Automobile Vase "Repair" is Chrysler Museum's "Object of the Week"

NORFOLK, VA — Carolyn and Richard Barry Curator of Glass Carolyn Swan Needell has chosen Repair by Dan Dailey to feature as the Chrysler Museum’s “Object of the Week” for June 24, 2020. Part of the museum's permanent collection, Repair is one of twenty vases from Dailey's Automobile Vase series that he produced in 1983.

“A viewer must move all the way around the vase to see the complete image and understand the story and personas the artist conveys. The graphic nature of Dailey’s work is sometimes compared to that of a comic strip, but there is no real beginning or end to the scene that unfolds around the vase. ”

— Carolyn Swan Needell

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Repair, 1983
Blown, sand-blasted, acid-polished glass. 9 × 6 in.

An exhibition of Dailey’s figurative work titled "Dan Dailey: Character Sketch" opened at the museum February 21. The show features 33 works that span four decades of the artist’s career.

"Dan Dailey: Character Sketch" Exhibition Opens at the Chrysler Museum of Art

NORFOLK, VA — "Dan Dailey: Character Sketch," an exhibition of Dailey’s figurative work opened Friday, February 21. The work will be on view at The Chrysler Museum of Art until November 29. The Chrysler-curated show features 33 works that span four decades of the artist’s career. Carolyn and Richard Barry Curator of Glass Carolyn Swan Needell has written a catalog to accompany the exhibition. Subjective and narrative in nature, Dailey’s work is “inspired by the human character and based upon his direct observation of the world,” reads the exhibition announcement. The artist "articulates his perceptions and thoughts about humanity through the medium of glass, pushing the material to new frontiers in order to tell stories about human nature," the announcement continues. The exhibition includes blown and hot-worked glass vases and sculpture, glass cane murals, wall reliefs made from Vitrolite (industrial colored glass), as well as his original drawings.

Kaitlin McKeown / The Virginian-Pilot

Kaitlin McKeown / The Virginian-Pilot

Kaitlin McKeown / The Virginian-Pilot

Kaitlin McKeown / The Virginian-Pilot

Kaitlin McKeown / The Virginian-Pilot

Kaitlin McKeown / The Virginian-Pilot

“Dan’s work really can’t be mistaken for the work of any other artist. The message and execution of his work is simply unique. This holds true for his over 40-year career: works made in the 1980s connect strikingly well to work made last year in 2019, in both aesthetics and meaning.”

— Carolyn Swan Needell

Since 1971, Dailey has participated in over 300 group, juried, and invitational exhibitions, and has had numerous one-person museum and gallery exhibits including a major retrospective at the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian Institution, and a recent installation at the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg. When asked if his work has been represented before in the way that the Chrysler Museum is recognizing and exhibiting his works, Dailey says, “Carolyn Needell has a thesis that she has put forth as far as my work is concerned. She wanted to focus on that and is not showing the illuminated works. She made deliberate selections and has rationale for each. Her take on it is different and my work has not been exhibited in this way before.”

View the exhibition catalogue

Dailey will return to the Chrysler Museum May 6 – 9 for a glassblowing workshop with Perry Glass Studio Manager Robin Rogers and artist Richard Royal. Carolyn Needell will give a gallery talk about the exhibition April 4.

UPDATE: Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, events associated with “Dan Dailey: Character Sketch” will be postponed until further notice. The exhibition will remain installed until November 29.

MIT Celebrates the 50th anniversary of its Center for Advanced Visual Studies

CAMBRIDGE, MA — To mark the 50th anniversary of the MIT Center for Advanced Visual Studies (CAVS), the MIT Museum opened on February 15th an exhibition presenting a historical overview through selected works by CAVS research fellows, students and professors. Installations and videos at the Compton Gallery along the main corridor of MIT are the works of more than 30 past and current research fellows.

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On view are time-specific works by Research Fellows and Directors, Gyorgy Kepes, Otto Piene and Dan Dailey, celebrating 50 years after the Center’s Opening by Kepes in 1967/68. In addition, a photo exhibit can be seen as of March 21st at the museum’s Kurtz Gallery: Kepes Photographs, MIT Years 1946-1985.

