On Friday, July 17, The Artpothecary in West Rehoboth will transform into something entirely different.
To celebrate Hunt & Lane’s 10th anniversary, the space will become Chiarocroma (pronounced key-ah-ROH-KRO-ma), a name we coined for the exhibition inspired by the Italian word chiaroscuro — the dramatic interplay of light and shadow — and chroma, meaning color. Together, the name reflects the heart of the show: an exploration of bright light, vivid color, craftsmanship and how different media come alive when experienced together.
The immersive pop-up brings together glass, food, furniture, light, music and art under one roof.
The exhibition features handblown glass by Eli Cecil, furniture and environmental design by Taber Bartoshesky of Hunt & Lane and my own culinary creations, original printmaking and light installations. Rather than simply displaying our work side by side, we’ve spent the past several weeks allowing our ideas to shape one another. Glass inspired the food. The food influenced the vessels. Furniture became part of the setting. Historic Delaware imagery found new life through fluorescent color and black light. Each medium still speaks in its own voice, but together they tell a larger story.
I’ve always been fascinated with glass. I have vivid memories of the beautiful paperweights that sat on my grandmother’s windowsills and trips to the Corning Museum of Glass in upstate New York. The way glass catches and holds light has always amazed me. It’s both functional and beautiful. You can eat off it, drink from it or simply admire it. To me, that’s a pretty magical combination.
When I asked Eli what first pulled him into glass, he didn’t talk about galleries or finished pieces. He talked about the process. The fire. The heat. The way the material responds almost immediately to every movement you make.
He said that’s what hooked him from the beginning and what keeps him coming back is that every day in the studio feels like another chance to make something new.
“I feel like I’m playing,” he told me. “It’s like seeing something come into being from nothing.”
As a chef, I understood exactly what he meant. Cooking starts the same way. You begin with raw ingredients, technique, instinct and an idea that only exists in your imagination. Your job isn’t to overcomplicate it. It’s to take something that already has beauty and help people experience it in a new way.
Instead of designing food first and asking Eli to make serving pieces to fit, we started with conversations. We’d throw ideas back and forth until something clicked.
During one phone call, Eli started sketching while we talked. He described blowing a large glass bubble, folding it back in on itself and creating a small, double-layered bowl in watermelon colors. Before he’d even finished describing it, I knew exactly what belonged inside: watermelon rind pico de gallo with tortilla chips.
The seafood course wasn’t something I sat down and planned. It came out of a conversation. I told Eli I wanted to make something that felt like the beach and worked with whatever glass he was making. We’d kick ideas around, he’d sketch while we talked and before long the dishes and the vessels were taking shape together. That’s been the best part of this whole project. Nobody’s trying to lead it. We’re just creating in the truest sense of collaboration.
Eli talked about how glass magnifies, reflects and refracts light. Some pieces use opaque colors so they feel almost painted, while others remain transparent, allowing projected light to become part of the work itself. Even some of the serving vessels have clear bottoms, turning something functional into part of the installation.
I’ve been doing block printing for a long time, and I’ve always loved the iconic images of Delaware. I started digging through old photographs of the Indian River Inlet and other local scenes from the Library of Congress, then carving them into prints and hand-colorizing them with fluorescent washes.
Delaware feels both very old and very new at the same time. I want people to recognize these places but also feel like they’re seeing them for the first time.
That balance between old and new is something I chase in food, too. Sometimes a dish challenges you. Sometimes it feels like a hug. I think this exhibition does a little of both.
Taber has spent years surfing, traveling and collecting ideas from different places before bringing those inspirations back to coastal Delaware. During this project, he and Eli began experimenting with blowing glass onto teak furniture and designing lighting together. Watching those ideas bounce between the three of us has been one of the most rewarding parts of the process.
Eli called it “cross-pollination,” and I think that’s exactly what this show is. It’s not about making food look like glass or furniture look like art. It’s about letting every medium influence the next until they become chapters in the same story.
At the end of the day, I want people to come in and have a good time. I want them to eat something they’ve never had before, drink from a handblown piece of glass, notice how the light changes everything around it and maybe see a familiar piece of Delaware through a different lens. If they leave talking about something they saw, tasted or experienced, and they’re still thinking about it on the drive home, then we’ve done what we set out to do.
Chiarocroma opens Friday, July 17, from 5 to 9 p.m. at The Artpothecary, 37401 Malloy St., West Rehoboth, with additional exhibition hours Sunday from 3 to 6 p.m. and a closing reception Monday from 5 to 9 p.m.
Whether you’re coming for the food, the glass, the furniture, the artwork or simply to experience something new, I hope you’ll join us. After all, some of the best ideas don’t happen alone. They happen when people are willing to create something together.
