Contact us to purchase any artwork: info@publicglass.org
Our pop-up gallery is a hub of creativity showcasing the talent of artists working out of the Public Glass studio and other glass artists from the Bay Area. As part of the city's initiative to infuse arts and culture into downtown SF, the Public Glass Gallery opened in June 2024 as part of the Vacant to Vibrant program. Stop by today! We will be here until the end of the year.
What is Vacant to Vibrant?
Vacant to Vibrant is a collaborative endeavor by SF New Deal through the City of San Francisco. Vacant to Vibrant helps small businesses partner with local property owners to create engaging pop-up experiences and community spaces in downtown San Francisco. Vacant to Vibrant handles everything from managing pop-up permitting to securing city funding, making it easier for locals to turn vacant storefronts into vibrant gathering places — re-energizing the neighborhood one space at a time to help revitalize and visualize the possibilities of what downtown SF can be.
Location and Hours
149 New Montgomery Street
San Francisco, CA 94105
located in SFMOMA at the corner of Minna
Closed permanently as of 12/20/24
Update the California Glass Art Timeline
On view in the gallery is the Sparks Timeline, created in 2015 as part research project by Mary White and part crowd sourced information. The initial timeline was presented at the 2015 Glass Art Society conference and it seeks to map the trajectory of glass art in California.
We need your help! We are calling on all glass artists, curators, art historians and enthusiasts to update the timeline with information, bringing it current and firming up details of California's glass network. Stop by the gallery to review what is available and add important information to it. You may also reach out to us on Instagram with information about yourself or other glass artists, school programs, studios, galleries, etc.
In the fall of 1964, Dr. Robert Fritz started the San Jose State University glass program and Marvin Lipofsky started the UC Berkeley glass program. They were the first hot furnace glass programs on the West Coast, and within a few years Lipofsky brought with them knowledge of glass techniques from other parts of the world and spread the word in California that glass could be used as a sculptural medium.
Their first students went on to "Spark" other glass programs and hot glass studios. SJSU alumni Joe Hawley started the San Francisco State University glass program in 1964. SJSU alumni James Wayne started an early 1964 studio, experimenting with form and optics. SJSU alumni like James Lundberg and Craig Zweifel took the skills they have learned calculating glaze recipes for ceramics to replicate early Tiffany and Art Deco surfaces. SJSU Alumni David and Shari Maxom Hopper traveled through Europe exploring glass bead, painting and photo processes, and cofounded Orient and Flume. UC Berkeley alumni John Lewis first experimented with moon like iridescent glass surfaces and went on to develop innovative large scale castings.
In 1696-70, UC Berkeley alumni Richard Marquis was one of the first American artists to work in the Venini factory in Murano Italy. He brought back to California new ways to stretch and form glass into murrini and made The Lord's Prayer for his MFA thesis. He has continued to actively experiment with new forms and concepts ever since.
Early alumni from many programs and workshops started studios that are still going, Esteban Prieto, Randy Strong, Michael and Ann Nourot, Steve Smyers, Michael Cohn, Jim and Connie Grant, Steve Correia, Rick Strini, and Stewart Abelman, to name only a few.
A bit of history...
In the 1950s, University of Southern California ceramics professor Glen William Lukens was slumping window glass, making beautifully colored plates and bowls. Around the same time, near Pepperdine College, John Burton, a Chemist and renaissance man, was playing with ways to transform borosilicate glass, used primarily for scientific purposes, into colorful forms. One of Burton's early students, Suellen Fowler, has been a pioneer in developing borosilicate colors used by many artists today.
John Burton Work
Suellen Fowler Work