PRESTON SINGLETARY (1963-) TLINGIT and JOE DAVID (1946-) NUU-CHAH-NULTH, Glass "Bentwood" Container, 2004

Preston Singletary has spoken about how his ongoing practice in glassmaking has shown him that “glass brings another dimension to Indigenous art” [1]. Further to this, “the artistic perspective of Indigenous people reflects a unique and vital visual language which has connections to the ancient codes and symbols of the land, and this interaction has informed and inspired my own work” [2]. Fittingly, in the 1982 documentary, Joe David: Spirit of the Mask, Joe David speaks to the art that he creates as not being “a tribute to the past, but a tribute to a living culture” [3].

The classic, seamless nature of a bentwood box is highlighted and honoured by this stunning blown glass collaboration. The formlines of Joe David’s design give a tone-on-tone look to the glass sculpture created by Singletary: it’s a subtle design that is beautifully “crowned” by the rows of operculum shell shapes that pop against the frosted glass.

1. Preston Singletary, “Artist's Statement,” PrestonSingletary.com, www.prestonsingletary.com/about/

2. Ibid.

3. Joe David in Joe David: Spirit of the Mask (1981), Robert Lang, Kensington Communications.

References: For additional information about Preston Singletary’s glass work, see Jodi Simpson, ed., Native American Art, (Boston: Museum of Fine Arts / MFA Publications, 2010), p. 43. For a recent publication on the collaboration between Joe David and Preston Singletary, as described by Singletary, see Preston Singletary: Humanity at the Cross Road, exh. cat., Sandra Ainsley Gallery, Toronto, unpaginated.

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PRESTON SINGLETARY (1963-) TLINGIT and JOE DAVID (1946-) NUU-CHAH-NULTH

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