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Bright idea

February 16, 2011

By Staff Reporter

The chandelier, weighing in at 2,100 pounds, is the result of a new collaboration between master glass blower Dale Chihuly from Tacoma, Wash., and the craftsmen of Waterford Crystal.
Chihuly has said that in his work he attempts to envisage and then create “unpredictable order,” an order that to the observer can convey a striking and unnerving beauty.
Thus the stormy apparition that hangs silently from the roof of the lobby like a supernova frozen in time: a dazzling burst of light or life. Chihuly’s glasswork all contain some element of the organic, from his “sea form” sculptures that look like zany plants or baskets to his massive floats, 40-inch diameter glass balls that glow from within.
This chandelier is known simply as the Mandarin Oriental Waterford Chandelier — but its complexity and size as a work required the hotel builders to keep the Chihuly studio informed as to their progress while the chandelier came into being, according to a spokesperson at the studio in Washington. Work began on the chandelier more than a year ago.
The eccentric Chihuly has worked in glass since the 1960s. A crucial aspect of his work, he says, is that glassblowing — particularly the complex work that he creates — requires considerable teamwork, often as many as 100 workers. This chandelier contains 683 pieces of glass, some fashioned by Chihuly, others blown by Waterford according to his instruction: the artist designed glass parts known as gourds, chanterelles, horns, and balls.
Workmen then took a day and a half to assemble the piece in New York, in time for the opening of the newest Mandarin Oriental hotel. Chihuly, who lost an eye and suffered serious injuries in a car accident in the 1970s, finds physically blowing the glass difficult and channels his talent in hands-on oversight, according to his studio.
“I want to be able to make the idea and have it happen quick,” Chihuly said recently. “Why can I let go? Because I’m only interested in the final result.”
Hotel spokesperson Tiana Kartadinata said that the work complimented the Mandarin Oriental hotel group’s 18th latest location, within the Time Warner twin tower complex at Columbus Circle. “These are subtle, understated blends of Asian and New York design themes,” she said.
Chihuly embarked on a chandelier series in 1996, working with world-class glassblowers at Waterford and in Finland and Mexico. The exact cost of the latest chandelier in New York has not been released by Mandarin Oriental, but speaking of the series, Chihuly said recently: “It cost me personally a million and a half dollars.” And small Chihuly items, such as bowls and desk sculptures, retail at $22,000 to $38,000 per piece.
He was the first outside artist allowed into Waterford’s world-class factory to work with Irish artisans. The first chandelier was Campiello del Remer, a piece that presages the Mandarin Oriental work and hangs in the permanent collection of the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art in Kansas City, Mo. Another chandelier hangs in the Oklahoma City Museum of Art.
Chihuly asked the Waterford artisans to experiment with different cuts to create abstract designs on each individual piece of crystal in that sculpture, and a pattern of collaboration was established that continues with the new chandelier.
The opportunity to work with Chihuly is a prestigious one for Waterford craftsmen — the eccentric artist has been called a “rock star of the art world.”
The Waterford chandelier can be seen in the lobby of the Mandarin Oriental hotel at the Time Warner Complex at Columbus Circle.

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