Still waiting for sculpture: Setback for glass museum

If you want to see art outside Tacoma’s Museum of Glass, you’ll have to keep waiting.

In theory, there should be two large glass sculptures gracing the waterfront side of the museum this fall. But technical issues have delayed the completion of the museum’s new installation “Fluent Steps” and the return of the City of Tacoma’s “Water Forest”– the first until next spring, the other indefinitely.

For “Water Forest,” a fountain of 22 vertical glass tubes that was damaged by a boy who bumped into it soon after its 2002 installation, the delay is still due to the problem of finding a way to stabilize the fragile tubes – now to be made of acrylic.

The original work, made by acclaimed Rhode Island artist Howard Ben Tre, cost the city $208,000. A sealing method has been tested and found efficient, says Naomi Strom-Avila of the Tacoma Arts Commission, which is handling the repair, and negotiations are under way for the job contract. Strom-Avila was not able to give a definite reinstallation date or a final repair budget.

Meanwhile, the site has been covered by clear plexiglass benches, which were installed for Tall Ships Tacoma to “better utilize the space,” says Strom-Avila. The benches, which belong to the Foss Waterway Development Authority, will be moved to other locations once “Water Forest” is back in place.

On the other side of the plaza, though, there should be glass by next spring. “Fluent Steps,” an enormous installation of hundreds of folded clear glass forms, is halfway done by Seattle artist Martin Blank. Commissioned by the museum, the installation will rest permanently in the reflecting pool outside the museum’s store and elevator.

The pool has been filled in the past with works including Patrick Dougherty’s “Call of the Wild” (2002-2004) and Warren Langley’s “Breathe” (2004-2007), but it’s been empty for the past year.

But for “Fluent Steps,” as for “Water Forest,” the devil is in the details. “Fluent Steps” was supposed to have been unveiled this fall, but it’s the biggest work Blank has ever done, and, he says, he underestimated the sheer time it would take to blow, measure, assemble and finesse.

“I found that what would normally take me a few minutes to adjust now took two days with three of us wearing hard hats,” says Blank. “I had to engineer a different approach.”

Blank’s sculpture consists of individually blown circular glass shapes rolled flat and folded into crenellations, leaves, sails, petals and wisps of flame. Supported on brushed stainless steel shafts, they will rise at different heights out of the water, arranged into islands, archipelagos and skipping wavelets to echo the movement of wind on water. Occasional inserted small shapes in earth tones will give line and depth, and there’s even a glass log, formed in pieces around a real madrona trunk while the glass was hot.

The work has taken Blank four years of planning, 40 days blowing in the museum hot shop, over 1,000 pounds of glass and three months of teamwork assembly.

And he’s only halfway through. After assembling the work in a painstakingly measured replica pool in a rented studio on Puyallup Avenue, Blank has realized there’s another 80 feet of pool left to cover – hence the delay. Museum officials say that though the work may be finished before spring, they will wait for better weather for the installation. The current assemblage, which can be seen through the windows of 909 Puyallup Ave., will be taken down in a few days for storage.

Ultimately, says Blank, the piece will both stir emotions and blend into the surroundings.

“The shafts will be reflected in the pool, playing off each other as well as the vertical boat masts and the museum wall behind,” says the sculptor. “What an opportunity for an artist to be given the front door of the museum.”

Rosemary Ponnekanti: 253-597-8568