Richard Paton

Damien Hirst commission · 2016

Damien Hirst Skull Windows

A three-year series of stained-glass skull windows combining painted mouth-blown glass, copper foil and thousands of Swarovski crystals.

Installed stained-glass skull and skeleton windows commissioned by Damien Hirst
A group of the completed skull and skeleton windows installed together.
Commission
Damien Hirst
Reference
For the Love of God
Project duration
Three years
Studio team
Richard Paton, Shane and Zhanna
Series
Twenty adult-skull windows
Completed
2016

Translating a diamond skull into stained glass

Damien Hirst commissioned Rainbow Glass Studios to make a series of windows based on his diamond-encrusted skull sculpture, For the Love of God. Richard worked with Shane and Zhanna on the project over three years, completing the series in 2016.

The imagery demanded a level of detail beyond conventional architectural stained glass. The skulls were built from specially shaped, painted and fired glass, then covered with Swarovski crystals so that the surfaces changed continually with the light.

“Each adult-skull window used approximately 7,000 crystals, applied individually to both faces of the glass.”

The making

Glass, paint, solder and thousands of crystals

  1. 01
    Five detailed views of a skull used as reference for the stained-glass windows
    Reference drawings showing the skull from five viewpoints.

    Five views of the skull

    The skull was developed from frontal, three-quarter and profile studies. These reference drawings allowed the changing structure of the head, jaw and teeth to be resolved across the series.

  2. 02
    Full-size skull outline marked out as a guide for shaping the glass pieces
    The skull mapped out at full size for glass cutting and shaping.

    Diamond cutting and grinding

    The background glass was mouth-blown in Germany. Diamond saws and grinders were used to produce the unusually small and complex shapes required by the skull designs.

  3. 03
    A purple profile skull being hand-painted on a light table
    Painting the modelling and detail onto the shaped glass.

    Painting and kiln firing

    Individual pieces were painted to build the modelling, shadows and anatomical detail, then fired in the studio’s gas kiln to make the painted work permanent.

  4. 04
    Close view of work progressing across a purple skull panel on a light table
    Assembling the detailed glasswork using copper foil and solder.

    Copper foil assembly

    The glass pieces were wrapped in copper foil and soldered together. This technique produced much finer joins than conventional lead came, preserving the density of the design.

  5. 05
    Close detail of the skull’s jaw, teeth and tightly packed circular glass and crystal elements
    The minute surface detail around the jaw and teeth.

    Preparing and applying the crystals

    The mirror backing was removed from the Swarovski crystals using nitric acid. Crystals from 0.2 to 6 millimetres were then fixed to both sides with tweezers and UV-curing adhesive. Covering one panel took approximately two weeks.

Gallery

Completed purple skull window photographed against a blue background
A completed frontal skull window.
Completed crystal-covered skull window photographed against wood
The crystal-covered surface catching the light.
Two completed skull windows installed one above the other
Two skull panels installed as a vertical pair.
Completed purple skull window shown in profile
A profile skull from the series.
Four completed skull windows installed together
Four views of the skull installed together.
Painted skull glass pieces arranged inside the kiln
Painted glass pieces prepared for kiln firing.
Four purple skull windows installed in dark timber frames
A purple group of skull windows in their setting.
Overlapping pieces of brightly coloured mouth-blown glass
Colour and glass selection for the wider series.
Completed purple skull window viewed from the side
Fine detail across a side view of the skull.
Black-and-white skull reference photograph
An anatomical reference used during development.
Completed purple skull in three-quarter view against blue
A three-quarter skull view.
Completed dark skull window densely covered with sparkling crystals
The finished crystal surface under direct light.
Five skull views arranged in a horizontal design sequence
The five viewpoints developed as a continuous sequence.

Detail on an exceptional scale

The technical difficulty lay in combining very small pieces of glass with painted modelling, fine solder lines and an exceptionally dense crystal surface. The smallest crystals were only 0.2 millimetres across, yet every one had to be prepared and positioned individually.

Approximately 7,000 crystals were required for each of the twenty adult-skull windows. Applied on both sides, they transformed the imagery: the skulls remain carefully observed and anatomically detailed, but their surfaces glitter and shift as the viewing angle changes.

Credits

Commission
Damien Hirst
Source artwork
For the Love of God
Stained-glass fabrication team
Richard Paton, Shane and Zhanna
Studio
Rainbow Glass Studios

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