Solo Exhibitions

Chapel Spirit and Flesh
Ahmanson Gallery
Irvine, California
2016

Curated by John Silvis

The idea for Chapel Spirit and Flesh began with an offer from Lucien Zayan, director of the Invisible Dog Art Center. It was a transformative exhibition that marked our first major show in California. The installation featured a freestanding confessional, glass wall tapestries, beaded glass sculptures, pen-and-ink drawings, and LED-lit panels—all evoking the spiritual, reflective, and symbolic nature of sacred spaces.

This personal iconography inspired a new body of drawings and objects. Red ink grids layered with color became our first experimentation with painting. For the exhibit’s centerpiece, we constructed a full-size confessional with deep red textile walls, beaded glass doors, and a peaked roof, using vintage trimmings found at The Invisible Dog. Inside, we placed a bench, a chair, and a glowing chandelier made of translucent and opaque tubular beads—our first collaborative work with The Corning Museum of Glass.

“William had been developing a series of intricate glass bead panels that shimmered like stained-glass windows as I, visiting Sainte-Chapelle in Paris, was overwhelmed by the emotional power of light shining through colored glass. These experiences reconnected us to childhood memories of the narrow windows at our Catholic grade school and to a small stained-glass window in a neighbor’s house that felt opulent and mysterious to us as kids.”

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A suite of hand-beaded trees—human-scale and forest-like—stood nearby, alongside a set of blown-glass ants we named Adam, Eve, and Original Sin. The show also featured the debut of our Seven Deadly Sins series, oversized glass bombs representing sin through material and form. The Holy Spirit panels—six glowing beaded tapestries—radiated with rich reds, oranges, and blacks. Each panel required over 200 hours to weave.

To bring the space to life, we collaborated with artist Anne Pearce, who performed Confession of Rights. She invited visitors to share personal experiences, transcribing their stories onto cards and returning them as mementos.

When the exhibition traveled to the Ahmanson Gallery in Irvine, California, we expanded the installation and presented the fully completed Holy Spirit panels. Chapel Spirit and Flesh was both a meditation on faith and memory and a technical breakthrough in our exploration of light, material, and storytelling.

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