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During the fall of 1965, Chihuly attained the rudiments of glassblowing while working with bits of melted flat glass in his Seattle basement. He learned that the best glassblowing program in the United States was at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, and upon his acceptance there he left Seattle in September 1966 to study glassblowing with Harvey Littleton, the preeminent U.S. authority. In Littleton's first-of-its-kind graduate program Chihuly swiftly mastered the essentials of glassblowing, gained a basic understanding of the history of glass, and for the first time got to know dedicated artists. The long-necked, organic forms Chihuly blew he grouped into simple installations, and he won awards in several state art competitions that year.
At Wisconsin, and the following summer in Seattle, he mixed glass with other materials and took many liberties with the medium: blowing glass around steel, using commercial neon, and boxing blown glass in clear and tinted Plexiglas containers, reminiscent of the work of California artist Larry Bell, though Chihuly did not know Bell's work. A graduate exhibition in 1966 of his first blown glass earned him a special MFA after just one year.
Dale
Chihuly: Installations 1964–1992 by Patterson Sims
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