Jeremy Langford
Encyclopedia
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
/Israeli glass
Glass
Glass is an amorphous solid material. Glasses are typically brittle and optically transparent.The most familiar type of glass, used for centuries in windows and drinking vessels, is soda-lime glass, composed of about 75% silica plus Na2O, CaO, and several minor additives...
designer and sculptor known for his monumental stacked glass sculptures. His family's original name was Lelyveld, natives of the Netherlands
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
, and Langford is related to Joseph Lelyveld
Joseph Lelyveld
Joseph Lelyveld was executive editor of the New York Times from 1994 to 2001, and interim executive editor in 2003 after the resignation of Howell Raines. He is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author, and a frequent contributor to the New York Review of Books.In all, Lelyveld worked at...
, an editor of The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, and to civil rights activist Rabbi Arthur Lelyveld
Arthur Lelyveld
Rabbi Arthur J. Lelyveld was a rabbi within the movement of Reform Judaism. As well as being a prominent rabbi he also embraced social activism in many forms....
. Jeremy Langford’s great grandfather was a royal court entertainer in the U.K. (specializing in whistling), serving the court of King Edward VII and, after whose death, opened the soap factory Sloman’s. Langford’s father, Barry Langford (b. London, England, 1926) was the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
producer and director who created the first pop-music shows for the network and directed many, including The Tom Jones Show
The Tom Jones Show
The Tom Jones Show was a syndicated television variety show hosted by Tom Jones, that aired during the 1980-1981 television season. Twenty four episodes of the show were produced. The show was produced in Vancouver, Canada. The format of the show was for Tom Jones to perform his old hits and...
. He also worked with the Beatles and the Rolling Stones discovered David Bowie
David Bowie
David Bowie is an English musician, actor, record producer and arranger. A major figure for over four decades in the world of popular music, Bowie is widely regarded as an innovator, particularly for his work in the 1970s...
and briefly managed Deep Purple
Deep Purple
Deep Purple are an English rock band formed in Hertford in 1968. Along with Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath, they are considered to be among the pioneers of heavy metal and modern hard rock, although some band members believe that their music cannot be categorised as belonging to any one genre...
.
Biography
Jeremy Langford moved from Great BritainGreat Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
to Melbourne
Melbourne
Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...
, Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
, when he was 13, and began dabbling in glass when he was 15. At first, he melted bottles in an old ceramic kiln, creating from the raw material his first stained glass works. At 18, he returned to the U.K. to study at The London Film School
London Film School
The London Film School is a private film school in London and is situated in a converted brewery in Covent Garden, London, close to a hub of the UK film industry based in Soho. The LFS was founded in 1956 by Bob Dunbar as The London School of Film Technique...
and met a traditional English glass artist who taught him glassmaking techniques; thus, he acquired the foundation for his future work. At this time he also studied naturopathic medicine
Naturopathic medicine
Naturopathy, or Naturopathic Medicine, is a form of alternative medicine based on a belief in vitalism, which posits that a special energy called vital energy or vital force guides bodily processes such as metabolism, reproduction, growth, and adaptation...
and Jewish mysticism
Mysticism
Mysticism is the knowledge of, and especially the personal experience of, states of consciousness, i.e. levels of being, beyond normal human perception, including experience and even communion with a supreme being.-Classical origins:...
and later homeopathy
Homeopathy
Homeopathy is a form of alternative medicine in which practitioners claim to treat patients using highly diluted preparations that are believed to cause healthy people to exhibit symptoms that are similar to those exhibited by the patient...
.
He has stated, “Just as a musician trains in classical music, he can then diversify and enter any musical field—even heavy rock. I feel that, with such a training in traditional glassmaking techniques, I can stretch the limits and even go wildly off the established path of traditional glass working.”
With a studio in London in the mid-1970s, he divided his time between the U.K. and Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
and continued developing his glassmaking skills. It was at this time he first started experimenting in stacked sculptural glass, a skill he has developed further over the last few years in some of his monumental glass sculptures around the world.
He married Yael Langford (née Itach), a scientist who specialized in quantum chemistry
Quantum chemistry
Quantum chemistry is a branch of chemistry whose primary focus is the application of quantum mechanics in physical models and experiments of chemical systems...
