Roadside Reverie: Glass Works by John Miller

Get ready to feast your eyes on more than 40 large-scale glass sculptures comprising hundreds of individually molded and blown glass components artfully designed and playfully assembled by glass artist John Miller when Vero Beach Museum of Art presents Roadside Reverie: Glass Works by John Miller from October 5, 2024, to January 5, 2025. The exhibition marks the artist’s largest solo museum exhibition to date.

Roadside Reverie spans four of Miller’s artistic series: “Hot Stuff,” “The Blue Plate Special,” “Do Not Duplicate,” and “Classic Heat”—created from 2008 to 2024. The artworks reflect his fascination with and personal connection to American automotive and food culture and the Pop Art movement of the 1960s. Drawing inspiration from prominent Pop Art figures like Claes Oldenburg, Miller imbues his contemporary pieces with reverence and humor, evoking nostalgia and joy in visitors.

An instrumental work shown for the first time is Miller’s V-ATE, 2024, which cleverly references V8 engines. This piece combines select glass works by Miller integrated within a site-specific installation of a 1954 Ford Mainline. The inclusion of this artwork marks the first time that Miller has exhibited a mixed-media installation of this scale in a museum or gallery.

Roadside Reverie: Glass Works by John Miller is organized by the Vero Beach Museum of Art and features select loans from the Tacoma Museum of Glass.

Photo credit: John Miller, Chili Dog, 2024. Blown and hot sculpted glass, 32 x 10 x 11 inches. Photo: Aric Attas © John Miller