Persian Window by Dale Chihuly

		Dale Chihuly (born 1941) Persian Window, 1999–2000 and 2005 Blown glass F. V. du Pont Acquisition Fund and other contributions, 1999 and 2005 Left: Photo by Florian Holzher
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Dale Chihuly insists that his art revolves around a simple set of circumstances - fire, molten glass, human breath, spontaneity, centrifugal force and gravity. The combination of these essential ingredients results in works of immense power, poetry and beauty.  Internationally renowned, Dale Chihuly revolutionized the use of glass as a medium for large scale sculpture and environmental installations.  His work challenges traditional expectations with its scale, intense color, and organic form.

In the spring of 1999, the Delaware Art Museum commissioned internationally renowned artist Dale Chihuly to create a large site-specific work of art for the window facing Kentmere Parkway. Since its first appearance, Persian Window has transformed the Museum’s Upper Lobby into an environment of brilliant color, filtered and reflected light and fluid energy. Due to the singular importance and beauty of the piece and its popularity in Wilmington, the Museum acquired the work for the permanent collection with funds provided by the community at large and other public and private support. Completed in August 2000, the work of art consisted of 18 blown glass forms placed on an open architectural structure. When the Museum re-opened after reinstallation In June 2005, eleven more Persians were added to an installation designed by the artist as a trellis-archway for the new entrance.

Chihuly, who often creates series of related works, began to make the large round pieces he calls Persians in 1986.  The Persians take their inspiration from the colors and motifs of Persian carpets, as well as from ancient and Islamic glass traditions. Installed as a group, Persians create a luminous, colorful garden, a place of physical and spiritual delight, reminiscent of the gardens of paradise celebrated in Persian poetry.

Although the intensely colored forms are essentially abstract, they seem nature-based, evocative of spiraling forms and growth. The fluid shapes, swirling edges and decorative patterning of the forms in Persian Window suggest monumental floral shapes floating across the Museum’s Upper Lobby, connecting the Museum’s exterior landscape with its interior space.

Chihuly began experimenting with glass in his basement studio in Tacoma, Washington in the mid-1960s. Soon thereafter, he enrolled in Harvey Littleton’s Glass Program at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and the Sculpture Program at the Rhode Island School of Design. A Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Grant and Fulbright Fellowship enabled him to continue his studies in the prestigious Venini Glass Factory on the island of Murano in Venice, Italy. Here he was introduced to sophisticated glass blowing techniques dating back centuries and to the importance of studio teamwork. His observations in Italy led to future formal explorations in glass and to the development of a collaborative artistic effort known as “Team Chihuly,” the working basis of the Pilchuck Glass School he founded in Seattle in 1971. This internationally recognized glass center attracts students as well as artists from around the world.

Dale Chihuly is the recipient of numerous awards, including the honor of being named America’s first National Living Treasure in 1992. He has explored the potential of the ancient art of glass blowing, transforming its scope and reputation as an artistic medium worthy of critical acclaim and scholarly attention. He has thwarted traditional expectations of the blown glass medium through intense color and expanded scale and its redefinition as a non-functional medium. For decades, Chihuly’s work has blurred the distinctions between Craft and Art, abstraction and representation.

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For more information on Chihuly Studios, visit www.chihuly.com