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From the Hands of the Maestro

L I NOtagliapietra

Last night, I was thinking...

“At night, strange thoughts come, sometimes bad, sometimes creative. I thought last night, how to answer the question... ‘Where do you get inspiration?’

It is often at night, you wake up and you’re working and you dream or think of doing something different, something a little crazy and definitely new. For example, Kenia is a product of the night, also Osaka, Fuji and Avventura.

To have ideas or inventions at night is easy; what is difficult is to implement them. I can do it if I work in the morning or during the following days. It is most frustrating if I cannot try immediately because the ideas overlap. It’s like putting white sheets of paper one over the other and covering those dreams which are asking to be.

You ask, ‘Why don’t you draw?’I tried and it does not work for me. I realize I draw while working; I need the raw glass, the color, the fire, to SWEAT. My concentration is in putting together dreams and trying to make them become reality.”

lino tagliapietra, 2011

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With the advent of the 50th anniversary of the birth of the american studio glass Movement*, it is fitting that lino tagliapietra is to be honored with a major retrospective exhibition at the Museum of glass in tacoma, Washington. it is certain that since arriving in 1979 to teach at the pilchuck glass school in stanwood Washington, lino has been a major influence and inspiration to three generations of artists working in glass and has been a leader in defining the studio glass Movement. lino's generosity and creative spirit has transformed the movement through his example of work ethic, innovation and dedication.

lino's passion for expression and creativity is perhaps at its highest. lino continues to experiment and push the glass medium in his quest to bring to light new form, pattern and texture. it is the Maestro's unsurpassed technical expertise which affords him the great freedom of expression. lino has continued his quest for experimentation this past year at the Museum of glass, Bullseye glass factory, pilchuck school and Massachusetts institute of technology. it was at these locations that lino was able to take his work into uncharted territory and to a new level. lino's willingness to engage with the glass community, share his enthusiasm and be a strong mentor brings a constant exchange of new energy to his own work. this is best represented by lino's latest series highlighted in this exhibition catalog. these include the dramatic osaka, fuji, fenice and Venice series produced during the past year are the result of his ongoing exploration and commitment to his art.

We are honored to present lino tagliapietra's incredible range of artistry with this catalog. it is our humble offering of an insight into his enormous passion for creativity, the intense energy sustained to make his art and the birth of each new form as it evolves from a gather of molten glass at the end of a punty into pulled or twisted cane. Cut into lengths or chopped into murrini, these prime elements are composed into a complex design and then expertly blown or fused into a form - all from the heart, mind, soul and hands of the Maestro.

Jim schantz and Kim saul, 2011

Acknowledgements: We wish to thank Lino and Lina Tagliapietra for their passion for life and friendship. We would like to also extend our gratitude to Cecilia Chung, who has been so instrumental in managing Lino's career. Thank you to Marty and Eric Demaine, David Walters and James Yood for their contribution to this catalog.

* 2012 marks the anniversary of the first experimental glassblowing workshops with Harvey K. Littleton and

Dominick Labino at the Toledo Museum of Art.

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there are (at the very least!) two reasons why each new exhibition of the work of lino tagliapietra is an opportunity for celebration, the first because of who he is, and the second because of what he does. it just has to be acknowledged - there are probably no two words more respected and honored in the history of modern sculpture in glass than ‘Lino Tagliapietra’; he is the living bridge, the crucial link between the august history of Venetian glass (he was even born in Murano and began his career there at the age of 11) and the ceaseless wonders of what we today call the modern studio glass movement.

in his 77 years he has seen the context of sculpture in glass shift, from his role as a certified ‘Maestro Vetraio’ (Master of glass, at age 21) working within the skilled workshop and artisanal traditions of for-profit firms with regular product lines, to the current situation where a sculptor functions as an independent artist in his or her studio. tagliapietra not only witnessed this, he helped bring it into being, beginning in the 1960s when american artists (littleton, Chihuly, lipofsky, etc.) began to find their way to Murano coveting the skills and techniques that only tagliapietra and his colleagues possessed. tagliapietra shared his knowledge with those artists and more, and beginning in 1979 began to visit the Us regularly, leading workshops and classes all over the country, accelerating (i would argue) the technical proficiency of a generation of american artists through his generous transmission of his consummate mastery of Venetian techniques (please feel free to Youtube him to see a master at work). tagliapietra himself was changed by these encounters too, responding favorably to the independence and ambition and risk-taking spirit of american artists, and, after 42 years of working for Muranese firms and glass factories in 1988 he became an independent artist.

