Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America Search this
Type:
Sound recordings
Interviews
Citation:
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Harvey K. Littleton, 2001 March 15. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Topic:
Glass artists -- North Carolina -- Interviews Search this
William H. Holston Gallery (New York, N.Y.) Search this
Type:
Interviews
Sound recordings
Citation:
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Tom McGlauchlin, 2006 October 13. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
An interview of Harvey K. Littleton conducted 2001 March 15, by Joan Falconer Byrd, for the Archives of American Art's Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America, in Littleton's home, Spruce Pine, N.C.
Littleton speaks of his family background including the work of his father [Jesse Talbot Littleton] at Corning Glassworks, and his early experiences with glass at Corning. He discusses his studies at the University of Michigan in physics and his switch to sculpture; his studies at Cranbrook Academy, in 1941, and his teachers Marshall Fredericks and Carl Milles; his studies on industrial design; becoming a potter; and working at Corning Glassworks, in the summers, inspecting hand-blown coffee pots and top-of-the-stove ware. He discusses his service in the 849th Signal Intelligence Unit in North Africa and Italy during WWII; studying with Norah Braden, at the Brighton School of Art, in England; the importance of, "A Potter's Book," by Bernard Leach; teaching pottery at night, in Ann Arbor, Michigan; the beginnings of the Ann Arbor Potters Guild; making his own potters' wheels; serving on the board of Penland School of Crafts; the development of "American" art and the impact of the GI Bill on the creation and expansion of art departments; the "master-slave apprentice system"; "the genius of Shoji Hamada"; the properties of porcelain; artist communities at Penland and Cranbrook; the influence of Bill Brown, director of the Penland School of Crafts; art education and the impact of the MFA; Black Mountain College, Pilchuck Glass School, and Haystack Mountain School of Crafts; problems with the European educational system; the importance of Erwin Eisch's work on his development; his relationship with galleries and museums, particularly the Museum of Modern Art, the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, and American Craft Museum; and consignment laws. He also comments on the founding of the Midwest Designer Craftsmen; his involvement with the American Crafts Council (ACC) and the distinction between "the indigenous craftsman" and the "artist-craftsman"; American Crafts Council fairs; his printmaking; his techniques of sandblasting; teaching vitreography; and his plans for opening a print gallery. He recalls Charles Eames, Peter Voulkos, Shoji Hamada, Robert Turner, Dante Marioni, Fritz Dreisbach, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Harvey K. Littleton (1922- ) is a glass artist, potter, sculptor, and printmaker from Wisconsin and Spruce Pine, N.C. Joan Falconer Byrd (1939-) ia a professor in the art department of Western Carolina University, Cullowhee, N.C.
General:
Originally recorded on 3 sound cassettes. Reformatted in 2010 as 6 digital wav files. Duration is 3 hrs., 10 min.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
Topic:
Glass artists -- North Carolina -- Interviews Search this
An interview of Tom McGlauchlin conducted 2006 October 13, by Joan Falconer Byrd, for the Archives of American Art's Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America, at the Archives of American Art, Washington, D.C.
McGlauchlin speaks of his childhood in Wisconsin; receiving a B.S. and M.S. in Art from the University of Wisconsin, Madison; studying pottery with Harvey Littleton and Toshiko Takaezu; attending the first workshop for glassblowing at the Toledo Museum of Art in Toledo, Ohio in 1962; building his glass studio; teaching experiences at Cornell College; experiences as the Director of the Glass Program at the University of Toledo/Toledo Museum of Art; the rivalry between Harvey Littleton and Dominick Labino; his relationship with galleries throughout the years including Heller Gallery, Habatat Galleries, Holsten Galleries, Vespermann Gallery, Pismo Gallery, and others; his participation in Glass Art Society and National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts; his interest in textured surfaces; being influenced by Washington Color Field painters; the strong influence jazz has on his artwork; his involvement with the Art Tatum Jazz Heritage Festival in Toledo, Ohio; his plans to stop blowing glass in the near future; and his interest in working in pottery once again. McGlauchlin also recalls Clayton Bailey, Norm Schulman, Harvey Leafgreen, Otto Wittmann, Fritz Dreisbach, Russell Day, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Tom McGlauchlin (1934-2011) is an glass artist and potter from Toledo, Ohio. Joan Falconer Byrd (1939- ) is a ceramics professor from Cullowhee, North Carolina.
