In 1980, a student from Taiwan studying in the US was about to return home. The boss in the pizza parlor where she worked wanted to give her a going-away present. He looked around forever, but it seemed that everything that was both cute and affordable had the label "Made in Taiwan." Finally. he saw a piece of glassware "Made in Ireland." The boss said, as if having found buried treasure, "Taiwan makes everything. The only thing not made over there is crystal!" Today, fifteen years later, the situation has changed dramatically. Glass making is in the midst of a renaissance in Taiwan, and the goal of the moment for the glassware industry is to achieve the standards of "crystal glass."

"Chinese glass" combines glass with traditional Chinese aesthetics, so the pieces have a genuine Chinese feel. The photo shows a detail from Heinrich Wang's "Dragons of the Four Seas.".

The magical world of glass.

At the end of January of this year, the Newworkshop opened its "Contemporary Glass Exhibition '95." It brings together the works of more than 40 artists from over 40 nations, and is going on tour through Taipei, Kaohsiung, Taichung, and Tainan. In early February, the Hsinchu city government held a Chinese New Year's event entitled "The Hsinchu International Festival for Glass Arts." Besides bringing in glass works from abroad, it also exhibited domestic glass creations. Moreover, there was a demonstration of the manufacturing process, so that people could get a glimpse of the magical world of glass.

Having two exhibitions one on top of the other, which gave much of the public their first-ever taste of either international or local glass artists, was very noteworthy.

The exhibitions attracted large crowds, which reacted with great enthusiasm. Each piece displayed a different character, depending upon the light, shape, and coloring. Each had a different story to tell, from cool and aloof to hot and passionate. People discovered to their great delight that the world of glass is a varied and colorful place.

Mankind has long used glass. Historians say that the oldest glass products yet discovered come from about 3000 BC. Transparent glass bottles were in existence by the 2nd century BC. It is assumed that people already understood glass-blowing techniques by that time.

Glass was originally brought into China from afar. Legend says that it came from a place called "Poli."

In a book of general knowledge compiled by the Ming dynasty author Sung Ying-hsing, in the section devoted to jewelry and precious stones, it says: "The earliest glass baubles were not produced in China, but rather are produced in the Western regions [Xinjiang]. The people delighted in their many colors and learned how to make them."

Growing contacts between East and West introduced glass-making techniques into China, and there is evidence that shows the appearance of glass back to the Warring States Period. Glass working was flourishing by the Han dynasty. A huge number of glass artifacts from the Tang and Sung dynasties have been unearthed, and there are remains of a glass factory from the Yuan dynasty. Imperial glass works were established in the Ming dynasty, and privately manufactured snuff bottles from the Ching dynasty are common.

（left） Glass just with drawn from a furnace at over 1000℃ is transparent and soft, rather resembling caramel candy.

Like burning money

Anyone who has ever been in a glass factory has a deep impression of the enormous furnace in the center. These ovens, essential for melting the glass, not only cost more than NT$1 million, they must be kept going all year round. Once the oven is off, it's all over. S.P. Tsai, chairman of Royal Li Land Art Glass says that the oven is fueled by "huge wads of cash."

Such an enormous and expensive piece of equipment is not something the average artist can aspire to. Most are used to mass-produce items for export. Therefore, in the past, even if there were artists who wanted to make "pure art" with glass, most had to work "indirectly."

Heinrich Wang, who has become well-known recently for his advocacy of the union of glass and Chinese society, was one of the founders of the Newworkshop and is now the director of Grand Crystal. He points out that even great artists like Dali and Picasso, who produced some works made from glass, could only do the designs and ideas. They then had to turn these over to a glass worker for execution. It was impossible for them to do the work themselves.

In 1962, the American ceramic artist Harvey Littleton invented a small-scale furnace. This greatly reduced the size and costs of glass melting equipment. It was only then that glass moved from the factories to the studios. Some artists began to use glass as a material to create "pure art" that transcended practical or decorative functions.

（right） The lost-wax technique requires that the shape first be molded in clay, after which there are several other procedures. The technique is complex, but is suited for bringing out the detail and lines of Buddhist statuary.

Going back to the glass roots

When you talk about glass in Taiwan, you cannot but mention Hsinchu, home to more than 300 plants for the glass industry and for glass handicrafts. Because of the local abundance of the main raw material for glass--quartz sand--as well as natural gas, Hsinchu had already developed a small glass industry in the Japanese occupation era. At that time Hsinchu produced mainly instruments, medical equipment, and household articles.

Hsinchu's glass handicrafts were bred in its glass industry. At first some people used bits of discarded industrial glass to create paperweights and adorable little animals. These became unexpectedly popular, leading to the founding of glass factories that specialized in decorative knick-knacks.

