Cathy's Art Diary

Fabulous exhibition at Kew Gardens of work by the glass artist Chihuly. Chihuly’s large scale pieces where shown around the gardens, hidden amongst the planting and inside various buildings and provided huge pops of colour. I am very fond of his wonderful glass sculptures and it was lovely to see them in a different context and out of doors. I wish I’d managed to go a few times to see the work in different lights. I think my favourite was the beautiful white installation in the water lily house with lily like white works shown on the water amongst the flowers so the reflections added to the work and it could be seen from all angles. I also loved the specially commissioned blue chandelier in the Temperate house. It was also lovely to see some of his drawings and smaller works in the art gallery there. There were tableaux of the work and a chance to get very close and see it’s intricacies in detail. Closes 27 October 2019

Beautiful exhibition at the Halcyon Gallery of new work by Dale Chihuly, the glass artist. I love this artists work having first discovered him via his wonderful chandelier at the Victoria and Albert Museum. The centre of this show was a display of sculpture by him in bright colours. He layers the coloured glass with white layers so that the colours remain crisp. They are like big waterlilies. Around the edge was a new idea from him where he paints on both side of acrylic which he then lights from behind. The commentary said these were inspired by stained glass windows and they have the effect of projecting colour into the room. It was interesting to see one of the gallery assistants turning the light on and off behind one so that you could see the different the light made.

Magical exhibition at the Halcyon Gallery of new work by the glass artist Dale Chihuly some of which were created for that display. I hadn’t seen this advertised at the front of the gallery so went up to a room at back assuming there would be more prints in it from the main exhibition but instead found this magical room of coloured glass. I loved the Sunset Red Persian Table, a wonderful red glass installation in a black table and the wall of water lily like blooms. I had seen “The Light Princess” at the National Theatre a few nights before and it reminded me of the scenery of act two of that.