Artist Spotlight: Michael Petry

For the exhibit "Touching the Neoclassical and the Romantic" I exhibited works from my "Bare Back Lovers" series of glass pieces that fuse neoclassical silver forms with the organic, fluid qualities of molten glass. Soane was interested in neoclassical silver (as evidenced in his collection of Robert Adam drawings for silver designs) as well as glass, which he innovatively used in his architecture. Each of the BB works is numbered as to its place in its production (i.e. BB45, BB103). This alludes to the nature of its origin as a mass-produced object (the silver plate) that aped craftwork.Yet after the introduction of molten glass (a craft technique), each object became a unique sculptural artwork.The works were installed throughout the museum and were placed in such a way to appear as if they were part of Soane’s original collection of diverse objects from across historical periods and of many materials. — M.P.