In the 1960s and 1970s Hsinchu was a center of manufacture for export of Christmas tree bulbs and decorative glass. Lin Han-chuan, a folk artist raised in the Hsiangshan area of Hsinchu, remembers that era very clearly. "When I was small almost every house was involved in glass-making." Today, with higher manufacturing costs and reduced orders, this scene of prosperity is already a thing of the past.

Today most of the glass handicraft work in Hsinchu is non-standardized hand-made or semi-hand-crafted glassware. The products are things like vases, perfume bottles, paperweights, swan, tropical fish, and other designs that conform to the tastes of the export market.

Many workshops apply torches to glass rods of various thicknesses to lampworking or solid glass sculpture. The ant in this picture is already taking shape.

Chinese glass

The Newworkshop was established in 1987. Founders Yang Hui-shan and Heinrich Wang brought the "studio glass" format to Taiwan, and began to search for inspiration in Chinese culture and religion. For example, they drew on motifs like ancient Chinese window frames, "phoenix" vessels, bell tripods, lions, flying tigers, bamboo cups, and Buddhist statuary. They dubbed their work "Chinese glass." It injected new life and added a new facet to glass handicrafts in Taiwan.

Places like Newworkshop and Grand Crystal, which work along the studio model, have no restrictions placed on them by export orders, so they enjoy enormous creative space. However, when they first began considering which creative direction to take, they defined their products as not as "pure art" but as "handicrafts."

"How many artists become famous? Designer products are quickly out of fashion. Only those handicraft products which capture the flavor of a people and a culture can stand the test of time," argues Wang. Craft products have a longer shelf life, and they are more affordable for the general public. so they are more acceptable to society. Most of the products produced by Grand Crystal are handicrafts suitable to become family heirlooms.

In fact, the definition of art has always been controversial, and the line between art and crafts is an obscure one. Art critic Hsiao Hsiung-juei points out that in the past art was defined by creativity and uniqueness, so that anything that duplicated something already in existence could not be considered art. However, in the 1980s there was a rethinking. People began to argue that excessive egoistic self-expression can lead the loss of the existing culture. Thus handicrafts began to attract attention, and became seen as a form of art.

As a result, suggests Hsiao, both the animal, plant, and insect glass handicrafts made in Hsinchu as well as the "Chinese glass" made by Newworkshop and Grand Crystal both are part of the gratifying development of glass subject matter in Taiwan, and both "have the opportunity" to become works of art.

Huang An-fu's work "Five Fortunes" won the bronze at the first "Golden Glass Awards." With the beginning of the "Year of the Pig" in the Chinese calendar, glass pigs have been especially popular.

Taking shape in an instant

Glass handicrafts in Taiwan can be divided into three broad types: hollow glass, solid glass, and lampworking.

There are many ways to handle glass. S.P. Tsai, who has been doing glass work for more than 30 years and is now president of the Hsinchu Glass Association, states that glass techniques are virtually limitless, and include: blowing, lampworking, painting, cutting, grinding, darkening, and baking. There is a great deal of space for creativity. Take for example the little glass pigs that have been very popular in the market recently. They are hollow glass made by blowing. The heavy "golden boar" made by Grand Crystal, on the other hand, is manufactured by the lost-wax technique.

The temperature in the furnace for melting glass reaches more than 1400°C. In the furnace the glass takes on a pasty consistency. When the glass is withdrawn from the oven to be shaped, it is as soft as caramel candy.

Different kinds of techniques can be used depending upon the temperature of the glass. These range from the low-temperature lost-wax technique at 800-900° to the lampworking or solid glass methods at 1300°. The range of things you can do with glass is part of the reason glass creations are so fascinating. "There is no material quite like it," emphasizes Heinrich Wang.

Under high temperatures, glass has a cohesiveness that no other material can match. Wang An-fu, who makes solid glass sculpture, points out that you can melt glass and mix it together without leaving any flaws or marks, which differs from other materials like pottery clay, which leave marks.

Although they both take shape at high temperatures, glass and ceramics are markedly different. Paul Y.S. Chen, general manager of China Ceramic Engineering Consultants and also a lecturer in glass-making in the Department of Chemical Industry at the Chinese Culture University, has made a comparison of the two materials. He states, "You can work slowly with porcelain, whereas glass must be completed within a short space of time." The disadvantage of having to finish in such a short time is in fact also the most enticing thing about glass. Chen points out that whereas ceramics must be dried and baked, glass can take shape instantly, so "you can immediately satisfy your creative urges."

