Last week I had the distinct pleasure of visiting the Harvard Museum of Natural History to see the Glass Flower collection.
This unique collection of over 3,000 models of 847 plant species was created by glass artisans Leopold Blaschka and his son, Rudolph.
Professor George Lincoln Goodale, founder of the Botanical Museum, wanted life-like representatives of the plant kingdom for teaching botany. Leopold, who was already highly acclaimed for his beautifully detailed glass models of sea creatures for natural history museums and aquaria around the world, was commissioned to make a few samples. They were so extraordinarily life-like that Mrs. Elizabeth C. Ware and her daughter Mary Lee Ware financed the commission for the remaining models and presented it to Harvard University as a memorial to Dr. Charles Eliot Ware, class of 1834.
Rudolf worked with his father on the project for the first five years until Leopold died in 1895, then continued alone until 1936, three years before his own death. Rudolf supplied more than 4,000 glass flower models to the Harvard museum, with remarkably accurate anatomical sections and enlarged flower parts. Since the Glass Flowers are always in bloom, tropical and temperate species may be studied year-round.
Each specimen consisted of a model of a life-size section of branch or piece of the plant, exquisite, enlarged stamen and pistols or other important parts, and cross section slices of the ovaries.
With their unsurpassed technical mastery, the Blaschka Flowers are the holy grail of flameworking. Artists and artisans make pilgrimages from around the world to see them. As both a flameworker and plant lover, I was thrilled to see this collection. The pieces are exquisitely and impeccably detailed; the craftsmanship and technical prowess are stunning!
I spent perhaps an hour just “being with” the flowers, marveling at their beauty, their perfect likeness to nature, and the technical accomplishments of the Blaschkas. After some time I realized I was most drawn to the enlarged stamen and the interesting variety of their shapes. I look forward to playing with some of these forms and bringing them into my own work.
http://www.hmnh.harvard.edu/on_exhibit/the_glass_flowers.html