New Pilchuck Gallery at Reopened Bellevue Arts Museum Features ‘70s Retrospective

The Bellevue Arts Museum will reopen to the public on Saturday, June 18, 2005, and features the Pilchuck Gallery with rotating exhibitions exploring a fine arts medium synonymous with the Pacific Northwest – glass. The inaugural exhibition, Taking Shape: Pilchuck Glass School in the ‘70s, surveys the rapid changes that took place in glass at Pilchuck during that vibrant decade.

The majority of the work highlighted in Bellevue Arts Museum’s upcoming exhibition in the newly dedicated Pilchuck Glass School Gallery represents predominantly blown glass, chosen by guest curator Kate Elliott, from private Eastside collections and Pilchuck Glass School’s study collection. It offers a condensed sampling of the unfolding talent produced and progress made since the ‘70s. On display are some seventy-five pieces representing both early and later work by such celebrated artists as Dale Chihuly, James Carpenter, Fritz Dreisbach, Erwin Eisch, Mary Ann “Toots” Zynsky, Italo Scanga (1932 – 2001), Benjamin Moore, Paul Marioni, the team of Flora Mace and Joey Kirkpatrick, William Morris, Lino Tagliapietra, and Richard Marquis.

The main gallery’s Taking Shape: Pilchuck Glass School in the ‘70s exhibition is complemented by an educational room featuring early footage of Pilchuck in DVD format, vintage photos, posters, and in-house memorabilia along with explanatory text, tools, and early examples of work blown on site by instructors and visiting artists between 1971 and 1979. The “ed room,” conceived as a work in progress, will be expanded over the years and periodically updated to include the ‘80s, ‘90s, and the twenty-first century evolution of Pilchuck Glass School.

"BAM’s Pilchuck Glass School Gallery and educational room provide a special opportunity for glass and contemporary art enthusiasts to view the continuous development of an art form so closely linked with our region," explains Pilchuck Glass School Executive Director Patricia Watkinson. "Retrospective exhibitions such as this tell the amazing history of the aesthetic, technological, and materials advances that are changing the nature of contemporary glass – a story BAM is committed to telling just as Pilchuck Glass School is committed to honoring its past and continuing the trajectory of its growth."

For more information about Bellevue Arts Museum and its operating hours, please visit the museum’s Web site at www.bellevueart.org.

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