For Beth Lipman and Hiromi Takizawa, glass operates as a metaphorical container for the fluid nature of memory and human experience. It is also a material that holds endless fascination for them; it is malleable like clay, but with unique optical qualities that bring a broad range of associations to the various forms it can take. In the following conversation, the artists dig enthusiastically into the nitty gritty of this unique material and its place in their practices. In glass art, even a non-utilitarian work will often begin its life as a blown vessel before being shaped into something else, making the practice an opening for possibilities for form and meaning. In much the same way, the vessel here is a jumping off point into the endless possibilities of this material and all it can hold.
Beth Lipman News
Beth Lipman: All In Time | Wichita Art Museum
June 24- September 25, 2022
Wichita Art Museum
1400 West Museum Boulevard
Wichita, Kansas USA
Opening Day
June 25, 2022, 11am-3pm
Seeing More Clearly Through Glass Curator Talk
July 7, 2022, 6pm
In celebration of Beth Lipman–whose monumental, 3-ton sculpture Living History was recently unveiled in the museum’s Boeing Foyer–Wichita Art Museum presents All in Time, a mid-career retrospective of the artist featuring her work from the mid-2000s through today.
For over 20 years, artist Beth Lipman has used glass and other materials to create luscious and sumptuous still lifes. These still lifes feature everything from bowls of fruit to prehistoric plants to piles of books. For Lipman, each still life object speaks to identity–of an individual, a society, and of human culture in general. All in Time brings into focus Lipman’s long interest in using glass to explore issues of life, creation, decay, and death–the fleeting nature of human life and human history contrasted with the billions of years of geological time. What is the role of humanity and art in a world and universe that existed long before us? What do we create that endures?
Learn more at wichitaartmuseum.org
Show Contract & Finance Independent of Ferrin Contemporary.

Beth Lipman, “Sphenophyllum and Chains”, 2019, glass, wood, metal, paint, adhesive, 54 x 38 x 50″ Courtesy of the artist. Photograph by Rich Maciejewski
EVENTS
Seeing More Clearly Through Glass
July 7, 2022, 7pm at Wichita Art Museum
Curator Talk with Dr. Carolyn Needell, Carolyn and Richard Barry Curator of Glass at the Chrysler Museum of Art in Norfolk, Virginia
Beth Lipman explores aspects of material culture through still lives, site-specific installations, and photographs. Working primarily with glass, she creates portraits individuals and our society through inanimate objects that are often broken, “flawed,” or “perfect”. Mortality, consumerism, materiality, and temporality, have been critical issues since the inception of the still life tradition in the 17th century, and continue to be relevant her in contemporary work.
Lipman has received numerous awards including a USA Berman Bloch Fellowship, Pollock Krasner Grant, Virginia Groot Foundation Grant, and a Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Grant. She recently completed One Portrait of One Man, a sculptural response to Marsden Hartley for the Weisman Art Museum (MN). Lipman has exhibited her work internationally at such institutions as the Ringling Museum of Art (FL), ICA/MECA (ME), RISD Museum (RI), Milwaukee Art Museum (WI), Gustavsbergs Konsthall (Sweden) and the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum (DC). Her work has been acquired by numerous museums including the North Carolina Museum of Art, Brooklyn Museum of Art (NY), Smithsonian American Art Museum (DC), and the Corning Museum of Glass (NY).
CRAFTING AMERICA | Crystal Bridges
February 6 – May 31, 2021
Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art
600 Museum Way
Bentonville, AR
Featuring a newly commissioned work of art by Beth Lipman
Featuring over 100 works in ceramics, fiber, wood, metal, glass, and more unexpected materials, Crafting America presents a diverse and inclusive story of American craft from the 1940s to today, highlighting the work of artists such as Ruth Asawa, Peter Voulkos, Jeffrey Gibson, Sonya Clark, and more. Craft has long been a realm accessible to the broadest range of individuals, providing an opportunity to explore personal creativity, innovation, and technical skill. This exhibition foregrounds varied backgrounds and perspectives in craft, from the vital contributions of Indigenous artists to the new skills and points of view brought by immigrants to the United States.
Learn more at crystalbridges.org
Show Contract & Finance Independent of Ferrin Contemporary.

Beth Lipman, “Belonging(s)”, 2020, glass, ceramic, gold lacquer, enamel paint, salt, sand, adhesive, 27 x 40.5 x 23″. Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas, 2021.3. Photo by Ironside Photography.
Beth Lipman explores aspects of material culture through still lives, site-specific installations, and photographs. Working primarily with glass, she creates portraits individuals and our society through inanimate objects that are often broken, “flawed,” or “perfect”. Mortality, consumerism, materiality, and temporality, have been critical issues since the inception of the still life tradition in the 17th century, and continue to be relevant her in contemporary work.
Lipman has received numerous awards including a USA Berman Bloch Fellowship, Pollock Krasner Grant, Virginia Groot Foundation Grant, and a Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Grant. She recently completed One Portrait of One Man, a sculptural response to Marsden Hartley for the Weisman Art Museum (MN). Lipman has exhibited her work internationally at such institutions as the Ringling Museum of Art (FL), ICA/MECA (ME), RISD Museum (RI), Milwaukee Art Museum (WI), Gustavsbergs Konsthall (Sweden) and the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum (DC). Her work has been acquired by numerous museums including the North Carolina Museum of Art, Brooklyn Museum of Art (NY), Smithsonian American Art Museum (DC), and the Corning Museum of Glass (NY).
Sabbath: The 2017 Dorothy Saxe Invitational
Sabbath: The 2017 Dorothy Saxe Invitational
Nov 12, 2017—Feb 25, 2018
Contemporary Jewish Museum, San Francisco, CA
Ferrin Contemporary artists Sergei Isupov, Jason Walker, Kurt Weiser, and Beth Lipman are among the diverse group of fifty-seven artists interpreting the Sabbath — the day of rest — from their own unique perspectives and engaging with its contemporary relevance. All work is three-dimensional as artists explore the theme through ceramic, wood, and glass.
Click for Contemporary Jewish Museum.
Click for more about Sergei Isupov.
Click for more about Jason Walker.
Click for more about Kurt Weiser.
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