General:
Originally recorded on 2 sound discs. Reformatted in 2010 as 2 digital wav files. Duration is 1 hr., 58 min.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Mark Peiser, 2004 February 26. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Pilchuck Glass Center (Stanwood, Wash.) Search this
Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America Search this
Type:
Sound recordings
Interviews
Citation:
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Paul Stankard, 2006 June 9-August 20. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Richard Marquis, 2006 September 16. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Joel Philip Myers, 2007 May 1. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
An interview of Joel Philip Myers conducted 2007 May 1, by Daniel Klein, for the Archives of American Art's Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America, in the artist's home, in Marietta, Pennsylvania.
Myers speaks of his childhood in Patterson, New Jersey; making charcoal drawings as a child and taking private courses in oil painting; choosing to pursue a career in advertising design; attending Parsons School of Design in New York City; working as a package designer for Donald Deskey Associates; being influenced by Scandinavian design he saw in New York City to study abroad in Denmark; studying ceramic design at Kunsthaandvaerkerskolen in Copenhagen; meeting and marrying his wife, Birthe, while in Copenhagen; returning to the United States and going back to work for Donald Deskey; attending Alfred University and receiving his B.F.A. and M.F.A. in ceramics; accepting the position director of design for Blenko Glass Company in Milton, West Virginia with no previous experience in glass; teaching himself how to blow glass in the factory alongside the workers; the intense heat and extreme noise of a glass factory; learning of Harvey Littleton's glass workshop in 1962 in Toledo, Ohio, but being unable to attend; having limited exposure to the glass movement and developing his glass art without knowledge of the work of Littleton and his students; designing 50 to 60 different vases, bowls, decanters, and decorative objects a year from 1963 - 1970 at Blenko Glass Company; creating sculptural glass forms in his penetration pieces for his masters thesis; learning of what was happening in the studio glass world by attending the World Craft Council in 1964 in New York City; Paul Smith discovering his work and thereby gaining some publicity in Craft Horizons; being invited by Littleton to give a workshop at the University of California, Berkeley in 1968; the initial shock of seeing glass sculpture made with no real technique; his early attraction to cold-work in order to work intimately with the surface of the glass; acquisition of his work by the Toledo Art Museum and the Mint Museum of Art in Charlotte, North Carolina; establishing a glass program at Illinois University in Bloomington-Normal; his attempts to recruit international students; taking a semester sabbatical in Baden, Austria; being heavily influenced by the natural world; the series Garden, Perfume Bottle, Contiguous Fragment, Dr. Zharkov, The Dialogues, and others; teaching at Pilchuck School of Glass; studying the First World War and consequently creating Musée des Beaux Arts [1996]; travels to Japan; his teaching philosophies; the prevalence of independent glass studios in the world today; and plans for the future. Myers recalls Ted Randall, William H. Blenko, Sr., William H. Blenko, Jr., Marvin Lipofsky, Fritz Dreisbach, Richard Marquis, John Lewis, Bob Ness, Bertil Vallien, David Huchthausen, John Popelka, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Joel Philip Myers (1934- ) is a glass artist from Milton, West Virginia. Daniel Klein (1938- ) is an art consultant from London, England.
General:
Originally recorded on 3 sound discs. Reformatted in 2010 as 6 digital wav files. Duration is 4 hr., 15 min.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
An interview of Paul Stankard conducted 2006 June 9 and August 20, by Doug Heller, for the Archives of American Art's Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America, at the Heller Gallery, in New York, N.Y.
Stankard speaks of his family heritage and growing up in rural Massachusetts; attending Catholic school in North Attelboro, Massachusetts; his struggle with undiagnosed dyslexia throughout school; studying scientific glassblowing at Salem County Vocational Technical Institute; working in the scientific glass industry and feeling creatively stifled by its monotony; being intrigued by the flameworking of Charles Kaziun and Francis Whittemore, who both worked from the scientific glassblowing tradition; the satisfaction he felt from early experiments in making paperweights; the decision to leave his industry job to focus on flameworking and paperweight making; the secretive nature of the paperweight world; his early representation by paperweight dealers including Jack Feingold; experiences with Heller Gallery and Habatat Gallery; teaching experiences at Penland School of Crafts, Pilchuck Glass School, and Salem Community College; travels to Singapore, Japan, and Scotland; his involvement as a founding member of Creative Glass Center of America; his induction into the American Craft Council College of Fellows; the differences between the studio glass and paperweight fields in the 1960s and 1970s; working with his three daughters at Stankard Studio; the spirituality of his work; being influenced by Walt Whitman, Morris Graves, Robert Grant, and Edward Hopper; and being an enthused art collector. Stankard also recalls Harvey Littleton, Dominic Labino, Reese Paley, Mark Peiser, Erwin Eisch, Paul Hollister, Tom Patti, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Paul Stankard (1943- ) is a studio glass artist of Mantua, N.J. Doug Heller (1946- ) is a gallery owner and director of the Heller Gallery, New York, N.Y.
