Museum JAN in Amstelveen is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year. To mark this occasion, we are organizing the anniversary exhibition Sparkling Glass - 30 Years of Museum JAN: an overview of the exceptional glass collection. A true celebration of diversity in technique, form, and color.
Origins of Museum JAN: Jan van der Togt (1905-1995), director of the well-known Tomado factory (Van der Togt Massa-artikelen Dordrecht), amassed a fortune. He collected everything he liked: international visual art and, in particular, modern glass. Especially after his retirement, his collection grew with works by Andries Copier, Václav Cígler, Ossip Zadkine, Sam Francis, and others. Together with artist and friend Jan Verschoor, he founded the Jan van der Togt Museum (now Museum JAN) in Amstelveen in 1991. As director, Verschoor expanded the glass collection and deepened it with pieces from the Netherlands and abroad. The glass collection of Museum JAN has since gained international renown.
The Van der Togt collection purchased a lot of glass from the former Czechoslovakia, a region with a centuries-old glassmaking tradition. Around 1965, the glass departments in both the Czech Republic (Prague Academy of Fine Arts) and Slovakia (Bratislava Academy of Fine Arts) developed into independent branches, led by Stanislav Libenský and Václav Cigler, respectively. Under Libenský, artists focused on monumental glass, which was used in architecture. Cigler developed a geometric-abstract design language.
During the same period, the studio glass movement, which had originated in the United States, gained momentum. Until then, glass had mainly had a utilitarian function, but now glass artists began to build their own kilns. From that moment on, they were no longer dependent on craftsmen in glass factories to carry out their work: hence the name 'free glass'. In the Netherlands, this studio glass movement led to the establishment of the glasswork group at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam in 1969. Since then, this department has developed into one of the most important glass academies in the world. In 1977, Willem Heesen built his own glass studio in Acquoy, in the Dutch province of Gelderland, where artists such as Andries Copier, Lino Tagliapietra, and Mieke Groot regularly came to realize their designs.
Van der Togt was particularly charmed by the Slovakian cut optical glass of Václav Cigler, Lubomír Artz, Bohumil Eliáš, and Pavol Hlôška, but on Verschoor's advice, he also began to acquire the more sculptural and rougher works of Libenský, Gizela Šabóková, and Aleš Vašíček. A characteristic feature of modern, international glass is that the container-like form of utility glass (vases, jugs, drinking glasses) has more or less given way to free forms and glass sculptures.
Contemporary Dutch glass is also well represented in the collection, with works by Andries Copier, Willem Heesen, and Bert Frijns. After Van der Togt's death in 1995, Verschoor became director of Museum JAN. Under his leadership, the collection was expanded with international modern glass by Julius Weiland, Tomoko Doi, Frank van den Ham, Barbara Nanning, and several spectacular glass sculptures by Bernard Heesen.
Museum JAN houses many surprising treasures, even for those unfamiliar with glass art: from the sober aesthetics of Ritsue Mishima's work and the fascinating play of light in Peter Bremers' large bowl to the enchanting asymmetrical shapes and colors of the vases by masters Tagliapietra, Copier, and Heesen.
Donation and new publications: The exhibition Brilliant Glass - 30 Years of Museum JAN is presented in the renovated glass room of Museum JAN. The glass object 'Verre églomisé' by artist Barbara Nanning, which she donated in honor of this 30th anniversary, will also be on display.