Fluent Steps, 2009
Martin Blank (American, born 1962)
Hot-sculpted glass, stainless steel
Collection of Museum of Glass, Tacoma, Washington
Created during Martin Blank’s Visiting Artist Residency, Museum of Glass Hot Shop, March 12 – June 24, 2008

Seattle artist Martin Blank, one of America’s premier young sculptors, finished assembling his new 207-foot-long outdoor glass art installation, Fluent Steps, on April 18, 2009. The work was commissioned by the Museum of Glass for its Permanent Collection of twentieth and twenty-first century glass and created for the Museum’s Main Plaza reflecting pool. The work comprises 754 pieces of individually hand-sculpted clear glass, most created in the Museum’s Hot Shop during an unprecedented 45-day Visiting Artist residency in 2008 and augmented by an additional 31 days in Blank’s own studio.

Fluent Steps is poetry in glass that celebrates the many moods of water, from the delicate wisps of mist that rise from a meadow at dawn to the crashing cascades of a waterfall. “My intent with this installation is to awaken the viewer’s eye to keenly observe, interact and respond to the emotive nature of water,” states Blank. “It can be placid, sublime, and in an instant, a tremendous surge of raw power.” Blank further describes the composition of the work as “a dialogue between the mass and the void.”

The sculpture consists of nine individual islands of glass that interact with one another to portray Blank’s interpretation of water in its various forms. Cascades rises above the viewer to a height of 15 feet above the water like a surging waterfall. Echo languidly flows across the surface of the pool, creating an intimate dance of texture and reflective light. Crystal Skin, created by molding glass around a 20-foot madrona tree, quietly floats atop the water surface, and Wisps, a field of hundreds of small glass forms, breaches the surface like rising mist.

The project required the invention of new tools to handle the massive amounts of glass and a team of 41 artists, architects, and engineers to create and install the work. For both Martin and the Museum, it was a marathon that demanded vast amounts of imagination, creativity, persistence and resourcefulness. Director Timothy Close explained, “Fluent Steps is a truly transformative work of art for MOG. It is our first permanent outdoor installation and helps fulfill our vision of becoming the world’s premier glass museum. This project has united all three components of MOG—the Hot Shop, exhibitions and the Permanent Collection. I am extremely pleased with the result and hope our visitors will find this work to be as compelling as I do.”

The result, for those who visit the Museum as well as those who will see Fluent Steps in the thousands of photographs that will soon circle the globe, is a magnificent sculpture that captures the fluidity, light, motion and transparency of water in clear glass. Ultimately, it is a work of art that is as imaginative and exuberant as Martin Blank himself.

About the artist:

Martin Blank was born in 1962 in Sharon, Massachusetts. He received his BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1984 and opened his own studio in 1986. Over the next decade, he worked with three artists who influenced his life and his art: American glass master Dale Chihuly and Venetian maestros Lino Tagliapietra and Pino Signoretto. Blank is known for his interpretations of the human form, both realistic and abstract, in glass.

Fluent Steps Facts:

· Over 3.5 tons of molten glass were used to create the 754 individually hand-sculpted pieces.

· The glass is supported by eight tons of stainless steel.

· Martin and his team worked 45 days in the MOG Hot Shop.

· The project utilized the talents of 41 artists, engineers and architects.

· The final sculpture is 207 feet in length; individual pieces rise from 6 inches to 15 feet in height from the water surface.

· Artist statement: http://www.museumofglass.org/exhibitions/transition-between-planes/artist-statement/.

Photo credit:
Martin Blank (American, born 1962)
Fluent Steps, 2009
Hot-sculpted glass, steel
Collection of Museum of Glass, Tacoma, Washington
Photo by Chuck Lysen, courtesy of Martin Blank Studios