Blowing Bubbles out of Glass
Dale Chihuly is a founder of the Pilchuck Glass School in Washington state and has exhibited his work all over the world. Even so, he is in awe of the technical process of blowing bubbles out of glass.
"I was totally infatuated and completely absorbed in the concept of being a glassblower, because to see this bubble come out at the end of this blowpipe—can you imagine how anybody ever thought of doing that—that you have to melt sand, any sand will work—you have to melt and add some kind of flux—you don't even need a flux if you got enough temperature, and it makes this extraordinary material.
"And then to think that somebody thought—how in the hell they did it nobody will ever figure out—that sticking something into it and blowing it—you can't blow any other material—can't blow plastic, bronze—so, here it is this completely unique material, that's transparent, translucent, opaque, it's anything you want it to be almost, and then on top of that you can make the form with your own human breath—just think about how strange and mysterious that whole process is."
Source: White House Collection of American Crafts online exhibition at http://americanart.si.edu/collections/exhibits/whc/index.html.
Pictured: Dale Chihuly, born 1941, Niijima Floats: Garnet Black and Mint Green Float with Dimple, 1991, blown glass, 18 3/4 x 22 3/4 x 19 1/2 in., Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Dale and Doug Anderson.
Dale Chihuly is a founder of the Pilchuck Glass School in Washington state and has exhibited his work all over the world. Even so, he is in awe of the technical process of blowing bubbles out of glass.
"I was totally infatuated and completely absorbed in the concept of being a glassblower, because to see this bubble come out at the end of this blowpipe—can you imagine how anybody ever thought of doing that—that you have to melt sand, any sand will work—you have to melt and add some kind of flux—you don't even need a flux if you got enough temperature, and it makes this extraordinary material.