot and cold glass. This experimental work was critical to the development of using glass as a material to explore issues in contemporary art.