Dinosaur
Artist: Lino Tagliapietra (Italian, born 1934)
Date: May 12, 2006
Dimensions:
H: 59 in. (149.9 cm); Diam: 9 3/4 in. (24.8 cm)
Medium: Glass; blown, tooled, ground and polished battuto
Classification: Glass
Credit Line: Gift of the artist
Object number: 2007.16
Label Text:Venetian glass maestro Lino Tagliapietra created Dinosaur in 2006 in the then-brand-new hot shop in the Museum’s Glass Pavilion, which opened earlier that year. The vessel demonstrates many formal and technical risks. For example, patterns layer over one another, with bright oranges and blues meeting soft yellows and purples; transparent sections of glass join with opaque ones—a playful presentation of how light interacts with the material; and the precariously narrow base and delicately pulled and twisted neck showcase the artist’s mastery of balance.
Tagliapietra’s Dinosaur series explores anatomical relationships between extinct dinosaurs and contemporary aquatic animals. He describes the way his vessels form: “A shape like the dinosaur grows on the blowpipe. And if you lay the dinosaur on its side, you make a fish, which I have done—it is a part of my relationship to nature.”
Tagliapietra’s Dinosaur series explores anatomical relationships between extinct dinosaurs and contemporary aquatic animals. He describes the way his vessels form: “A shape like the dinosaur grows on the blowpipe. And if you lay the dinosaur on its side, you make a fish, which I have done—it is a part of my relationship to nature.”
DescriptionBlown of transparent colorless and multi-colored non-lead glass, with internal filigree decoration of swirling and interlocking concentric lines, encased in colorless glass, then tooled to form the elongated neck with graceful curves; ground and polished battuto [ital. beaten - simulating hammer marks of a metalsmith] decoration accentuating the patterned fields.
Not on view
In Collection(s)