Chandelier Dale Tiffany

With his sculptural works that fuse naturalistic forms with vibrant colors, Dale Chihuly has established himself as one of the world’s preeminent contemporary makers of art glass. The Tacoma, Washington, native’s experimental techniques — manifest in large-scale glass sculptures, installations and environmental artworks alongside smaller table-top pieces — combine fine art, design, architecture and craft.

Chihuly’s inspired creative energy has brought glass blowing to a place at the forefront of the arts in the United States. His prolific body of work is coupled with a dedication to artistic instruction, education and community. Trained in interior design at the University of Washington, he pursued graduate work with Harvey Littleton, who built the first academic art glass program in the U.S. at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. After further studies at the Rhode Island School of Design, Chihuly was awarded a 1968 Fulbright Fellowship to study glass blowing at the Venini glass factory on the island of Murano in Venice, where he was first introduced to group collaboration in glass making. Not only has Chihuly been committed to his own improvement as an artist, but he has also devoted much of his career to sharing his knowledge. He returned to RISD as an instructor, and after working there for more than a decade and he cofounded the Pilchuck Glass School in Washington State in 1971. An automobile accident in 1976 left Chihuly blind in one eye; a subsequent injury while bodysurfing weakened one shoulder, leaving him reliant on assistant glassblowers to execute his designs.

Chihuly’s skills and technical innovations have allowed him to make pieces in an astonishing array of patterns, textures and hues — yet his work can be recognized immediately. He has created several notable extended series of artworks. These include his “Seaforms,” which evoke shells, starfish and other marine animals; “Blankets,” which are composed of cylindrical units in patterns suggested by Native American textiles; and, most famously, his grand chandeliers made up of scores of curling, curving, pepper-shaped elements. Whether large or small, as you will see on 1stDibs, the works of Dale Chihuly blend practical flair and bravura artistry. They are a highlight of any contemporary art and design collection.

Beginning in the early 20th century, abstract art became a leading style of modernism. Rather than portray the world in a way that represented reality, as had been the dominating style of Western art in the previous centuries, abstract paintings, prints and sculptures are marked by a shift to geometric forms, gestural shapes and experimentation with color to express ideas, subject matter and scenes.

Although abstract art flourished in the early 1900s, propelled by movements like Fauvism and Cubism, it was rooted in the 19th century. In the 1840s, J.M.W. Turner emphasized light and motion for atmospheric paintings in which concrete details were blurred, and Paul Cézanne challenged traditional expectations of perspective in the 1890s.

Some of the earliest abstract artists — Wassily Kandinsky and Hilma af Klint — expanded on these breakthroughs while using vivid colors and forms to channel spiritual concepts. Painter Piet Mondrian, a Dutch pioneer of the art movement, explored geometric abstraction partly owing to his belief in Theosophy, which is grounded in a search for higher spiritual truths and embraces philosophers of the Renaissance period and medieval mystics. Black Square, a daringly simple 1913 work by Russian artist Kazimir Malevich, was a watershed statement on creating art that was free “from the dead weight of the real world,” as he later wrote.

Surrealism in the 1920s, led by artists such as Salvador Dalí, Meret Oppenheim and others, saw painters creating abstract pieces in order to connect to the subconscious. When Abstract Expressionism emerged in New York during the mid-20th century, it similarly centered on the process of creation, in which Helen Frankenthaler’s expressive “soak-stain” technique, Jackson Pollock’s drips of paint, and Mark Rothko’s planes of color were a radical new type of abstraction.

Conceptual art, Pop art, Hard-Edge painting and many other movements offered fresh approaches to abstraction that continued into the 21st century, with major contemporary artists now exploring it, including Anish Kapoor, Mark Bradford, El Anatsui and Julie Mehretu.

Find original abstract paintings, sculptures, prints and other art on 1stDibs.

Explore a vast range of abstract prints on 1stDibs to find a piece to enhance your existing collection or transform a space.

Unlike figurative paintings and other figurative art, which focuses on realism and representational perspectives, abstract art concentrates on visual interpretation. An artist may use a single color or simple geometric forms to create a world of depth. Printmaking has a rich history of abstraction. Through materials like stone, metal, wood and wax, an image can be transferred from one surface to another.

During the 19th century, iconic artists, including Edvard Munch, Paul Cézanne, Georgiana Houghton and others, began exploring works based on shapes and colors. This was a departure from the academic conventions of European painting and would influence the rise of 20th-century abstraction and its pioneers, like Pablo Picasso and Piet Mondrian.

Some leaders of European abstraction, including Franz Kline, were influenced by the gestural shapes of East Asian calligraphy. Calligraphy interprets poetry, songs, symbols or other means of storytelling into art, from works on paper in Japan to elements of Islamic architecture.

Bold, daring and expressive, abstract art is constantly evolving and dazzling viewers. And entire genres have blossomed from it, such as Color Field painting and Minimalism.

The collection of abstract art prints on 1stDibs includes etchings, lithographs, screen-prints and other works, and you can find prints by artists such as Joan Miró, Alexander Calder and more.