Anja Isphording
Anja Isphording is an artist who reinterprets the familiar in ways that make us see our world in a new light. With glass as her medium and lost wax casting as her primary technique she creates idiosyncratic sculptures always looking familiar enough for us to recognize that they are inspired by nature, yet rarely resembling anything that we have actually encountered.
Juried into the Corning Museum of Glass prestigious annual New Glass Review an unprecedented ten times, Anja is a multiple award-winning artist who studied glass in Germany and in the Czech Republic. Since 2000 she has lived and worked in Canada. Her works are represented in numerous public collections including the Toledo Museum of Art, Toledo, Ohio, Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, VA, Museum of American Glass, Wheaton, NJ, Glass Museum Kamenicky Senov, Czech Republic, Museum of applied Arts, Frankfurt and Kuntsgewerbemuseum, Berlin Germany, among others.
Many consider her intimate sculptures among the most intriguing objects ever made from glass. They embody a sense of reverence for nature’s mysteries and explore the patterns and structures of nature without ever literally reproducing them, often they evoke a mood as much as an image. Plants and marine creatures may echo in the forms, but ultimately, they are guided by Anja’s exquisite imagination.
Even though Isphording maintains a full-time studio practice, demanding technical challenges, coupled with the complexity of her forms, conspire to limit her output. First modeled full-size in wax and then cast in glass, her intricate compositions often require multiple firings. When finished, the sculptures have a tactile quality and emotional range that sets them apart from contemporary trends and renders them timeless. Each piece takes months to create.
2004 Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, USA
2002 Museum fur Angewandte Kunst, Frankfurt, Germany
2001 Kunstmuseum Dusseldorf, Dusseldorf, Germany
Kunstgewerbemuseum, Berlin, Germany
2000 Ernsting Foundation, Alter Hof Herding, Coesfeld-Lette, Germany
1999 Glasmuseum Kamenicky Senov, Czech Republic
1998 Ernsting Foundation, Alter Hof Herding, Coesfeld-Lette, Germany
2014 SOFA Chicago with Heller Gallery, New York, NY
2013 Slow Growth; Heller Gallery, New York, NY
Oceans; Glasmuseet Ebeltoft, Ebeltoft, Denmark
2012 New Work; solo exhibition; Heller Gallery, New York, NY
2010 On The Edge – Kruisgang Roermond, Holland
2009 SOFA West with Heller Gallery, New York
2008 On View; group show Heller Gallery, New York
Glass Quake ,group show Mobilia Gallery, Cambridge,MA
On The Edge; Kruisgang Roermond, Holland
2006 SOFA Chicago with Heller Gallery, New York
“ Global Views”, group show, Heller Gallery, New York
Palm Beach3 with Heller gallery, New York
2005 Solo exhibition, Heller Gallery, New York
“Particle Theories”, International Pate de verre and Other Cast Glass
Granulations,Museum of American Glass, Wheaton Village, NJ, USA
2005 “20/20 Hindsight, Twenty Artists/Twenty Years”, The Bullseye Connection Gallery,
Portland, OR, USA
2005 SOFA Chicago with Heller Gallery, New York
2003 SOFA Chicago with Bullseye Connection Gallery, Portland, OR
2002 SOFA Chicago with Bullseye Connection Gallery, Portland, OR
“Terra Incognita”, group show, The Bullseye Connection Gallery, Portland OR
ST’art, Art Fair Strassbourg with JCC Galerie (Luxembourg)
2001 WG @ BE, Bullseye Connection Gallery, Portland, OR
Contemporary Arts and Crafts from Germany, Deutsche Festspiele in Indien, New Delhi,
Calcutta
International Exhibition of Glass, Kanazawa, Japan
ST’art, Art Fair Strassbourg, with JCC Galerie (Luxembourg)
2000 Dusseldorf, Kunstmuseum am Ehrenhof, Jubilaumsausstellung des Jutta Cuny-Franz
Foundation Preises
Solo show “vessel 2000”, Luxembourg, Jean-Claude Chapelotte Galerie
8th Triennale des Kunsthandwerks, Australia and Germany, Frankfurt, Sydney, Adelaide
Strassbourg, ST’art Art Fair with Galerie
1999 Annual Exhibition der British Columbia Glass Art Association, Vancouver, Library
Kamenicky Senov, Glassmuseum, 2nd Gravyrsymposium
Engraved Glass, International Contemporary Artists, London
Glassammlung Ernsting, Glasmuseum Alter Hof Herding, Coesfeld-Lette
1998 International Exhibition of Glass – Kanazawa, Japan
1997 MANU FACTUM 18th Landesausstellung NRW, Hamm
1996 Painted Glass, Bergbau- und Industriemuseum Ostbayern, Theuern
1995 MANU FACTUM 17th Landesausstellung NRW, Koeln
1994 Synagoga, exhibition of the class Vlad. Kopecky, Academy of Applied Arts, Prague
Portrait der Meister, Winner of the “Bayrischer Staatspreis” 1952 – 1994, Muenchen
Glass Engraving in Europe: Bergbau- und Industriemuseum Ostbayern, Theuern
1992 Neuland, special show of the “ambiente”, Frankfurt
1990-91 Fifth Triennale des Kunsthandwerks, Frankfurt, Hannover, Leipzig
1990 Gestaltungswettbewerb Junges Handwerk in NRW, Aachen
1989 Gugend gestaltet, special show of the Int. Craft Fair, Muenchen
1988 Glas, Gestaltung, Glas, student’s works of the BFS Zwiesel, Glasmuseum Frauenau
