Iris Nestler
Meeting Point London
Under the title, ‘ASPECTS of 20th Century Glass’ the BSMGP announced this conference already months in advance as a ’special event’ to its members and on its homepage. The two days of continuous events in the summer of 2008 were excellently organised by Adelle Corrin, in collaboration with the ‘Worshipful Company of Glaziers’. Full of information and worthwhile ‘talks’ in an exceedingly pleasant atmosphere and humorously enriched with ‘performances’ by one or other of the artists. The conference, organised mainly for members of BSMGP and the Glaziers Company, took place in the venerable Glaziers Hall adjacent to London Bridge. It began with a greeting and introduction by Caroline Benyon, board member of the BSMGP.
The lecture by the American Julie L. Sloan about the austere structures of the ‘Prairie School’ and the ‘Chicago School’ offered a comprehensive insight into the highlights of the earliest modern buildings, as in Philadelphia, Minnesota, Iowa and New York.
On Thursday it continued with art historian Libby Horner presenting us with her discovery, the artist Frank Brangwyn. The Belgian born artist’s pictorial work is known about but not his glass painting oeuvre, like the windows in Bucklebury, Berkshire or the Zevenkerken Abbey near Bruges.
After a tea break the richly diversified programme, presented by Michael Barker, traced the development in French glass painting of the last century starting with Maurice Denis, followed by Braque, Leger, Rouault, of course Chagall, Manessier, Miro and Matisse’s creation for the famous Chapelle de Rosaire in Vence.
After lunch it was now my theme, ‘The influence of the classical modern on German glass painting in the first half of the 20th century’. Starting with a long quote from the famous utopistic Paul Scheerbart and Bruno Taut’s pavilion at the ‘Werkbund-Ausstellung’ in Cologne in 1914, it was important to outline Gottfried Heinersdorf and his relationship to Prikker, Pechstein, Karl-Schmidt-Rottluff and Kirchner. One asks oneself what actually happened in the time between Prikker and Meistermann, between the concept of the Glass Chain and Heinz Mack’s utopian glass chapel. How much did Josef Albers, with his grid mounted image and his ground breaking sandblasting at the end of the 20s and his now many destroyed windows, influence these artists? In effect we rediscover similar abstract rhythmic stylistics in Campendonk, Klos, Mack and Luther. Albers’ kinetic playfulness continues in the work of Joachim Klos and his pupil Alexander Beleschenko. His evening presentation accompanied by David Ball, Master of the Worshipful Company of Glaziers and chairperson of BSMGP, was impressive.
Beleschenko is able to unite art and architecture in a way that no other can. The architect Richard MacCormac wrote about the artist: ‘(…) this transfer from painted to glass is not superficial. It is mediated by an exceptional understanding of glass itself, its intrinsic characteristics, its behaviour in light, not just its transparencies and translucencies, but the effects of enamelling, etching, sowing and chipping’. (1) Now he is working with Derix Taunusstein again.
Narcissus Quagliata, Kaohsiung. (Photo: Derix Glasstudios, Taunusstein)
Marcus Lüpertz, Fenster in St. Andreas, Köln. (Photo: Martin Duckek, Ulm)
On the Thursday afternoon of the BSMGP conference the company, with its speaker Andrea McKay, presented itself in exemplary fashion. They presented the newest works by Markus Lüpertz, Gerhard Richter, Narcissus Quagliata, work by Tobias Kammerer, Keiko Mokaide, Mel Howse, Mark Gulsrud, Raphael Seitz, Douglas Hogg and many others was presented. The last was the latest pane by Johannes Schreiter dedicated to his wife who had died the previous year.
On the second day of the conference after an introduction by the art historian Peter Cormack, Patrick Reyntiens, the doyen of British glass painting of the 20th century held a series of lectures. His talk equalled a performance, a happening with many humorous asides and serious passages. He led off with glass painterly contrasts of works by his teacher John Piper. He demonstrated works by his own pupils, whom he amongst others taught at the Pilchuck Glass School, Stanwood, Washington and at the Edinburgh College of Art. At the end Reyntiens showed us a few examples of his own version of the Commedia dell’Arte, cartoonish painterly perfection on glass.
Thereafter the architect and curator of monuments Donald Buttress gave us a historic review entitled, ‘New wine in old bottles’ or ‘New glass in old windows’. It dealt with the professional completion of historic windows and the integration of historic fragments in modern composition, not an easy assignment. His examples went as far back as the 19th century.
It continued with Historic Preservation . Julie L. Sloan spoke about the decidedly extensive restoration of St. Thomas’ Church in New York, begun in 2007 and the largest restoration project ever undertaken in the USA.
After the lunch break the content remained historic and was introduced by David Ball, Master of the Glaziers Company. Peter Cormack’s lecture on the Arts & Crafts Movement in Great Britain around 1900, starting with Christopher Wall, offered an insight into works by Margaret Agnes Rope, Karl Parsons and many others. Following that Martin Harrison, specialist in Victorian glass painting, but also Francis Bacon (!) lectured back and forth between history and the present. He spoke about these remarkable contrasts in British glass painting of the 20th century which, on the one hand still keep to the Gothic heritage, and on the other produce artists like Clarke and Beleschenko. On the whole this conference was studded with history, that of the first half of the 20th century and undoubtedly the BSMGP will organise a sequel in order to look at glass painting covering the entire 20th century, or so Caroline Benyon has already intimated. An exciting two days came to an end and among the 132 international participants there were also six Germans. It is worth being there in the future!
(1) in: Iris Nestler (editor): Alexander Beleschenko. Glass-Interventions. Bönen/Germany 2002, page 8.