Miriam Ellner is an artist with a capital A. The New York–based maker is world-renowned for her intricate gilded-glass paintings. “It has been said that alchemy is the search for spirit in matter, and verre églomisé is the medium through which I connect the world of things seen and unseen, ancient and modern,” she tells Business of Home. “It is both solid and changeable, and the act of creating is my way of giving these ephemeral connections permanence.”
Growing up in Queens, New York, Ellner was always an artist. She began taking dance and sewing lessons at a young age, often handcrafting her own costumes and hosting local performances in her community. “I’ve always been drawn to things that are fluid and hard to pin down,” she says. “In dance, one has a palpable connection to space, time and energy, and each piece of choreography translates these forces and gives them form through movement.”
After graduating from the High School of Performing Arts in Manhattan, she lived, worked, studied and danced professionally around the globe—in places ranging from Greece, India and parts of Africa to London, New York and Belgium. She fell in love with verre églomisé while studying decorative painting at Van Der Kelen Logelain in Brussels in the 1980s, where she was introduced to an array of historical gold leafing techniques. “This ancient and unique art form resonated with me deeply,” she says. “I was captivated by its ephemeral, mysterious and alchemic qualities.”
Ellner moved back to New York, and in 1991, she launched her studio in Chelsea. “In my early work I utilized more traditional approaches to the medium, water-gilding 22-karat gold leaf onto the back of the glass,” she says. “Using this ‘golden panel’ like an expensive piece of paper, I then fashioned my own wooden stylus to draw into the gold and back it with color.”
Today she leads a team of eight highly trained glass artisans inside the same studio on West 26th Street where she got her start. Here she keeps an extensive library of archival ornaments and patterns that she uses for inspiration when fashioning her designs. Her contemporary iterations of the old-school technique—which is traditionally composed of precious metals like gold and silver—often employ a modern palette that features fresh elements such as oil paints, acrylics, inks, dyes, mica, mother-of-pearl and crushed abalone. “I am constantly expanding upon and extracting from traditional motifs that can be reconfigured in new ways,” she says. “In studying the historical references to this ancient genre, I’ve built a foundation of materials and techniques that I continue to experiment with and replenish with new ones.”
Ellner’s client roster is every bit as illustrious as her designs, including stars like Michael S. Smith, Celerie Kemble, Alex Papachristidis, Peter Marino, Steven Gambrel, Thomas Jayne, David Kleinberg and Wesley Moon. Past collaborations have included bespoke pieces such as a room-dividing glass panel for a Tony Ingrao project and a glass-paneled chimney breast for an Arizona residence by Michael Simon. “Interior designers bring their own distinct point of view and concerns, which in turn widen my outlook and present new possibilities,” she says. “They are a great source of presenting me with new ways of thinking.”
To celebrate the release of her new book, Golden Glass, Ellner will host a survey show inside her Chelsea studio. On display from March 21 through April 4, the Brian McCarthy–designed exhibition will feature a selection of original pieces that showcase the profundity of Ellner’s work. “At our core we have remained a small specialized studio that prefers to go deep instead of wide,” she says. “Verre églomisé has the ability to make a room sing and dance, and in our current machined and digitized world, more and more people crave craft, and to feel the hand of artists.”
