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Dale Chihuly first used glass in a weaving class at the University of Washington. His teacher Doris Brockway assigned the problem of loom weaving with a non-fiber material, and Chihuly picked glass "because it was the material most foreign to fiber." (Linda Norden, Dale Chihuly Glass, p. 7) Chihuly cut flat panes of colored glass into rectangles and incorporated small, often slumped, or fused, bits into panels of open weaving and created several shimmering tapestries. "While discovering ways of incorporating glass into the tapestries, I also developed equipment to melt and fuse the pieces of colored glass together with copper wire, which I could then weave into the fabric. . . . I learned more about the fluid possibilities of the material and soon became immersed in my glasswork." (Chihuly: Color, Glass and Form, p. 15)
The largest (48 inches by 66 inches) and most successful of these textile and glass curtains was begun in 1964 as a gift for his mother. This weaving still covers the window in the dining area of Viola Chihuly's Tacoma home. It transforms an ordinary, suburban view into a faceted composition of line and small rectangles of color. The first public showing of Chihuly's work was a single panel exhibited in Bellevue, Washington, at the Art Fair in 1965. This earliest work in glass recalls for Chihuly that his first memory of the beauty and allure of this material goes back in time to beach walks with his family when he would collect and treasure the smooth, sea-washed pieces of glass.
Graduating from the University of Washington in 1965, Chihuly worked for John Graham Architects, Seattle's biggest firm, best known for its Space Needle for Seattle's 1962 World's Fair. At the firm he helped design several local shopping malls and continued to experiment with weaving colored glass elements. That same year Chihuly received a Fulbright Fellowship to study weaving in Finland, which he had to decline. But by the end of 1966, his fascination with blown glass had overtaken his interest in weaving.
Dale
Chihuly: Installations 1964–1992 by Patterson Sims
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