Let It Blow

Robert T. Gonzalez praises the above short film, Bert Haanstra’s 1959 Oscar-winning documentary Glas, as the “perfect little ten minute vacation”:

[W]hat caught my attention was how effectively it contrasts the meticulous, method-based craftsmanship of the glassblowers with the automated processes of the bottle-building machines. It’s an especially powerful comparison, considering that glass blowing remains widely practiced to this day, even after decades of global industrialization. I can think of few examples where an artisan’s virtuosity juxtaposes more compellingly with the raw generative capacity of a factory – this makes the film wonderful to think about, and practically impossible not to watch.