Click any image to enlarge and view actual size.

Robert Levin

Robert Levin is an internationally known glass artist who lives in the mountains of Western North Carolina. Born and raised in Baltimore, MD, he received his BFA from Denison University and his MFA from Southern Illinois University. He was formerly the Resident Glass Artist at Penland School of Crafts, and has lectured, taught, and led workshops throughout the US, in Ireland, and in New Zealand. He has exhibited widely in the US, Europe, and Japan. His work is in numerous public and private collections, including the Corning Museum of Glass, the Museum of American Glass, the High Museum in Atlanta, the Contemporary Glass Museum in Madrid, the Ebeltoft Glasmuseum in Denmark, the Great Synagogue of Jerusalem, and the Museum of Arts and Design in New York.

Levin has received a Southern Arts Federation/NEA Visual Arts Fellowship, two North Carolina Arts Council Fellowships, and a NC Arts Council Project Grant. For nine years he created the NC Governor's Entrepreneurial Schools Awards. He has twice created the NC Governor's Business Awards in Arts and Humanities, and has also made works which have been presented to visiting dignitaries to our state. His work has been featured in magazines such as American Craft, New Zealand Crafts, Craft Arts International, New Glass Review, as well as in books such as An Introduction to Visual Literacy, Contemporary American Craft Art, Contemporary Glass, and Masterpieces of American Glass. He is included in Who's Who in American Art, The Dictionary of International Biography, and Who's Who in America.

Artist Statement:

I was originally attracted to hot glass because of its liquid qualities and sense of immediacy. I have always tried to capture an element of the elegance, fluidity, and whimsy which I feel are inherent properties of glass. I have often formulated my own glass, including the colors I use, and have generally used opaque glasses or frosted surfaces, which tend to emphasize the overall form of each piece. I find that various aspects of my work take on much more personal connotations for me, although rarely in any explicit ways. This usually happens without my conscious knowledge; I may be looking at a completed piece and see something new in it -- something about myself or my work. This kind of dialogue with the work has become very important to me. I view many of the pieces I've done as extensions of this dialogue, and as an analogy for my attempt to integrate the various facets of my life -- the fusing of various parts, somewhat off-balance, but hopefully integrated into some sort of harmony. The glass itself can be a symbol of human characteristics: fragile, but durable; fluid, but hard-edged. This all has something to do with the possibilities for change and transformation, both with the material and with the person doing the creating. I think of my work as an act of communication, not only with myself, but with the viewer as well. Perhaps what is communicated is more of an attitude than a specific idea.