The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 18, 2025

Glass chandelier with two levels, one black, one white, of stylized flowers curving up from a central point with candle flame shaped lights extending from the center of each flower. The lower black level transitions into the slightly narrower white level through ornate grey foliage before the white continues to extend in roughly pyramid shaped foliage towards the ceiling. Roughly spinning-top shaped ornaments hang from the bottom and edges of each level.

To Die upon a Kiss

2011

Fred Wilson

(American, b. 1954)
America
Murano glass
Overall: 177.8 x 174 x 174 cm (70 x 68 1/2 x 68 1/2 in.)
The Severance and Greta Millikin Purchase Fund 2012.115
© Fred Wilson
Location: Not on view

Did You Know?

Wilson’s chandeliers are the first black chandeliers ever to be created in the history of Venetian glassmaking.

Description

“To die upon a kiss” are the dying words of Othello, the Black general in William Shakespeare’s play Othello, set in the 1500s in Venice, Italy. Long interested in the overlooked histories of the African diaspora and, in this work, people from Africa living in Venice, Fred Wilson began his series of sculptural chandeliers in 2003 when he represented the United States at the Venice Biennale (the premiere international survey of contemporary art occurring every two years). Like the complex histories they reference, these works are embedded with seeming contradiction: they are heavy yet fragile, dark yet luminous. Wilson describes his chandelier series, which he creates from Italian glass made on the island of Murano, as “a meditation on death, on Blackness, on beauty.”
  • 2012
    (Pace Gallery, New York, NY), sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art
    2012-
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • Erickson, Peter. "Mining Shakespeare: Fred Wilson's Visual Translations of Othello". Nka: Journal of Contemporary African Art. no. 33 (2013): 8-19. Reproduced and mentioned: 14-15
    Wilson, Fred. Fred Wilson: Venice Suite : Sala Longhi and Related Works. New York: The Pace Gallery, 2012. Exhibition Catalogue. Reproduced on cover
  • Fred Wilson: Works 2004–2011. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (December 22, 2012-May 5, 2013).
    Gallery One 2012. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (December 12, 2012-March 5, 2017).
  • {{cite web|title=To Die upon a Kiss|url=false|author=Fred Wilson|year=2011|access-date=18 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/2012.115