General:
Originally recorded on 4 sound discs. Reformatted in 2010 as 6 digital wav files. Duration is 3 hr., 32 min.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
Restrictions:
Transcript available on the Archives of American Art website.
An interview of Richard Marquis conducted 2006 September 16, by Mija Riedel, for the Archives of American Art's Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America, at the artist's home and studio, in Freeland, Washington.
Marquis speaks of his childhood spent moving around Arizona, Colorado, and California; his lifelong affinity for collecting objects; attending University of California, Berkeley; the influence of seeing the shows "Abstract Expressionist Ceramics" at the University of California at Irvine in 1966 and "American Sculpture of the Sixties" at Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 1967; receiving a Fulbright grant to study glassblowing in Murano, Italy; experiences at Venini Fabbrica Glass Factory in Murano; teaching experiences at University of Washington, Seattle and UCLA; traveling throughout Australia to set up glass workshops; working as artist-in-residence at Tasmanian School of Art in Hobart, Tasmania, Australia; establishing Marquis Deluxe Studios; large-scale installation collaborations with Therman Statom; the importance of teaching and sharing knowledge; the cyclical progression and diversity of his work; future plans to work less with glass and focus instead on daguerrotypes. Marquis also recalls Peter Voulkos, Ron Nagle, Marvin Lipofsky, James Melchert, Harvey K. Littleton, John Eubanks, John Pearson, Ludovico de Santillana, Lino Tagliapietra, Bob Naess, Fred Bauer, Nick Mount, Les Blakebrough, Jack Wax, Jody Fine, Therman Statom, Kenneth Price, Dante Marioni, Jerry Spagnoli, and Bill Concannon, among others.
Biographical / Historical:
Richard Marquis (1945- ) is glass artist and educator from Freeland, Washington. Mija Riedel (1958- ) is a curator and writer from San Francisco, California.
General:
Originally recorded on 4 sound discs. Reformatted in 2010 as 9 digital wav files. Duration is 4 hrs., 57 min.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
An interview of Mark Peiser conducted 2004 February 26, by Henry Halem, for the Archives of American Art's Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America, in Penland, North Carolina.
Peiser speaks of growing up in Chicago; his relationship with his parents; developing an early interest in music and engineering; attending Perdue University and transferring to the Institute of Design, Illinois Institute of Technology; working for a design firm in Chicago; becoming interested in glass after seeing an exhibit at the Art Institute of Chicago; attending a workshop at Penland School of Crafts; becoming Penland's first Artist-in-Residence in glass and developing a technique on his own; working with Fritz Dreisbach to set up the first Glass Art Society conference; making improvements to the Penland glass studio; teaching at Penland; making a living as an artist; making opal glass for the first time; choosing certain imagery and color in his work; experimenting with technique including glass casting; making his Innerspace series; his relationship with collectors; finding challenges with his latest body of work; and the influence of Zen on his art. Peiser also recalls Harvey Littleton, Bill Brown, Billy Bernstein, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Mark Peiser (1938- ) is a glass artist from Penland, North Carolina. Henry Halem (1938- ) is a glass artist from Kent, Ohio.
General:
Originally recorded on 3 sound discs. Reformatted in 2010 as 6 digital wav files. Duration is 3 hr., 55 min.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
Restrictions:
Transcript available on the Archives of American Art website.
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Fritz Dreisbach, 2004 April 21-22. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Robert Levin, 2004 December 11. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Flora Mace and Joey Kirkpatrick, 2005 August 17-18. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
An interview of Fritz Dreisbach conducted 2004 April 21-22, by Susanne Frantz, for the Archives of American Art's Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America, in Tucson, Arizona.
