Daniel Clayman: Capturing Light in Cast Glass Sculpture and Large-Scale Installations

Some might say that Daniel Clayman is more a sculptor using glass as his primary material than a glass artist. That is to say his sculptures would be successful from a formal point of view no matter what material they were created in. With one major exception: the play of light in Clayman’s glass art enhances the objects dramatically in comparison with how they might appear in a solid, non-translucent medium.

Born in 1957 in Lynn, Massachusetts, Clayman planned a career as a theater lighting designer, studying in the theater and dance departments at Connecticut College, eventually dropping out of college to work in the professional theater, dance and opera world. A chance class in 1980 introduced the artist to using glass as a sculptural material. In 1986, he received his BFA from Rhode Island School of Design and has maintained a studio in East Providence, Rhode Island since then.

​Clayman’s interests in engineering, the behavior of light, and the memory of experience, act as an impetus for much of his work. Having turned his attention to large-scale installations, he employs technology from the simplest hand tool to the latest three-dimensional modeling and production tools. Recent public projects include Rainfield, Massachusetts College of Art and Design and Media Center Atrium, exhibition dates: January 23, 2017 – January 23, 2018; and Radiant Landscape, Grounds for Sculpture, Hamilton Township, New Jersey, exhibition dates: May 7, 2017 – February 28, 2018.

Clayman is the recipient of several grants and awards and has had numerous one-person shows throughout the country to include the Tacoma Museum of Glass in Tacoma, Washington, the Mint Museum in Charlotte, North Carolina, and the Fuller Craft Museum in Brockton, Massachusetts. Works in glass sculpture by the artist can be found in the permanent collections of the Museum of Fine Art in San Francisco, The Museum of Art and Design in New York, the Corning Museum of Glass, the Hunter Museum of American Art in Chattanooga, the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Milwaukee Art Museum, the Museum of Fine Art in Boston and the Renwick Gallery of the National Museum of American Art of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. 

An artist/educator, Clayman has taught in Japan, Israel and Australia in addition to a robust teaching schedule here in the U.S. He has been a Visiting Critic at the Rhode Island School of Design and Artist in Residence at Tyler School of Art and Massachusetts College of Art and Design. He lectures frequently and teaches workshops at Penland School of Crafts, Pilchuck and The Studio at the Corning Museum of Glass, among others. In 2018, Clayman became the first endowed chair of glass at University of the Arts, Philadelphia. 

Clayman states: “While I moved away from a professional career pursuit in lighting design, I have never turned away from my observations of light. Using glass as my primary sculptural material, I have spent the last 20 years developing a vocabulary of forms which describe volumes of light. Over the past four years, my studio work has centered around the creation of large-scale glass castings that thematically reference the capturing of light. One of the many mysteries of light is that it refuses to reveal any of its essence until it happens to reflect on something other than itself. For instance, the headlight of a car projects (reflects) light onto objects as the viewer approaches, but not until there is a foggy mist in the air does one see the shape and arc of the beam.”