Andries Dirk Copier

Andries Dirk Copier (1901-1991) is the best known 20th-century Dutch glass artist and a precursor of the international studio glass movement. At the age of twenty-seven, he was already managing the Leerdam Glass Factory, the largest of its kind in the Netherlands. There he was able to freely develop aesthetically alongside extensive work in designing utilitarian glass, to experiment with forms and colours and try out recently discovered techniques. The works that grew out of that artistic experimentation are called Unica. Today they are viewed as autonomous works of art in their own right. Even after he retired, Copier continued to work until he was ninety years old at the world's leading glass centres in Murano, the US, Sweden, France and the Czech Republic. Copier called the Unica objects he produced during that period 'autonomous glass'. This book focuses on the artistic development of Unica glass. Some 60 Leerdam Unica pieces as well as 'autonomous glass' pieces are shown and analysed, covering a period of approx. 70 years. Nor is the work Copier produced as an industrial designer neglected. Particularly important or rare examples of designs for utilitarian objects - notably Leerdam glass - are also shown. Photographs of people, rare drawings from Copier's own hand, detail photos, reproductions of signatures, chronological tables to facilitate dating and objects for comparison round out this comprehensive publication on Andries Dirk Copier and the glass of his day.