All Photos By Gail
OMG! How cool are these stained glass drums? Answer: So effing cool! While they are not playable, they sure do light up the room — quite literally! Stained glass artist Paul Heller created this gorgeous lighting fixture by emulating a four piece kit made up of a kick drum with two mounted rack toms and a floor tom, which appears to be a stand-alone unit. Even the cymbal is glass! Sweet! Continue reading Illuminated Stained Glass Drumkit
Autumn Landscape, 1923-24, Leaded Favrile Glass (Photo By Gail)
A tour de force of its medium, this window, executed late in Tiffany’s career, portrays the late afternoon sun filtered through a rich autumnal foliage. It was probably designed by Agnes Northrop (1857 – 1953), who was known especially for her landscapes and flowers.
Continue reading Tiffany Stained Glass Window: Autumn Landscape
Photo By Gail
This unique and graceful sculpture contains all of the text of The Lord’s Prayer. Photographed in the courtyard of the Transfiguration Church on Mott Street in ChinaTown, NYC.
New Photo Added October 15th, 2021!
Watertower By Tom Fruin (All Photos By Gail)
Oh, what fun it was to discover one of Tom Fruin’s Watertower sculptures inside an art gallery instead of out in DUMBO or somewhere off the BQE! As it turns out, Fruin’s current exhibit, Color Study, over at Mike Weiss Gallery marks the very first time that the artist’s architecturally-scaled public works have been shown in a gallery context. Super fun!
Watertower Close Up
The Watertower is constructed from found scrap metal and colored Plexiglas in a patchwork design that also incorporates facsimiles of cigar bands and the word “Ecstasy” repeated at intervals across it’s colorful and endlessly captivating surface, which is illuminated from the tower’s interior.
The wall sculpture above (of which there are several on display at Mike Weiss) will give you an idea of the grid that Fruin builds on for his colored Plexiglas creations. Check out the one below:
This patchwork of colors relates not only to the surface of the Watertower but also to Fruin’s earlier project series, Drug-Bag Quilts, in which the artist used found drug bags, stitched together with thread, to create quilt-like wall hangings. Talk about an interesting way to upcycle!
Color Study also includes a set of Swings with Cigar Band Seats which are suspended from the gallery’s ceiling (not shown) and the above lanterns, one electric and one powered by a small fuel tank.
And last but not least, Fruin has created this illuminated-from-within, Stained Glass replica of what looks to me like the cluster of flame from Lady Liberty’s torch. Astounding.
Stained Glass Flame Detail
Color Study presents enchanting and unique artworks the likes of which you aren’t going to see anywhere else in the Chelsea Gallery District, so don’t let yourself miss this one!
Tom Fruin’s Color Study will be on Exhibit Through October 18th, 2014 at Mike Weiss Gallery, Located at 520 West 24th Street in the Chelsea Gallery District.
Photo By Gail
The newest commissioned artwork for the High Line Billboard just went up on September 3rd. This installation is a boldly-colored, stained glass-inspired Gilbert & George painting called Waking. The controversial art duo appear in the painting (from 1984) three times in the very center of the image and are surrounded on both sides by various male figures and faces. This photo was taken at approximately 7 PM, so you can see the sun is already starting to set, but this was the best I could do as I am not in this neighborhood very often.
Gilbert & George: Waking will be up through October 1st, 2013 in a parking lot adjacent to the The High Line, at West 18th Street and 10th Avenue in Manhattan.