Vitreosity

squaredcircle

saw this at design observer -
Here's the general article about the photo sharing website, Flickr. Then, the 'Group Photo pool' known as squaredcircle. This is pretty amazing. There are, as I write, more than 12,600 photos tagged as 'squaredcircle' in Flickr. This is the first time I am tempted to join in to some thing like this. I'd like to put some cropped photos of rose window images in there. I've already seen one image from a stained glass window, though it's just a close up detail of a standard off-the-shelf jewel in a panel.

Stained Glass Bandit

from the local riverfront times-

I've lived in St. Louis for about six months now and didn't hear a thing about this. Just too too bizarre.

Windows -- stained glass windows, to be precise -- commenced crowding the crime maps at Caruso's South Patrol Division this past summer. Joining wrought iron, terra cotta, fireplace mantels, even the black metal stars affixed to earthquake bolts, glass had seemingly become the latest architectural object St. Louis thieves had found they could pop and peddle.

Andy Young exhibition pieces

from the Stained Glass Network -
Andrew Young Exhibition pieces The stained glass is toward the bottom of the page.

Sendak in NYC

Recently called to my attention - an article on Maurice Sendak in the New York Times on a show at the Jewish Museum in NYC. With luck I'll be able to see the show. I have seen a few other shows with Sendak's artwork. I went to the Morgan Library some years ago and saw artwork for the book Dear Mili. Really amazing though I liked the simple storyboard drawings better then the ornate detailed final artwork. I have been to the Rosenbach Library, which is the offical repository for his artwork. This was years ago and they did not have much on display. Still, the musem is a very good small treasure. I hope it still retains its small museum charm with the recent expansion.

St Marks Episcopal, St. Louis

About a month ago I visited St. Mark's Episcopal, the first church in St. Louis to be built in the modern style. Basically, Art Deco design. Very striking. The windows were designed by Robert Harmon and made at the Frei studios of St. Louis in 1939.
All the windows are tall and narrow with a stylized image of Christ at the top leading down to different symbols for that particular window. The colors throughout feature this nearly monochromatic shift from white to lavender to variations of middle blue. A very difficult range of colors to make work with - and here it works very well.

The image at the bottom of this window is something of an in joke - as the architects were named Dunn and Nagel, German for hammer and nail. The theme for the window is 'cooperatively working together'.

The leads are wide. The vertical lead in the upper center area of the photograph is about 1.5" wide. The majority are about 3/4" wide. Much wider than usual for stained glass. If you look closely you'll see this is the head and hand of the figure at the bottom of the Dunn and Nagel window holding the nail.

A deco lion, symbol of St. Mark.

There is a strong element of social justice in these windows. The one below is sited most often with its references to labor exploitation and racial prejudice. Highly unusual in stained glass.