PUBLIC ART IN GLASS PUBLIC ART IN GLASS Warren Carther, Sarah Hall, Robert Jekyll and Michèle Lapointe PUBLIC ART IN GLASS 3 Stained Glass as Public Art tained glass has a long history as public art. First developed on a Slarge scale in the late 11th cen- tury, coloured glass was a transparent and beautiful material to fill the large window openings of the cathedrals and parish churches north of the Alps. It was a barrier to hostile weather conditions, kept out birds, and created an enclosed space which was separated from the dis- tractions of the secular world. In the 1140s, Abbot Suger of the royal abbey of St-Denis, not far from Paris, assembled a team of glaziers to create a series of stained glass windows for his new church. When done, they were the wonder of the building. In his treatise on the church, Suger explained the two main non-physical purposes of his windows. First was the pedagogical – the narrative scenes depicted were to teach the viewers the biblical stories and truths basic to their faith and to provide examples of moral behaviour. The windows became the visual “bibles of the illiterate.” Second was the ana- gogical – invisible sunlight became the visible and tangible manifestation of God’s presence when it passed through the coloured glass membrane and filled the interior with jewel-like hues. McCausland Studio, Industry and Commerce, City Hall, Toronto, Ontario, 1895. Contemplation of transformed light Photo by Shirley Ann Brown. elevates one’s thoughts to a meditation on Divine perfection and beauty. Before long, the vast public spaces of the goth- William Warrington, The Convent and Catholic Basilica, St ic cathedrals and churches of medieval John’s, Newfoundland, 1848. Photo by Shirley Ann Brown. 4 PUBLIC ART IN GLASS PUBLIC ART IN GLASS 5 keeping pace with the aesthetic changes • • • seen in other forms of painting, became The earliest public stained glass in retardetaire and copyist. Canada dates from the mid 1800s and The Arts and Crafts Movements of the was imported from England and France. later 19th century changed the charac- The Convent and Catholic Basilica ter of stained glass. Artists associated in St John’s, Newfoundland, received with the movement were free to design windows from William Warrington in according to the artistic tenets of the London in 1848. In Toronto, Bishop day. Stained glass was democratized. Charbonnel purchased the vast It found its way into new public spaces, Crucifixionwindow for the chancel of led by the commission given to Wil- St. Michael’s Catholic Cathedral from liam Morris’s Company to create four the Thévenot Studio in Clermont-Fer- windows for the Green Dining Room in rand, France, in 1858. That same year the new South Kensington Museum in saw the installation of the Evangelist London in 1866. From there it spread, windows above the altar in Holy Trinity and now we see art glass in all its forms Anglican church across town, fabricated in every type of public space, from by James Ballantyne of Edinburgh. The religious buildings such as churches, first tentative attempts to actually create synagogues and mosques, to secular spaces including schools, court houses, city halls, hospitals, restaurants, train northern Europe were filled with these glass into the windows of dining halls, Lutz Haufschild, Pasture, Sperling Rapid stations, swimming pools, offices, and Transit Station, Burnaby, BC, 2002. awe-inspiring feats of light and colour. libraries and stairwells. department stores. Photo by Shirley Ann Brown. As the stone walls became more skele- It was during the medievalist revivals tal, the windows grew larger, until the of the 19th century that stained glass buildings became cages of glass. was reborn, particularly in England, Stained glass became such a powerful France, and Germany. Repairing and effective means of propagating the damage to churches brought about by faith, that when the Protestant Refor- religious wars and revolution, along mation gained momentum in the 16th with Catholic emancipation, created the and 17th centuries, windows were often need to build new churches. Stained destroyed in countries where the icon- glass was once again seen as an essen- oclastic dissenters gained control. The tial aspect of religious buildings and this depletion of the opportunities to create led to a renewal in the art form. At first, church windows led to new markets for the preference was for windows that glaziers. Stained and painted glass pan- were directly inspired by medieval ex- els became popular items for display in amples. Stained glass, which up to that the private homes of wealthy merchants, point had always been a “modern” art, often embodying scenes with moral lessons or family coats of arms. Wealthy Above: Eric Wesslow, Canada, Montréal-Pierre colleges and universities as well as Elliott Trudeau International Airport, Montréal, government buildings inserted stained Québec, 1960. Photo by Shirley Ann Brown. 