Hsinchu glass handicraft workers often depict flora and fauna. This water buffalo with a child on its back is an adorable example.

Crisis to opportunity

Although the glass industry in Hsinchu has world-class production technology, it has long neglected the creative side. It used to be easy to pile up export orders based on prices that were 30% lower than those from Europe. But nothing lasts forever. In the last four or five years orders have been steadily shifting to places with even lower costs, like Southeast Asia and mainland China. With the decline in competitiveness, many factories have simply closed, while others have moved to the PRC. Some, however, are staying on, struggling to transform themselves and create a "second spring" for Hsinchu glass.

"Hsinchu has world-class technology, but loses out to others in concepts and creativity," states S.P. Tsai. Hsinchu has many master craftsmen with decades of experience, some of whom have been hired away to Southeast Asia to teach glass making. "The problem is not in the technology. The Problem is: What are you going to do with it?" concludes Tsai.

In their efforts to transform, many manufacturers have abandoned their previous passivity and begun doing design work of their own in order to increase the value-added in their products.

Take for example Line Heng Enterprises. Company general manager James Young says that in the past they worked almost exclusively from samples provided by customers. But now, 60% of their exported products have been designed in-house. Furthermore, after the production line shuts down, several master craftsmen and entrepreneurs take over. They have formed a workshop and use the factory's equipment to produce works different from the ones manufactured by day.

S.P. Tsai has organized his own studio. There he gets together with artists in hopes of creating an even closer connection between technique and creativity.

The photo shows one of the pieces invited to the Contemporary Glass Exhibition '95. It was crafted by an Italian artist, Livio Seguso. （photo courtesy of Newworkshop）

Glass and crystal

Besides encouraging creativity, glass work in Taiwan is also moving toward upgrading quality to the standards of "crystal glass."

Hsu Wen-hsiung, an engineer at the Union Chemical Laboratories at the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI), points out that the raw materials for glass cost about NT$3-4 per kilogram, while those for crystal ware cost NT$30-40. However, while the costs are higher, so is the value-added: 10 or 20 times higher than ordinary glass.

Crystal and glass are in fact two different things. Hsu Wen-hsiung points out that originally crystal referred to the naturally-occurring crystalline shapes of quartz. It appears colorless, transparent, and sparkling. Glass, on the other hand, is manufactured out of quartz sand, potassium carbonate, sodium carbonate, bauxite, or minium (red lead).

In fact, there are no fixed ingredients for crystal glass, says Hsu. It is merely any glass that appears as sparkling as natural quartz crystal, and has no bubbles or flaws. In other words, "crystal" simply describes a more perfect form of glass.

However, to produce sparkling, flawless crystal requires raw materials of very high purity. Moreover, the furnace must be kept at a constant temperature and there can be no impurities in the melting stage.

In the past neither the equipment nor the raw materials in Taiwan could reach the required standards. Therefore those who worked with crystal had to import either raw materials or glass rods from abroad in order to create.

Today, Taiwan has come a long way in terms of creating the raw materials for crystal glass. Hsu Wen-hsiung points out that ITRI has already produced suitable raw materials and provided them to glass manufacturers.

The Hsinchu International Festival for Glass Arts symbolized "a new start" for the Hsinchu glass industry. It is hoped that two-way communication through this international exhibition will spark a "second spring" for this traditional Hsinchu craft.

Not foreign-made

Unlike the export-oriented glass factories in Hsinchu, workshops like Newworkshop and Grand Crystal have focused on Taiwan right from the start. "When we first started out people thought we were a joke," says Chang Yi, president of the Newworkshop. They were the first ones to ask thousands of US dollars for glass ware. Today they can't keep up with demand, so obviously they are becoming more and more accepted by Taiwan's market.

With the stimulus provided by the glass studios, some of the Hsinchu manufacturers have begun to develop the domestic market. Many agree that people in Taiwan are increasingly receptive to glass art, but say that people lack understanding and confidence in locally made products.

James Young notes that in the past people in Taiwan never even saw the Hsinchu glass that was made for export, and products made for foreign labels wouldn't even be marked "Made in Taiwan." So not just outsiders, but even people in Taiwan, have absolutely no understanding of the technology and standards of Hsinchu glassware. In fact, there were even cases of people unknowingly importing Hsinchu glassware from abroad to sell in the domestic market.

Foreign products, on the other hand, carry the chic "imported from abroad" label. "If you tell people something is made here in Taiwan, they don't want it," claims Yang.

Even today many of those who sell locally made glass out of kiosks in department stores hang out "imported glassware" signs to attract customers. This deceptive labeling shows how little understanding Taiwanese have of local glassware. For their part, the glass sellers should bear much of the responsibility for this because of the "inadequate promoting" of local products.