, and particularly in the relationship between brainwaves and consciousness. Yael passed away on September 15, 2009. At the time of her passing the couple were involved in a beta project concerning the connection between art, brainwaves and consciousness.
He is currently working on projects in various U.S. cities. They include three monumental sculptures in the The Trump International Towers at Sunny Isles Beach, Florida
Sunny Isles Beach, Florida
Sunny Isles Beach is a city located on a barrier island in northeast Miami-Dade County, Florida, United States. The City is bounded by the Atlantic Ocean on the east and the Intracoastal Waterway on the west...
, and a sculpture in the Miami Four Seasons Hotel.
His glass work is to be included in a Holocaust Memorial in Beverly Hills, California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
, and a number of residences in Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
and New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. Other work has been installed in numerous synagogues.
Langford’s best-known project is The Chain of Generations Center, a 2006 heritage center in Jerusalem that features a large collection of glass sculptures documenting the history of the Jewish people from Biblical times until the present. The project, which recently received the prestigious Thea Award from the Themed Entertainment Association
Themed Entertainment Association
The Themed Entertainment Association is an international non-profit association that represents creators, developers, designers and producers of themed entertainment...
, extends down into the catacombs at the edge of the Kotel (or Western Wall
Western Wall
The Western Wall, Wailing Wall or Kotel is located in the Old City of Jerusalem at the foot of the western side of the Temple Mount...
) in Jerusalem. Partly funded by media magnate Mortimer Zuckerman
Mortimer Zuckerman
Mortimer Benjamin "Mort" Zuckerman is a Canadian-born American business magnate with interests primarily in magazines, publishing, and real estate. He is now a naturalized citizen of the United States....
, the installation features uniquely carved and etched layers of plate glass, and required almost 150 tons of glass to create. When archeologists were excavating the space for the Langford installation, they first discovered a fully preserved ritual bath from the Second Temple
Second Temple
The Jewish Second Temple was an important shrine which stood on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem between 516 BCE and 70 CE. It replaced the First Temple which was destroyed in 586 BCE, when the Jewish nation was exiled to Babylon...
period, located beneath the Roman-times
Ancient Rome
Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
level. They then discovered a portion of a Wall from the First Temple (or the Solomon's Temple), completed in about 950 BCE but destroyed by the Babylonians approximately 360 years later.
On the connection between his art and spirituality, Langford compares the physical material of glass to the state of seeking a spiritual dimension. “As alchemists
Alchemy
Alchemy is an influential philosophical tradition whose early practitioners’ claims to profound powers were known from antiquity. The defining objectives of alchemy are varied; these include the creation of the fabled philosopher's stone possessing powers including the capability of turning base...
symbolically sought to change a base metal into a precious material—gold
Gold
Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au and an atomic number of 79. Gold is a dense, soft, shiny, malleable and ductile metal. Pure gold has a bright yellow color and luster traditionally considered attractive, which it maintains without oxidizing in air or water. Chemically, gold is a...
—so working in glass mirrors this process. Glass starts as sand, a lifeless substance. Through a process of heat and pressure, it becomes a bright, light-transmitting, elastic material—transparent but with defined boundaries and borders.”
Works
Projects are included in:- Supreme Court Building, Jerusalem
- Residence of the President of Israel, Jerusalem
- Western Wall TunnelWestern Wall TunnelThe Western Wall Tunnel is an underground tunnel exposing the full length of the Western Wall. The tunnel is adjacent to the Western Wall and is located under buildings of the Old City of Jerusalem, Israel. While the open-air portion of the Western Wall is approximately long, the majority of its...
s, Old City, Jerusalem - Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel
- Ben Gurion Airport, Tel Aviv
- British MuseumBritish MuseumThe British Museum is a museum of human history and culture in London. Its collections, which number more than seven million objects, are amongst the largest and most comprehensive in the world and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its...
, London - Hilton Hotel, Mayfair, London
- Los Angeles Temple Etz Chaim Los Angeles
- Trump International Towers, Sunny Isles Beach, Florida
- Four Seasons Hotel, Miami