that’s a nice tale, and a true one, and a month doesn’t go by that some american sculptor who works in glass doesn’t speak to me with awe about the privilege of having watched tagliapietra work and possibly crewed for him. But this is not just about what tagliapietra knows and has witnessed, it is about what he does, and continues to do. More than sixty years of working with glass in the finest workshops both in italy and around the world have given him what are almost singular and unique skills with glass, built upon a thousand-year-old tradition and applied today with great beauty and elegance.

from his work with filigrana into reticello, zanfirico and murrine into incalmo, working with blown or fused glass, the arenas of his inquiry into the possibilities of glass seem literally endless. his recent Fuji and Osaka series and his new Venice wall panels in subtly different ways skirt the edges of expressionism, providing tagliapietra a more painterly and inherently visually risky platform than he has regularly investigated, a kind of foil for the consummate elegance he continues to achieve today particularly in the capricious Fenice series, some of those as close to a giddy giggle as anything i’ve seen in any branch of contemporary art.

exult in the rhythmic sweep of an Angel Tear or a Bilbao or a Dinosaur, see how it plays toward and against the vessel tradition, stretching its limits to a kind of poignancy and grazia. it is the assuredness of his activity that continues to amaze, the sheer pleasure of watching someone, in this case someone who has been a maestro for 56 years, work his will, seemingly effortlessly, over his material, making it look so easy and inevitable that the thousands and thousands of hours of experiment and experience seem to slip away. the hands of the master - dalle mani dei maestro - after all, are directed by that master’s mind and eye and shoulders and wrists, and lino tagliapietra’s hands they are led by the very best.

James Yood, 2011

James Yood teaches art history at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and writes regularly for GLASS magazine.

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“All life has a pulse to accompany it, but some lives produce a certain rhythm that is beautiful to watch. The rhythm of Lino’s life gets more beautiful and fun to watch as it develops and his improvisational mind travels through it. It shows in the language of his work as it does in the way he moves through the world. It is for this reason he is a Maestro and now Dr., but most importantly he is a master of living and squeezing all there is to be had of the human experience.”

Dave Walters, artist, 2011

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lino @ Mitour collaboration with lino tagliapietra at the Massachusetts institute of technology (Mit) explores how geometry and computer science can influence the design of blown glass.

lino first visited Mit in october 2009 to give a public lecture about his work. in addition to showing his amazing pieces and techniques, we found it striking how much lino stressed the history of blown glass, making him a genuine scholar in addition to an artist. a second visit happened in october 2010, when lino came for a week. the glass lab is small, tucked into a small room in the basement of Mit campus. fortunately, lino finds this quaintness charming, (“like the old way”). While the tools in the glass lab are all traditional, the surrounding science and technology of Mit has started to creep into its influences. Being both glass blowers and scientists, our goal has been to pursue these connections more thoroughly, hoping to change the way people blow glass or think about blowing glass.

Back during his second visit, we asked lino about a new project idea to use computational and geometric techniques to design new glass cane. Cane is made by pulling a fat cylinder of colored glass into a very long string, often twisted to produce a fine, intricate color pattern that later gets incorporated into a glass sculpture. While there are dozens of standard cane designs, few new patterns have been designed in the past few decades. We asked lino whether he thought there were any new cane designs to be found, and he encouraged us with his belief that there were many new designs yet to be found. over the intervening several months, with a team of seven, we developed a first version of our virtual glass blowing software, whose current focus is around pulling, twisting, and arranging cane.

this past september, lino visited eager to explore new cane designs and make several large pieces. We presented him with a couple dozen designs that we had come up with on the computer, some of which we were not certain how to make when constrained by the reality of glass blowing. lino immediately saw how to make all of them, and chose a few designs that seemed particularly attractive according to our simulations. During the week of his visit, he pulled the cane and incorporated them into his larger pieces. lino turning our virtual designs into reality was the ultimate compliment. this experiment also represented the first time that lino put twisty cane into murrini pickups that he formed into vessels.* lino also gave us lots of useful feedback on the cane software, illustrating by way of example how cane warps and transforms depending on what final shape it becomes (bowl, cylinder, plate, etc.). it amazes us how lino has been such an icon of glass blowing for so many years, yet remains at the forefront, advancing the frontiers of ideas in glass. not only is lino the best glassblower in the world, but he is also the most open and sharing of his knowledge, techniques, and ideas.

erik D. Demaine & Martin l. Demaine

* Images are unavailable at time of publication. To see works created at MIT, contact Schantz Galleries.

