Toronto Reference Library Blog

Earlier this year, acclaimed Canadian glass artist Sarah Hall donated her archives to the Baldwin Collection of Canadiana's manuscript collection, located in the Marilyn & Charles Baillie Special Collections Centre on the 5th floor of the Toronto Reference Library. Hall has been an internationally-recognized artist specializing in large-scale art glass installations and solar energy projects since the mid-'80s, and her archives consist of plans, designs, photographs, publicity items, magazines and periodicals, financial information, correspondence and other material relating to her career to date.

Organized chronologically by the projects Hall worked on, her archives are both a comprehensive overview of an important Canadian artist's career and a valuable resource for anyone who aspires to work as a glass artist, containing material relating to the artistic, legal and business facets of her craft. A finding aid and detailed inventory of the archive is available at the front desk in the Special Collections department.

Hall was born in Hamilton, Ontario in 1951. After graduating from the Creative Arts Department at Sheridan College in 1974, she studied stained glass at the Swansea College of Art (Wales), The City & Guilds of London Institute, the Royal College of Art (London) and in Jerusalem. In 1980 she established her first studio in Toronto with some fellow glass artists, and in 1990, she moved to a larger studio of her own to accommodate an increasing number of commissions. In 2002, she was elected a member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Art, and in 2004 she received a Chalmers Art Fellowship from the Ontario Arts Council to research and include photovoltaic technology in her art glass installations; solar power and environmental issues continued to be an increasingly important aspect of her work until her transition from large-scale projects to the medium of glass mosaics in 2018.

The Toronto Reference Library is pleased to announce the addition of the Sarah Hall Archives to its holdings, which also include over one million photographs, paintings, drawings and prints in its Canadian Documentary Arts Collection.