Saturday, April 6 – May 25, 2002
Opening reception Saturday April 6, 2002

The Arthur Roger Gallery is pleased to announce an exhibition of the sculpture of Dale Chihuly, the world’s foremost glass artist. This important exhibit will be throughout the gallery’s three exhibition spaces and will be comprised of glass sculpture which has never been shown before and which is being created by Chihuly specifically for his New Orleans show at the Arthur Roger Gallery. In Dale Chihuly’s superb new glass work he moves in the direction of more organic, free flowing forms that are often arranged asymmetrically.

Dale Chihuly has led the avant-garde in the development of glass as a fine art. He has carried out a lifelong exploration of the fluid capabilities of glass. Dale Chihuly has transformed the perception of glass, a medium from one used primarily for decorative vessels to a sculptured medium of almost unlimited possibilities. His undulating glass sculptures with ruffled edges, biomorphic forms and varied colorings are suggestive of tropical shells and flowers. Chihuly excels in producing work that tests the technical limits of his medium and shows off the interaction of glass and light. There is a singular luminous beauty and exuberance in Chihuly’s glass baskets, Persian wall pieces and seaforms.

In 1999, Chihuly mounted his most ambitious installation to date: Chihuly in the Light of Jerusalem; more than one million visitors attended the Tower of David Museum to view his installations. In 2001 the Victoria and Albert Museum in London curated the Chihuly exhibition at the V&A. His first major glass house exhibition, Chihuly in the Park: A Garden of Glass is currently on display at the Garfield Park Conservatory in Chicago. Chihuly exhibited at the Salt Lake Art Center during the 2002 Olympic Winter Games and Paralympic Games in Salt Lake City, Utah. The Chihuly Bridge of Glass In Tacoma, Washington will be dedicated in 2002.

Born in 1941 in Tacoma, Washington, Dale Chihuly was introduced to glass while studying interior design at the University of Washington. After graduating in 1965, Chihuly enrolled in the first glass program in the country at the University of Wisconsin. He continued his studies at the Rhode Island School of Design where he later established the glass program and taught for over a decade.

In 1968 Chihuly was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to study glass making in Venice, Italy. While in Venice Chihuly observed glass blowing techniques which are critical to the way he works today. In 1971 Chihuly co-founded the Pilchuck Glass School in Washington. He has created many well-known series of works and is celebrated for his large architectural installations. In 1995 he embarked on the international project: Chihuly Over Venice. The project necessitated working in glass factories in Finland, Ireland and Mexico with the resultant sculptures installed over the canals and piazzas of Venice.