The bust of Don Quixote belongs to non-traditional objects of contemporary art housed by the Museum of Glass and Crystal. This piece is made of colorless glass, encased in a wire frame and complemented by a disc-shaped hat.
The noble and eccentric knight-errant is one of the most popular characters in world literature. Don Quixote recurrently appeared in various forms of art including music, theater, and cinema. Operas and ballets, philosophical treatises and literary essays were based on Cervantes’s novel. The artist Fidail Ibragimov offered his own interpretation of the image.
At the 2011 symposium, he presented two different figures of Don Quixote: a bust on an optical glass mount and an almost life-size equestrian statue in a frame, with a spear and a shield. Fidail Ibragimov put a lot of time and effort to develop the elaborate design. The artist prepared unique frames and used them to mold blown glass. When the glass parts were ready and went through the process of annealing (gradual cooling), he put them together into glass compositions. The life-size figure turned out to be much higher than its creator was.
A team of glass blowers led by Igor Moiseev worked on the project. The bust is mounted on a cube of optical glass with a cut surface. Optical glass is valued for its transparency and homogeneity. This tricky material requires a time-consuming and careful manufacturing process. At a certain stage of glass processing, special clarifying agents are added to the glass batch (a mixture of glass sand, soda and lime) — they are used to increase purity.
The artist Fidail Mulla-Akhmetovich Ibragimov has been famous in not only Nikolsk, but also in Gus-Khrustalny and Lvov that host symposiums and art glass triennials, as well as regional, republican and international exhibitions. He worked in a variety of techniques: glass engraving, colored stained glass, art glass compositions, and monumental glass and metal sculptures. The artist received many awards and titles and earned his high reputation among other artists who used to say, “Fidail Ibragimov was a sculptor in glass.” Fidail Mulla-Akhmetovich Ibragimov died in 2020.
The noble and eccentric knight-errant is one of the most popular characters in world literature. Don Quixote recurrently appeared in various forms of art including music, theater, and cinema. Operas and ballets, philosophical treatises and literary essays were based on Cervantes’s novel. The artist Fidail Ibragimov offered his own interpretation of the image.
At the 2011 symposium, he presented two different figures of Don Quixote: a bust on an optical glass mount and an almost life-size equestrian statue in a frame, with a spear and a shield. Fidail Ibragimov put a lot of time and effort to develop the elaborate design. The artist prepared unique frames and used them to mold blown glass. When the glass parts were ready and went through the process of annealing (gradual cooling), he put them together into glass compositions. The life-size figure turned out to be much higher than its creator was.
A team of glass blowers led by Igor Moiseev worked on the project. The bust is mounted on a cube of optical glass with a cut surface. Optical glass is valued for its transparency and homogeneity. This tricky material requires a time-consuming and careful manufacturing process. At a certain stage of glass processing, special clarifying agents are added to the glass batch (a mixture of glass sand, soda and lime) — they are used to increase purity.
The artist Fidail Mulla-Akhmetovich Ibragimov has been famous in not only Nikolsk, but also in Gus-Khrustalny and Lvov that host symposiums and art glass triennials, as well as regional, republican and international exhibitions. He worked in a variety of techniques: glass engraving, colored stained glass, art glass compositions, and monumental glass and metal sculptures. The artist received many awards and titles and earned his high reputation among other artists who used to say, “Fidail Ibragimov was a sculptor in glass.” Fidail Mulla-Akhmetovich Ibragimov died in 2020.
