Timo Sarpaneva, a 'Black bird' sculpture signed Timo Sarpaneva 1997. Nuutajärvi glass factory.
Multicoloured glass. Length 27 cm. Height 15 cm.
The general impression is good.
Timo Sarpaneva family.
In 1996, Timo Sarpaneva rented a chair from the Notsjö glassworks. He wanted to work as a freelance artist together with his two trusted glassblowers Heikki Punkari and Reijo Salonen. Sarpaneva used the steam-blowing method he had developed at Iittala as a young artist. The work took place on weekends when the daily production at Notsjö was down.
As the steam-blowing method was something unfamiliar to Punkari and Salonen, Matti Rautanen, the retired master, promised to supervise the work.
Sarpaneva started working with his well-known 'Sleeping Bird' theme, variations of which he had already designed in 1957. Now he wanted a new expression for the works - a rich glass mass and a 'more powerful figure'. So he created glass 'Black-bird' sculptures whose deep colours and magical optics of the glass create a glow resembling gemstones.
Marjatta Sarpaneva