English. The Bacchus Goblet, 1730–1740. Glass; 12 x 5 1/2 in. (30.48 x 13.97 cm.). The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri, purchase: the Charles T. and Marion Thompson Fund, 2022.14
For the next two years, from November 2, 2024, to August 9, 2026, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art celebrates historic glass, a little-known strength of its esteemed European decorative arts collection.
Nearly four dozen examples of European glassware, spanning the Ancient Mediterranean world to nineteenth-century Central Europe, will be on view in Gallery 110. Many of these works have not been seen in decades. They are joined by a brace of new acquisitions, including the show-stopper Bacchus Goblet. This monumental celebratory wineglass—over a foot tall—is a dazzling example of 18th-Century English lead glass, made at the moment when Great Britain became the go-to center for fashionable colorless glass. This famous object had many equally famous owners before the museum acquired it at auction in summer 2022. One of its former owners included William Randolph Hearst, the supposed inspiration for “Citizen Kane,” who kept it at his Irish castle for nearly 20 years.
In addition to the Bacchus Goblet, newly acquired examples of early modern German and Netherlandish glass explore decorative possibilities, from bright enamel colors to intricate blown stems.
The museum collected glass from its founding. Made of a basic mixture of three ingredients for thousands of years, glass is deceptively simple and often taken for granted—yet its forms and its appearances can tell us much about the cultures from which it springs.
Visitors will see a selection of exquisitely colored Ancient Mediterranean glass, including a bottle meant to collect the tears of mourners.
Newly acquired examples of German and Netherlandish glass, including a fanciful Serpent Stemmed Goblet, showcase the race to imitate and overtake Venice, whose famed glasshouses dominated the international market for centuries.
Meanwhile, anyone who has ever played beer pong or quarters will appreciate the clever—and potentially headache-inducing—drinking game represented on an 18th-Century German pasglas, another new acquisition.
Visitors also will become reacquainted with highlights from the Wallenstein Collection, a large group of English lead crystal glasses that once belonged to the wartime European correspondent for the Kansas City Star. Besides showcasing the variety of forms that British glassmakers perfected during the eighteenth century, the Wallenstein collection works on view in this installation include a selection of politically minded wineglasses. The engravings on these glasses allude to their owners’ allegiances during this period of strife between the Jacobite supporters of Bonnie Prince Charlie and the Hanoverian Georgian royal family—a reminder in an election year that the personal is the political.
The installation is supported by a grant from the Samuel H. Kress Foundation and features accompanying videos that show glassmaking in action. “Glorious Glass” is free to the public.
–William Keyse Rudolph, Deputy Director, Curatorial Affairs, Chief Curator, and Head, Architecture, Design and Decorative Arts, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art