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awards

1996 rakow Commission for excellence in glass award, the Corning Museum of glass, nY, Usa1996 Urbanglass award for preservation of glassblowing techniques, nY, Usa1996, 1998 Venezia aperto Vetro, guest of honour, invited guest, Venice, italy1997 glass art society lifetime achievement award, Usa1997 Urkunde goldmedaille, germany1998 libensky award, Chateau ste Michelle Vineyards and Winery and pilchuck glass school, Wa, Usa2000 humana Distinguished professor, Centre College, Kentucky, Usa2001 Metal for excellence in Craft award, the society of arts and Crafts, Boston, Ma, Usa2004 honorary Doctor of humane letters, Centre College, KY, Usa2004 the president’s Distinguished artist award, University of the arts, philadelphia, pa, Usa2004 artist as hero award, national liberty Museum, philadelphia, pa, Usa2004 artist Visionaries! lifetime achievement award, Museum of arts & Design, nY, Usa2006 Distinguished educator award, James renwick alliance of the smithsonian american art Museum Washington D.C., Usa2007 Cristal award, Museo del Vidrio, Monterrey, Mexico2007 foreign honorary Member, american academy of arts and sciences, Cambridge, Ma, Usa2009 the iiC lifetime achievement award, istituto italiano di Cultura, los angeles, Ca, Usa2010 Master teacher/Master artist, hite art institute, University of louisville, KY, Usa2011 Master of Medium award, James renwick alliance, Washington DC2011 honorary Degree, Doctor of fine arts, ohio state University, Columbus, oh

l i n o t a g l i a p i e t r a

selected Museum exhibitions and Collections

China: shanghai Museum of glass, shanghai · franCe: Musee des arts Decoratifs, paris · gerManY: Kestner Museum, hannover · italY: aperto Vetro, Venice·Biennale di Venezia·palazzo grassi, Venice·palazzo franchetti, Venice · Japan: hokkaido Museum of Modern art, sapporo·Kitazawa Museum of arts, takane-cho· tokyo national Modern art Museum·toyama City institute of glass · MeXiCo: Museo del Vidrio, Monterrey · the netherlanDs: glasmuseum, ebeltoft·Danish royal Museum, Copenhagen·Museum Boymans, rotterdam·Museum het paleis, the haag · sWitZerlanD: Musee des arts Decoratifs, losanna · UniteD KingDoM: Victoria and albert Museum, london

· UniteD states: Bellevue art Museum, Wa · Carnegie Museum of art, pittsburgh, pa · Chrysler Museum of art, norfolk,Va · Columbia Museum, sC · Columbus Museum of art, oh · Corning Museum of glass, nY · the Dayton art institute, oh · the Detroit institute of arts, Mi · fuller Museum of art, Brockton, Ma · hunter art Museum, Chattanooga, tn · the Jewish Museum, san francisco, Ca · M.h. de Young Memorial Museum, san francisco, Ca · Marianna Kistler Beach Museum of art, Ks · Mary and leigh Block Museum of art, Chicago, il · the Metropolitan Museum of art, nY · Mint Museum of Craft and Design, Charlotte, nC

· Montgomery Museum of fine arts, al · the Museum of fine arts, houston, tX · Museum of art, Washington state University, Wa · Museum of arts and Design, nY · Museum of glass, tacoma, Wa · national Museum of Ceramic art and glass, Baltimore, MD · norton Museum of art, West palm Beach, fl · orlando Museum, fl · palm springs art Museum, Ca · racine art Museum, Wi · renwick gallery of the smithsonian american art Museum, DC · scottsdale Museum of Contemporary art, aZ · seattle art Museum, Wa · spencer Museum of art, Ks · stanford University, palo alto,Ca · toledo Museum of art, oh

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published 2011 by schantz galleries

artwork photos:russell JohnsonWorking photos: Kim saul

D a l l e M a n i D e l M a e s t r o

f r o M t h e h a n D s o f t h e M a e s t r o

t h e a r t o f l i n o t a g l i a p i e t r a

“...there are probably no two words more respected and honored in the history of modern sculpture in glass than ‘Lino Tagliapietra’; he is the living bridge, the crucial link between the august history of Venetian glass and the ceaseless wonders of what we today call the modern Studio Glass movement.”

Schantz GallerieS c o n t e m p o r a r y a r t

3 E l m S t r e e tS toc k b r i d g e , MA 0 1 2 6 2

4 1 3 · 2 98 · 3044 www . s c h a n t z g a l l e r i e s . c o m