Dreisbach speaks of growing up in Ohio, in a family of educators and deciding at an early age to become a teacher; taking high school art; pursuing a BA in art and mathematics at Hiram College; getting his MAT and teaching high school math; attending the University of Iowa to study painting; the impact of taking a summer class in glassblowing; visiting Dominick Labino at his studio; researching colored glass and glass chemistry; becoming Harvey K. Littleton's teaching assistant at the University of Wisconsin, Madison; building a hot shop and teaching at the Toledo Museum of Art; teaching at Penland School of Crafts; creating the Glass Art Society with Mark Peiser after attending a NCECA conference; moving to Seattle to make glass colors for The Glass Eye; and working for Spectrum Glass Company. Dreisbach also speaks of the importance of community among glass artists; taking part in glass symposia in Frauenau, Germany; traveling around the country to teach workshops, known as his "Road Show"; making representational pop-style pieces as well as historical reference pieces; collaborating on a stained glass window with Gary Noffke; developing techniques for making goblets; working with Dante Marioni on a series of goblets; his commissioned pieces, including the Corning Pokal; engraving glass; his Mongo series; selling works through galleries; the influence of the Italian glass artists; teaching at Pilchuck Glass School; Dominick Labino's career and innovations in glass technology; being invited to give the Samuel R. Scholes lecture at the New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University; serving twice as Glass Art Society president; inaccuracies in the history of American studio glass; taking part in GAS conferences at Fenton Glass Factory; the importance of the rise of the university-trained glass artist in the 1960s; going to Pilchuck for the first time; meeting international glass artists; attending symposia at Novy Bor, Czech Republic; and his plans for the future. Dreisbach also recalls Tom McGlauchlin, Clayton Bailey, Erwin Eisch, Dale Chihuly, Bill Brown, Marvin Lipofsky, Joel Myers, Billy Bernstein, Dan Dailey, Dudley Giberson, Harvey Leafgreen, Bill Boysen, Henry Halem, Peter Voulkos, Ruth Tamura, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Fritz Dreisbach (1941- ) is a glass artist from Tucson, Arizona. Susanne Frantz is a writer and curator from Paradise Valley, Arizona.
General:
Originally recorded on 8 sound discs. Reformatted in 2010 as 21 digital wav files. Duration is 8 hr., 41 min.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
An interview of Flora Mace and Joey Kirkpatrick conducted 2005 August 17-18, by Lloyd E. Herman, for the Archives of American Art's Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America, at the artists' home and studio, in Seattle, Washington.
They discuss their first meeting at Pilchuck Glass School in Stanwood, Washington, in 1979; the structure of classes and teaching philosophies at Pilchuck in the late '70s and early '80s; the change in equipment and the growth of the Pilchuck campus through the years; their first projects together, which were wire drawings made by Flora and based on Joey's sketches; leaving Pilchuck after the summer session and moving together to Waterville, New Hampshire, where they worked in a studio at the Rhode Island School of Design with Dale Chihuly; building up a body of work and then having to decide whose work it was, at a time when collaborating and co-signing was not standard practice; going back to Pilchuck every summer for 14 years after first meeting there in 1979; beginning to teach as a collaborative team at Pilchuck in 1981, the first women to teach glass blowing at that school; building their house together on the grounds of Pilchuck, a design which was then emulated for dormitories at the school; convincing Dale Chihuly to lower the class size at Pilchuck to 10, down from 20, to allow teachers to work more closely with the students; early shows of their work at Habatat Galleries in Royal Oak, Michigan, Ivor Kurland Gallery in Los Angeles, California, and Foster-White Galleries in Seattle, Washington; the support of their sisters and families throughout the years, mostly in providing them a place to stay as they traveled cross country; their relationships with collectors; what each artist brings to the partnership, including vision, inspiration, and technique; the influence of water on their work, as both artists are drawn to the sea and the tides; the purpose of their work, and what they feel it can bring to the viewer; the challenge given to the artists by Joan Borenstein to make 30 glass goblets, all with different fruits and vegetables; having their work cast at the Walla Walla Foundry; and the ideas behind various bodies of work, including the "Bird Pages" and the large latticino fruit. A more in-depth discussion of each artist's childhood, education, and artistic experiences prior to their meeting at Pilchuck can be found in the individual artist's interviews. They recall Italo Scanga, Bill Morris, Ben Moore, Rich Royal, Howard Ben Tre, Toots Zynsky, Therman Statom, Harvey Littleton, Lino Tagliapetra, Chris Wilmarth, Judy Pfaff, Lynda Benglis, Alice Rooney, Bertil Vallien, Ann Wolff, Betsy Rosenfield, George and Dorothy Saxe, Doug and Dale Anderson, Jon and Mary Shirley, Sarah and Bill Dehoff, Francine and Benson Pilloff, George Stroemple, Ann Welch, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Joey Kirkpatrick (1952- ) and Flora Mace (1949- ) are glass artists from Seattle, Washington. Lloyd E. Herman (1936- ) is a curator and former director of the Smithsonian American Art Museum's Renwick Gallery of Art and is currently from Seattle, Washington. Mace and Kirkpatrick have been working collaboratively on glass since the late 1970s.
General:
Originally recorded on 3 sound discs. Reformatted in 2010 as 5 digital wav files. Duration is 3 hrs., 17 min.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
