'Masked Seducers', 1999

American artist Dan Dailey (b. 1947) was raised in Philadelphia; however, his career as a maker would later take him across America and the globe. A prolific creator of glass and metal sculpture, Dailey is closely associated with the Studio Glass Movement which arose out of Harvey Littleton’s body of work. That said, his technique and process set him apart from his contemporaries in the Studio Glass Movement in many ways. Most crucially, Dailey begins all of his three-dimensional works with a flat drawing or study, and his works feature metal extensively as a main material. The artist’s monumental Masked Seducers (1999) makes use of metal fused to bulbous multicolored glass forms, joining the two media in an unexpected, playful fashion. In the early 1970s, Dailey received an MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design, and studied under Dale Chihuly as the first graduate student he ever mentored. Shortly thereafter, Dailey received a prestigious Fulbright Fellowship which took him to the Venini Factory in Murano. During that time period, Dailey produced a number of incredible blown glass and brass sculptural works. A passionate educator, Dailey went on to found and direct the Glass Program at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design (MassArt). Incredibly, while he was getting the Glass program off the ground at MassArt, he simultaneously took on a research fellowship at MIT and filled a post at Cristallerie Daum as an independent designer. It comes as little surprise that Dailey has been exhibited more than 150 times during his life. His works are held in over 50 public collections including The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Renwick Gallery, Washington DC; and The Louvre, Paris.