CHIHULY IS CLEARLY & UTTERLY BEAUTIFUL AT NY BOTANICAL GARDEN NOW

CHIHULY

Glass artists capture the beauty of clear. What you see through and how you see through it, catching, reflecting, and passing through light are the focus.

Preeminent glass artist Dale Chihuly loves to work and play with the clear and translucent qualities glass. He’s developed countless innovations, in both design and process.

Chihuly excels, not only in his vision, artistry, and craft in creating his sculptures, but he takes it even farther with his large scale installations. Expanding from glass to ice and water, his sculptures transform landscapes, cityscapes, and public gardens.

The clear glass walls and roofs of conservatories are what originally inspired Dale Chihuly to develop exhibitions within botanical gardens. Chihuly’s current exhibition at the New York Botanical Garden (NYCB) highlights the synergy between his organic glass shapes and the natural environment.  

There are over 20 installations on view throughout NYCB’s 250-acre National Historic Landmark landscape.

Many of Chihuly forms are inspired by nature so they fit well in garden settings, teasing us into considering them as flora, while Chihuly’s ultra glossy surfaces and radical designs offer fresh contrasting accent. We see this interplay throughout the NYCB’ exhibition, beginning with the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, a landmark Victorian-style glasshouse, where Chihuly’s pointed green spears of glass have been paired with near-identical-looking plants, in the hallway. 

The Haupt Conservatory, is one of Chihuly’s favorites. Check out the epic “White Tower with Fiori” as it sparkles, rising up through the green hothouse foliage towards the domed glass ceiling.

Passionate color, ranging from baby’s breath pastels to intense jewel tones, is a major signature, some of which are created from rare minerals that are illegal to import in the US, so he creates many pieces in glass factories in Finland and Murano, Italy.

Vibrant blue, for example, is Chihuly’s muse in “Blue Polyvitro Crystals” located in NYCB’s Lillian Goldman Fountain of Life and “Sapphire Star,” located in the Janet Ross Conifer Arboretum.  Chihuly’s “Blue Herons” are showcased in a display entitled Persian Pond and Fiori within the Haupt Conservatory.

The water features in NYCB’s Native Plant Garden and the Haupt Conservatory Courtyard’s Tropical Pool amplify Chihuly’s mastery of clear beauty, reflecting and doubling the effect. “Neon” is especially beautiful when lit, reflecting off a courtyard pool at night.

“Koda,” one of his newest series consists of colored glass panels that offer an ever-changing reflection of light, as day transitions to night.

NYCB’s LuEsther T. Mertz Library Building displays some of Chihuly’s early, now iconic, works. We especially love the grouping of “Fire Orange Baskets,” not only for their graceful forms, but for their reference to solid woven Northwest Native American baskets.

Chihuly first discovered the beauty of glass while studying interior design at the University of Washington. He then enrolled in the first glass program in the country, at the University of Wisconsin, and continued studies at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), where he later established the glass program and taught for more than a decade.

In 1968, after receiving a Fulbright Fellowship, Chihuly went to work at the Venini glass factory in Venice, where he observed the team approach to blowing glass. Chihuly adopted the team methodology and works with it to this day.

Chihuly cofounded esteemed Pilchuck Glass School in Washington State which led the development of glass as a fine art.

Over the past four decades, Chihuly has had dozens of major exhibitions at top museums, gardens, and city sites around the world.

For more information about Dale Chihuly and his art, see Chihuly Shines Bright & Beautiful Now. For more clearly beautiful glass art, check out Astonishing Glass Art Happening Right Now and 10 Beautiful Glass Books Now.

Read more about Clearly Beautiful in The Most Beautiful Clear Bird’s-Eye View. 

And check out more beautiful things happening now in BN Arts/Design, Nature/Science, Food/Drink, Place/Time, Mind/Body, and Soul/Impact Daily Fix posts.

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IMAGE CREDITS:

1. Image: by Shira White. “Float Boat.” Sculpture by Chihuly. New York Botanical Garden. New York.
2. Image: “Palazzo Ducale Tower.” Sculpture by Dale Chihuly. Courtesy of New York Botanical Garden. New York Botanical Garden. New York.
3. Image: by Shira White. “Sol del Citrón.” Sculpture by Chihuly. New York Botanical Garden. New York.
4. Image: “Sapphire Star.” Sculpture by Dale Chihuly. Courtesy of New York Botanical Garden. New York Botanical Garden. New York.
5. Image: “Sol del Citrón.” Sculpture by Dale Chihuly. Courtesy of New York Botanical Garden. New York Botanical Garden. New York.
6. Image: “White Tower with Fiori.” Sculpture by Dale Chihuly. Courtesy of New York Botanical Garden. New York Botanical Garden. New York.
7. Image: “Red Reeds on Logs.” Sculpture by Dale Chihuly. Courtesy of New York Botanical Garden. New York Botanical Garden. New York.
8. Image: “Blue Polyvitro Crystals.” Sculpture by Dale Chihuly. Courtesy of New York Botanical Garden. New York Botanical Garden. New York.
9. Image: “Neon.” Sculpture by Dale Chihuly. Courtesy of New York Botanical Garden. New York Botanical Garden. New York.
10. Image: “Fire Orange Baskets.” Sculpture by Dale Chihuly. Courtesy of New York Botanical Garden. New York Botanical Garden. New York.
11. Image: “Seaform.” Sculpture by Dale Chihuly. Courtesy of New York Botanical Garden. New York Botanical Garden. New York.
12. Image: “Macchia Forest.” Sculptures by Dale Chihuly. Courtesy of New York Botanical Garden. New York Botanical Garden. New York.
13. Image: by Shira White. Glass Reeds in Enid A. Haupt Conservatory. Sculpture by Chihuly. New York Botanical Garden. New York.
14. Photo: Courtesy of Chihuly & Fairchild Garden. “Sapphire Star.” New York Botanical Garden. New York.
15. Image: by Shira White. “Neon.” Sculpture by Chihuly. New York Botanical Garden. New York.
16. Image: by Shira White. “Scarlet & Yellow Icicle Tower.” Sculpture by Chihuly.
17. Image: by BN App - Download now!
18. Image: “Red Reeds on Logs.” Sculpture by Dale Chihuly. Courtesy of New York Botanical Garden.