Out of the Vault: Art History 101

July 13, 2024 - Summer 2025

Exhibition Overview

As a material, glass is ubiquitous. However, it is more than just the screen on your smartphone. Glass is an artistic medium, capable of using a vibrant visual language to convey powerful ideas about who we are, and how we feel about the world around us.

Like painters with a palette, glass artists harness the unique qualities of molten glass to make artwork capable of telling the same stories art has been telling for centuries. Glass can create landscapes that represent the world around us; reflect how we see ourselves and others in portraits; compose still lives that discuss our relationship to our material culture; or be sculpted in abstract works that convey emotion and ideas.

Out of the Vault: Art History 101 takes visitors on a visual journey through the four basic pillars of art history: landscape, portraiture, still life, and abstraction, showcased through new and significant acquisitions from the Museum’s collections.

Joel Philip Myers (American, born 1934). *Uvejr (Storm)* from *Contiguous Fragment* series, 1981. Blown glass with applied elements; 10 1/2 × 4 1/8 in. Collection of Museum of Glass, Tacoma, Washington, gift of the Robert M. Minkoff Foundation.

Featured Images

Image Credits

Hank Murta Adams (American, born 1956). Beacon Bust (Spuds), 1998. Cast glass and copper; 32 x 26 x 16 in. Collection of Museum of Glass, Tacoma, Washington, gift of anonymous donor (2016.21). Photo by Duncan Price.
Corwin N. Clairmont (Member of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Indian Tribes, born 1947). Traditional Cedar Bark Berry Basket, Made at the Museum in 2009. Blown and hot-sculpted glass; 16 × 20 × 22 in. Collection of Museum of Glass, Tacoma, Washington, gift of the artist (VA.2010.19). Photo by Duncan Price.
Silvia Levenson (Argentinian, born 1957). Still Life, 2008. Kiln-cast glass; 6 1/8 × 13 1/8 × 9 3/4 in. Collection of Museum of Glass, Tacoma, Washington, gift of the Robert M. Minkoff Foundation. Photo courtesy of the artist.
Albert Paley (American, born 1944). Stacked Progression, 2015. Forged, formed and fabricated glass and steel; 41 x 23 x 25 in. Collection of Museum of Glass, Tacoma, Washington, gift of the artist (VA.2018.24). Photo by Chuck Lysen.
Lino Tagliapietra (Italian, born 1934). Manhattan Sunset, 1997. Blown glass with canepick-ups, battuto and inciso cut; steel and glass base; 67 x 60 x 20 in. Collection of Museum of Glass, Tacoma, Washington (1998.1). Photo courtesy of the Smithsonian American Art Museum.
Cappy Thompson (American, born 1952). Blue Sun, Made at the Museum in 2012, Completed 2013. Vitreous enamel reverse painted on blown glass. Collection of Museum of Glass, Tacoma, Washington, gift of the artist (VA.2015.35). Photo by Lynn Thompson.