Artist's Statement

During the past 40 years I have made a lot of glass. I have sold worldwide approximately 12,500 blown pieces and fabricated glass sculptures. This is the result of my basic intent; to translate a mental picture into a physical object of beauty that will bring pleasure to someone's life. My approach to my work is swift and efficient, precisely timed like music. It is disciplined because it has to be; it's controlling hot liquid glass.

Early in the 1960's my first blown pieces were quite elementary, but did have some interesting qualities. Most of my early works were blown in rectangular or square wood molds and were made from melted fiberglass marbles. Over the years I have passed through many different styles, some of which an observer would not attribute to me. My blown glass in the late 60's and early 70's was made from plate glass that I recycled from a local PPG dealer. Even though the glass always had a green tint, I did make many elegant blown pieces. It was easy to make some colors with plate - like blue, black, and purple which did improve the look. In about 1974, around the time I started my own studio, I switched to making my glass from Fenton cullet. Over the years I have moved to using standard batch as my raw material to fully enable me to have the freedom I desire in making colors. The colors I use I produce myself in pot furnaces using the batch glass. The batch is clear crystal, so the colors are created by mixing chemicals with the glass and melting them together in separate pots for each color.

Over the years I have introduced and dropped many styles and have developed my own unique style of glass. Edler glass today falls into roughly nine different series. They are:

1. Planetary Plain and Sea & Sunset Series

2. Florals

3. Alligator Glass Series

4. Metallic Sparkle Series

5. Optic Series

6. Silver Trail Series

7. Paperweights

8. Vertebrate Series

9. Sculptures

Samples of some of these can be seen in the Pictures section.

Among the paperweights are the Cut Meteors, Florals, Modern, Diamond & Twist, Snail, and Mars Flower designs. The Ninth style mentioned above is not blown, but is fabricated glass sculpture. The sculptures vary in size from small table top to large architectural pieces.

Much of my blown glass work is highly dependent upon the use of color. I use liquid color much in the same way as a painter. In the Planetary, and Sea & Sunset Series, the designs are depicting other-world landscapes and seascapes using vibrant colors and a lot of fluid detail. In addition, many of the forms are geometric. The floral pieces I started in the early 70's and continued into the early 80's when I dropped them. Recently I have reintroduced the floral in brighter colors with metallic accents. The Alligator Series is my most recent. It mainly involves the use of surface or suspended chrome flakes on or in the crystal. This technique I developed a few years back and I believe it is totally unique to my glass. These Alligator forms are available in metallic yellow, green, ruby, emerald, and sapphire blue. My Metallic Sparkle series plays on the uses of various colors lined with a metallic silver glass which develops a mirrored look to the work.

I have made paperweights for many years, since they have been very popular. Currently I am making six different designs which I mentioned above. My most recent addition to the weight line is the Snail weight. This design I find very interesting and has been an active seller. These pieces are built in 4 or 5 layers of thin color and canes with a surface of opal white and usually two color bands. The hot glass is formed into a cone shape and pulled out and coiled back on itself to form the snail shape.

Finally, the last type of work I mentioned above is my sculptures. I started this approach in the mid 1980's and continue to the present. The sculptures are made from many different types of glass and laminated together with a variety of epoxies. I use hot formed sections combined with plate, vitra-lite, laser reflector, sheet art glass, and glass tile. The sculptures are made in several styles: the Psychic Sail Series (the mind travel machine), the Cascade Series (a symbol for moving water), the Totem Series, the Bird Series, and the Geo Series. These sculptures have been sold all over the world and are purchased by collectors and/or used in domestic and commercial situations.

Over the years, my work has made a major contribution to the American Studio Glass Movement started in the early 1960's. I am very proud to be entering my 40th year working with this wonderful glass medium. It is a good feeling to have made many thousands of glass works available to lovers of glass all over the world. My glass is identified by my name, the year with copyright sign, a six digit registration number, and often a title engraved on the bottom, side, or base of each piece.

Daniel K. Edler - 2003 - Edler Glass Studio

COPYRIGHT INFORMATION: All images and compositions within this website are copyrighted material unless noted otherwise. All artwork represented by the images are copyrighted works.