Contemporary Studio Glass art is an important and well established; yet still developing specialty area in the realm of contemporary art. In recent years, major museum exhibitions of works in glass by Dale Chihuly have crossed the globe. In Ohio alone, the last three years have seen Chihuly exhibitions at the Columbus and Akron Museums, and the Dayton Art Institute recently presented an exhibition of his work entitled Form from Fire, which closed December 29, 2001.

In my experience, glass collectors are often migrants from other areas of collecting, who start small and quickly gain interest and awareness with each additional purchase. Although youthful in spirit, many of the collectors are “Baby Boomers.” They exhibit a high level of enthusiasm that transfers to their desire to acquire detailed knowledge of each artist and each individual piece in their collection. Artists and collectors often become friends through the personal contact sometimes resulting from the purchase of works direct from the artists.

Whereas so much of the output of studio glass is three-dimensional, collecting issues are more often similar to those of sculpture rather than paintings, drawings, prints, and photographs. Since we are dealing with a sculptural medium, the quality of the work must generally manifest itself when viewed from all perspectives. Some works of studio glass are a form of relief sculpture while other works simulate painting; these types of works are often exhibited in two-dimensional modes – wall hung and sometimes framed.

Although American glass artists have a significant proportion of the market, interest in contemporary glass art is international in scope and publications such as the German quarterly magazine Neues Glas provide a global look at promising and established studio glass artists from a wide range of countries.

American collectors sometimes limit their collections to works by American artists. However, larger and more comprehensive collections tend to include works by important artists from around the world. Many of these foreign artists are represented in American galleries, though collectors rather enjoy the opportunity to visit the individual artists’ studios while abroad.

Valuation of works is facilitated by an active national and international gallery market and by auction sales. As is the case with all forms of art, quality and condition are critical factors in the determination of value. The illustrated work by Dan Dailey exemplifies both the quality and the fragility of the medium. At present, even relatively minor damages to these often quite fragile objects seem to have a meaningful impact on the value. We are fortunate to have in Cleveland a remarkable conservation studio run by an artist/entrepreneur who was selected by Waterford as a designated repair and conservation expert for their production. Some repairs are possible–and many of these are highly successful.

Quality is a more subjective issue, but the market offers a premium for works of perceived quality and originality. One such item, a canopic jar (based on Egyptian antecedents) by a well known glass artist, William Morris, was sold at auction in 2000 for a record price of $140,000.00 – far exceeding the $70,000.00 - $90,000.00 estimate. This illustrates the difficulty of being both accurate and keeping current in the valuation of major pieces by important artists.

Due to the high level of interest and activity in the market for contemporary glass, prices of work by established artists may escalate rapidly, frequently by significant increments. Values from only two years ago are often well below current replacement values by 20-50% or more. I find that collectors of studio glass are well served by biennial (or even annual) updates to the insurance appraisals for their glass collections. This is rather more frequent than our 3-5 year cycle of appraisal updates for collectors of art in less volatile areas of the market.