Goode Glass FINAL (6-26-23) - Flipbook - Page 12
experimentations in molten glass for their revolutionary potential. Sold at street fairs, in gift
shops, and through craft galleries, studio glass then was far from being considered an art form.
The many small-scale, technically awkward, and monochromatic forms starkly contrasted with
the glossy perfection of mid-century modern Italian and Scandinavian designs then marketed for
the fashionable American home.
The Goodes moved to Roanoke, Virginia, in the late 1960s during these artistically formative times
for glass art, and they became involved with the Roanoke Fine Arts Center (now the Taubman
Museum of Art). The Museum actively encouraged young newcomers to the area to take advantage
of the Museum’s educational offerings to learn about art and art collecting. Consequently, their
small personal collection grew (as disposable income would allow). It increasingly included works
created by nationally known and respected artists from the Roanoke area — none of them, however,
were working in glass.
Meanwhile, the 1970s cemented the institutional bedrock on which this new art form could thrive
nationwide. The Pilchuck Glass School as well as the Glass Art Society were founded in 1971 in
the state of Washington. New academic programs dedicated to glass sculpture and design sprang
up at universities and colleges across the country, and specialized galleries and dealers attracted
and cultivated a new cadre of collectors. By the 1980s, studio glass had come into its own. In
Virginia, pioneering artist Kent F. Ipsen (1933-2012) had founded the highly respected glass
program at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) School of Art, graduating new generations
of independent glass artists — coincidentally, Ipsen designed the Virginia Governor's Art Award
presented to the Goodes in 2008. In 1987, the Virginia Glass Guild was formed. Public galleries
and museums nationwide began including glass art in exhibition programming. The Roanoke Fine
Arts Center hosted the traveling exhibition Chihuly: A Decade in Glass in 1987, which brought the
Poster of the
exhibition
Chihuly: A Decade
of Glass, 1984
vibrantly colored installations of America’s best known studio
glass artist to western Virginia.
Glass sculpture would come fully into focus as a collecting area
for the Goodes when the family moved to Norfolk, Virginia,
in 1990. David Goode had played a key role in the merging of
several Eastern railroad companies into the powerful Norfolk
Southern Corporation in 1982, and new headquarters were
subsequently established in Norfolk. During this period of
significant economic growth, the company also had resolved
to assemble a corporate art collection to be enjoyed by
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