I saw the cover of this book on the display wall of our library, so I went and found it. This was the book published for an exhibition of Chihuly in San Francisco in 2008. As Chihuly is one of my favorite contemporary artists, I thought it was time to read up on him some more, though I have read some shorter pieces, seen videos, and combed the Chihuly Web site. This gave a nice overview of his career with explanations of his communal studio methods and his various styles - Navajo blanket cylinders, baskets, seaforms, Macchia, Persians, Venetians, Ikebana, Niijima floats, and chandeliers. It was the chandeliers that totally blew me away when I first saw them in the Milwaukee art museum, and his exhibit of them throughout Venice I thought was one of the most brilliant installalations (in picutres) I had ever seen. Up until now I had less appreciation of some of his other forms, though I have enjoyed all of his exhibits I have seen (Kalamazoo Institute of Art & Meijer Gardens) plus individual pieces I have seen in other museums. I had never seen his work with neon pieces, and the Saffron tower looked amazing.
The photos in this book were just exquisite. I looked through them numerous times and just sighed over the colors, the lighting, the combinations. Just had to look for Chihuly's exhibits and found that there is one coming up in Flint of his seaforms starting in June. Will try to go.
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