The holding of the Festival of Glass Arts in Hsinchu is partly in response to this problem. It aims to give residents some understanding of Taiwan-made glass handicrafts and to thus pry open the domestic market.

A work by the French artist Toots Zynsky. （photo courtesy of Newworkshop）

Enemies in the same line?

Besides the past lack of creativity, another obstacle local glass makers need to overcome is the "mutually exclusive" attitude of many in the industry.

In the past many manufacturers passed up the domestic market because they feared that their best products would be quickly pirated and their orders taken out from under them. Not only was there little cooperation between companies, factories were never open to visitors.

S.P. Tsai notes that overseas, creative artists will form teams and give each other support and observe each others' techniques. Despite this, everyone retains their individual style, with no pirating.

Trying to break through the mutual distrust in Taiwan, Tsai has organized the "Hsinchu Glass Association." He plans to begin regular seminars in March to strengthen interchange and provide the latest information in the field.

He also encourages factories to open their doors to increase the understanding and affection of the public for glassware. Beginning this year, Royal Li Land Art Glass will lead the way in offering tours.

The Hsinchu Modern Dance Company performed "The Glass Window," using lithe, graceful movements to portray the process of melting, blowing, and shaping glass.

Opening the glass door

Besides advertising and sales, an even bigger challenge is recruiting skilled people. In subtropical Taiwan, it is no fun to work around a fiery furnace. As a result, all the glass factories in Hsinchu are having a hard time finding employees.

In order to save Taiwan's glass industry from having no one to carry on, several veteran artists like Huang An-fu and Lin Chi-lien have been teaching basic glass-making in middle schools and high schools in Hsinchu in hopes of drawing young people into the trade.

To encourage creativity, the Hsinchu Municipal Cultural Center last year began holding the "Golden Glass Awards." It also purchases the top three pieces for its collection, and plans to establish a "glass museum" in the future.

Meanwhile studios like Newworkshop and Grand Crystal, creating a new synthesis of glass and Chinese culture, have attracted many young people through their numerous exhibits, generating a new source of strength.

"People have to start from knowing and understanding, and only then can they move on to admiration and appreciation." says Heinrich Wang. To give more people a chance to get to know glass, Grand Crystal has begun recruiting students. Newworkshop's Chang Yi notes that in March of this year they will formally open their international glass art gallery in Tienmu, and they will begin a "basic glassware study camp" at the same time. It looks like glass working has a good future.

Today people in Taiwan have the chance to come into contact with world-class glass art, and to learn about creating with glass. Glass manufacturing equipment is more and more accessible (today it only costs around NT$300,000). Perhaps in the not-too-distant future, glass will be like pottery--an art form that anyone can engage in.

[Picture Caption]

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"Chinese glass" combines glass with traditional Chinese aesthetics, so the pieces have a genuine Chinese feel. The photo shows a detail from Heinrich Wang's "Dragons of the Four Seas."

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(left) Glass just with drawn from a furnace at over 1000°C is transparent and soft, rather resembling caramel candy.

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(right) The lost-wax technique requires that the shape first be molded in clay, after which there are several other procedures. The technique is complex, but is suited for bringing out the detail and lines of Buddhist statuary.

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Many workshops apply torches to glass rods of various thicknesses to lampworking or solid glass sculpture. The ant in this picture is already taking shape.

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Huang An-fu's work "Five Fortunes" won the bronze at the first "Golden Glass Awards." With the beginning of the "Year of the Pig" in the Chinese calendar, glass pigs have been especially popular.

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Hsinchu glass handicraft workers often depict flora and fauna. This water buffalo with a child on its back is an adorable example.

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The photo shows one of the pieces invited to the Contemporary Glass Exhibition '95. It was crafted by an Italian artist, Livio Seguso. (photo courtesy of Newworkshop)

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The Hsinchu International Festival for Glass Arts symbolized "a new start" for the Hsinchu glass industry. It is hoped that two-way communication through this international exhibition will spark a "second spring" for this traditional Hsinchu craft.

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A work by the French artist Toots Zynsky. (photo courtesy of Newworkshop)

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The Hsinchu Modern Dance Company performed "The Glass Window," using lithe, graceful movements to portray the process of melting, blowing, and shaping glass.

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A piece by the American artist Herb Babcock. Its Chinese title means "Without End," which exactly expresses how local glass makers hope their future will be.

A piece by the American artist Herb Babcock. Its Chinese title means "Without End," which exactly expresses how local glass makers hope their future will be.