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Dan Dailey, Light Bulb Prototype, 1976 sketches – 2018 modified prototypes

Glass has always been Dailey’s medium, using industrial processes to realize his vision. While collaborating with the Research Lab for Electronics at MIT, he focused on developing technical knowledge and recently prototypes for his thick light bulb sculptures. He defines them as ‘glowing elements inside a curved lens-like mass.’

CAVS was a bold experiment connecting artists with forefronts of science and engineering. New artistic media and methods, as well as scales of expression for expanding audiences were pioneered at CAVS through the art-driven, interdisciplinary collaborations that became its hallmark.

The Museum’s exhibition includes art installations at multiple sites within the Museum and in its Compton Gallery. Holograms, light art, and inflatable sculptures reflect the wide range of CAVS artistic explorations and achievements that changed the social standards of art. The exhibition will remain open throughout 2018.

Orbit, Originally in Rockefeller Center’s Rainbow Room, Finds New Home at Toledo Museum of Art

TOLEDO, OH — Formerly in Rockefeller Center’s Rainbow Room in New York, Orbit now resides in its new home outside the Little Theater at the Toledo Museum of Art. Donated by New York real estate firm Tishman Speyer, the 15 by 8-foot mural is a glowing work of glass with a changing lighting scheme that radiates shades of amber, rose, violet and blue. The muted, ethereal feeling the mural evokes contrasts with the images from ancient mythology, space exploration and science fiction that are cast into the glass.

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Dan Dailey recreates the original backdrop that had deteriorated over 3 decades in the Rainbow Room

“It’s a pretty significant piece for me,” Dailey said. “When I think about my influences, many are revealed here. This is about a kind of wide-ranging view of things that are significant in the history of art and in the history of design, and the iconography of these things.

“In retrospect, as big as it is, I realize it was still a really personal object.”

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Orbit, behind the Rainbow Room bandstand in Manhattan’s Rockefeller Center, 1987

Commissioned in 1986 for the Rainbow Room nightclub, Orbit’s first inspiration was the space’s revolving dance floor and iconic history. In 2014, almost 30 years later, the  glass mural was removed from its location behind the bandstand when the Rainbow Room’s owners had it dismantled as part of a major overhaul of the club’s interior. It was saved and donated to its new home in Toledo, Ohio, in 2015.

“Orbit’s scale is one reason it’s quite an impressive glass sculpture,” said Halona Norton-Westbrook, the museum’s director of collections. “But it’s also special because of the level of detail that went into the work, so that it has visual impact both from a distance, as it was installed in New York, as well as close-up. We’re thrilled to acquire this substantial work in glass for TMA’s collection.”

The installation of Orbit is the Museum’s third collaboration with Dailey; in 2007, he co-authored the children’s book “Glassigator,” and in 2008, he was invited to participate in the Guest Artist Pavilion Project at the Museum’s Glass Pavilion.

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The State Hermitage Museum Exhibition: Gifts from America

ST. PETERSBURG, RUSSIA — On the occasion of the 250th anniversary of The State Hermitage Museum, Dan Dailey installed his Byzantine Sconces on November 27 – 30, 2014 for the exhibition “Gifts from America” which opened December 2 and runs through March 8, 2015. The sconces were made in 2002 for Restaurant Daniel in New York City. Daniel Boulud has now donated them to The State Hermitage Museum permanent collection.

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Dailey and a Hermitage Museum electrician install his Byzantine Sconces before the exhibition opening reception.

“Working with the museum curators, installation team, electricians, architects and engineers was an unusual way to become familiar with the Russian people and with the Hermitage Museum, as we pursued the common goal of setting up my works in the exhibition. Museums have long been a source of inspiration for my art, and the fabulous collection of this museum has made a profound impression. I can’t tell yet how I will react, but the historical overview and the quality of works in the museum led me to inspect many of them in detail. In time this influence will be reflected in my thoughts and drawings, then new work.” —Dan Dailey

The exhibition was conceived by Helen Drutt English and curated by Matthew Drutt. They worked for two years to produce the “Gifts from America” exhibition, overseeing all aspects of production from the checklist of works, including crating, shipping, and set-up in the museum. The exhibition reflects Helen’s preferences, which are based on more than fifty years of scholarship and direct communication with the artists whose works are included.