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Introduction to Objects

INTRODUCTION TO OBJECTS

My work is about illusion and allusion, the play of light and shadow, the mystery and resonance of time. Glass captures the process of remembering and, as the light fades, forgetting. Light is my medium, glass my material, and memory – elusive as it is – my theme.

I am fascinated by the visual vocabularies that societies create to manifest their beliefs, desires, and rituals. I am drawn to historical pieces because they are simultaneously enigmatic and revealing in what they say about the cultures that invented and utilized them.

To know a painting, the art student paints it. To analyze a building, the architect draws it. To understand an object from the past, I make it. When I find something that intrigues me in a flea market, antique store, or book, I learn about its role and function. I then reimagine it in my own version, with my own narrative, adding another dimension to the story. Reinterpreted, a piece feels at once contemporary and old-world. Rendered in glass, altered in scale, and stripped of decoration, it is distilled and its essence exposed.

I draw from a wide range of influences and eras – alchemy, a Baroque floral still life, a painting by Giorgio Morandi, flea market finds – to create timeless narratives. I am also interested in the scientific exploration of the 1600s, a time of schism between science and religion, when natural phenomena previously accepted as divinely bestowed became the subjects of physical experimentation. Traveling in Florence, I came across a museum containing instruments invented by Galileo and others, things I had seen only in books: barometers, magnifying lenses, telescopes, and microscopes. I had been blowing glass for a while by then, and looking at the materiality of these devices, I suddenly understood: glass is a lens to the unseen world.

After more than twenty years, these elements of history and science remain a deep well of inspiration, an endless resource that I continue to draw from in all of my work. That is how my process and story as an artist begins.

  • Still life

  • Detail of Morandi's studio Diderot etchings

  • Bottle sketch Detail Flemish painting Still life

  • Form studies charcoal and oil pastel Alchemy still life

  • Tear Vial

  • Photo transfer collage

  • Form study Wedding goblets

  • Grappa bottle, Cast bottle Bottle with cast base and glass

  • Cup and Heart

  • Water bottles Drawing - graphite on mylar

  • Detail Water bottles

  • Bar set series

  • Bar set Studio cabinet detail

  • Still life

  • COMME DES GARÇONS

    Rei Kawakubo, the founder of Comme des Garçons, purchased some of my objects in the mid-1990s. Fascinated by the intersection of art and fashion, she was, at that time, commissioning installations for her Tokyo flagship store by artists whose work resonated with the spirit and aesthetic of her designs. She saw a connection between the layering in her clothing and the transparency and translucency of my work, and so invited me to create objects for a season's collection centered on that theme. I proposed taking the concept further, by building an entire environment for the façade of the store, one that would blur boundaries between interior and exterior through transparent divisions of space. Inspired by Giacometti's 1932 sculpture The Palace at 4 a.m., I made a series of large glass boxes that jutted out onto the busy sidewalk, interrupting the flow of pedestrian traffic. Inside, my glass vessels were placed on the floor like plants in a greenhouse, enticing viewers in the midst of a bustling urban setting to stop, bend down, and be quietly transported for a moment.

  • Giacommeti, The Palace at 4am Detail of installation

  • Comme des Garçons, Toyko installation

  • Comme des Garçons, Toyko installation

  • Comme des Garçons, Toyko installation

  • HERMÈS

    "Only the horse knows how the saddle fits" was the original slogan of Hermès, whose humble beginning was as a maker of equestrian gear. When I was commissioned by the company to create pieces for the tabletop, I reinterpreted that tenet, as "only the hand knows how the object feels." I set out to design items as simple, useful, and pure as a bridle for a horse. With the Balance Line Collection, my goal was to make objects that transcend time—heirlooms for the next generation.

  • Inspirations, Collage

  • Balance Line collection

  • Balance Line collection

  • Oil and vinegar

  • Salt and pepper cellars

  • Balance Line Collection