GAS selected the Chrysler, in part, on the strengths of its renowned glass collection and its state-of-the-art Perry Glass Studio’s growing national reputation in the world of glass, especially its groundbreaking glass theatrical performances.
Coastal Virginia is home to a thriving arts community that includes the Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art and the Virginia Glass Guild, and is the site of Jamestown, where the first glassmaking in Colonial America took place in 1608. Both the Museum and the Glass Studio serve as an anchor for Norfolk’s blossoming NEON, or New Energy of Norfolk, arts district. The district will launch in fall 2015, inviting visual, performing, culinary, and touring artists to transform several downtown blocks into a synergistic urban hub for creativity.

The 2017 GAS conference is co-chaired by Diane Wright, the Chrysler’s Carolyn and Richard Barry Curator of Glass; Charlotte Potter, Glass Studio Manager and Programming Director; and community volunteers Virginia Hitch and Colin McKinnon.

“We are eager to welcome so many artists working in the field of glass to Norfolk, a community with a tremendous passion for supporting the arts, especially glass,” Wright said. “For this conference we invite the international glass community to explore the deep history that glass has to offer, as well as to highlight some of the future movements in the field. We look forward to rolling out the red carpet in June 2017!”

The state-of-the-art Perry Glass Studio, launched in 2011 to complement the Museum’s glass collection, helps demonstrate how masterworks in the collection were created. The Studio offers free public glassmaking demonstrations and classes and workshops for all levels of expertise. Its educational assistantship program helps train the next generation of glass professionals. Over the past four years, its Visiting Artist Series has brought many of the world’s great names to Norfolk to create new works of art as the public watches. In addition, the Studio’s monthly evening performances on Third Thursday have helped establish a reputation for its innovation and groundbreaking glass theater. The venue is a full-service glass studio with a 560-pound capacity furnace, a full hot shop, a flameworking studio, nine annealing ovens, a flat-glass shop, and a coldworking shop.

The Chrysler Museum of Art maintains an encyclopedic collection of more than 10,000 works in glass, including significant strengths in American, English and French glass. The Museum’s extensive Tiffany collection is world-famous, containing many blown-glass masterworks, as well as opulent windows, lamps, and decorative arts.  The contemporary glass collection is far-reaching with representations of the Studio Glass Movement and works that illustrate new, innovative practices in contemporary glass. Recent acquisitions within the galleries include historic glass by Frederick Carder and Christopher Dresser and contemporary works by renowned artists such as Beth Lipman, Luke Jerram, Etsuko Ichikawa, Steffen Dam, Jun Kaneko, and Stanislav Libenský and Jaroslava Brychtová.  
For more information on the Glass Art Society, visit www.glassart.org. To learn more about the Chrysler Museum of Art, visit www.chrysler.org

ABOUT THE GLASS ART SOCIETY
Founded in 1971, the Glass Art Society is an international non-profit organization whose purpose is to encourage e
advance education, to promote the appreciation and development of the glass arts, and to support the worldwide community of artists who work with glass. GAS strives to stimulate communication among artists, educators, students, collectors, gallery and museum personnel, art critics, manufacturers, and all others interested in and involved with the production, technology and aesthetics of glass. We are dedicated to creating greater public awareness and appreciation of the glass arts.
 
ABOUT THE CHRYSLER MUSEUM OF ART
The recently expanded Chrysler Museum of Art in Norfolk, Virginia, is one of America’s most distinguished mid-sized art museums, with a nationally recognized collection of more than 30,000 objects, including one of the great glass collections in America. The core of this collection was given to the Museum by Walter P. Chrysler, Jr., an avid art collector who donated thousands of objects from his private collection to the Museum in 1971. In the years since Chrysler’s death in 1988, the Museum has dramatically extended its campus and developed new ties with the Norfolk community. It now has rapidly growing collections, especially in American art, photography, and contemporary glass. The Chrysler also mounts an ambitious schedule of visiting exhibitions and educational programs and events each season.
The Chrysler Museum of Art, One Memorial Place, Norfolk, and its Perry Glass Studio at 745 Duke St., are open Tuesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Sunday, noon to 5 p.m. The Historic Houses on E. Freemason Street are open weekends.

Admission is free for all locations. For more information on exhibitions, events, and programs, visit www.chrysler.org or call (757) 664-6200

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