6 PUBLIC ART IN GLASS PUBLIC ART IN GLASS 7 stained glass windows in Toronto can be Sarah Hall’s windows, Parables of Light, seen in the 1858 Acts of Mercy windows in Christ Lutheran Church in Waterloo in the loft at Holy Trinity. They were (2007). Her stained glass towers at the designed by English-trained William First Unitarian Congregation in Toronto Bullock in conjunction with the local (1993), at Regent College in Vancou- emerging McCausland studio. German ver (2007) and most recently at Christ glass, primarily from Mayer of Munich, Church Anglican Cathedral in Vancou- became popular 20 years later, after ver (2016) introduced dichroic glass and their five windows were installed in the solar panels into the art glass vocabu- chancel of St James’ Anglican Cathedral lary. The towers, illuminated from within in Toronto. Stained glass in colonial during the night, turned stained glass Canada was perceived as a visual link inside out, shining like beacons in the to a continuing tradition and history, a darkness. Stained glass came full circle, tie to the homeland. Soon, churches of back to Abbot Suger’s meditations on almost all denominations were ordering the transforming power of coloured stained glass windows. glass. Most groups accepted narrative Art glass moved into the secular Montreal-Trudeau airport. Stuart Reid’s architect; the artist, the material and windows, but the choice of allowable public realm in Canada, slowly at first, controversial Zones of Immersion, technology; space, light and colour; subject was determined by the sect. with the McCausland Studio’s Industry which stretches the entire length of the the earthly and the spiritual; private in- Catholics and Anglicans had the widest and Commerce tribute made for the Union Subway Station in Toronto was spiration and public reception. Stained range of possibilities, with biblical sub- stairwell in Toronto’s City Hall in 1895. unveiled in 2015. Robert Jekyll’s 1992 glass sculpts space and architecture jects and an array of saints and events in After WWII, schools, court houses, air- Academics window for Humberside with light. Glass prisms shatter light into Church history. Protestant groups mostly ports, transportation systems all became Collegiate Institute must be added to dancing colour. The sun moves and so accepted scenes from the life of Christ locales for art glass. Marcelle Ferron’s the list. Stuart Reid’s stained glass wall, do the shafts of ever-changing gem-like and images of the apostles. Churches, magestic Dancing Forms in the Champ Dance of Venus, for the great atrium of hues. All is transient in an environment either because of preference or modest de Mars Metro station in Montreal the Living Arts Centre in Mississauga transfigured by stained glass, transform- budgets, could opt for purely decorative (1966) and for the Court House in Gran- (1997) and Sarah Hall’s magnificent ing the movement of people who pass windows. Memorial windows prolif- by, Quebec (1979), flooded the interi- glass façades for Harbourfront Centre through it. erated particularly after World War I. ors with coloured filtered light. Other Theatre in Toronto (2011) brought large Families could honour their fallen dead stained glass works by different artists scale compositions to public buildings Shirley Ann Brown and find an outlet for their grief. were installed in the Montreal Metro in Ontario. After World War II, following inno- System, creating the longest art gallery Shirley Ann Brown, Professor Emer- Architectural art glass is always a chal- vations in Europe, religious art glass in the world. Lutz Haufschild’s Pasture ita of Art History, York University is an lenge for the artist. It involves personal in Canada moved towards abstraction in the Sperling Rapid Transit Station in interdisciplinary medievalist who also interactions on many levels: between and non-representation, led by Yvonne Burnaby BC (2002) recalls, in painted studies the Art and Crafts Movements the artist and the client, sometimes the Williams and her studio colleagues in float glass, the lush green meadows of and architectural stained glass as a mod- Toronto. Light and colour in themselves the former site. Eric Wesslow’s depic- ern art. She is the founding director of the Registry of Stained Glass Windows became acceptable themes to enhance tion of Canada (1960), as landscape Above: Marcelle Ferron, Dancing Forms, the religious experience as seen in forms in layered, collaged glass graces Champ de Mars Metro Station, Montréal, in Canada (RSGC) which documents Québec, 1996. Photo by Kathy Kranias. Canada’s art glass heritage. 8 PUBLIC ART IN GLASS PUBLIC ART IN GLASS 9 The Public Art Glass of Robert Jekyll and Sarah Hall 1 he art glass windows of Robert Jekyll and Sarah Hall draw from Tthe long European stained glass tradition of public art. In its relationship to public architecture, art glass serves a distinct role beyond a gallery setting.