The young artisan, blown glass artist and designer, Pròsper Riba Vilardell, who dreamt of the magnificent Bohemian forests when he was immersed in an intense learning process, is currently developing his project The Glass Apprentice in Barcelona. Under this brand Pròsper creates, produces and markets his works, collaborates with several firms and design professionals and shares his knowledge with students. The Glass Apprentice team is formed by Pròsper Riba Vilardell and the Portuguese Telma Araújo, his assistant and goldsmith.
Pròsper comes from a family of Catalan artists who have dedicated themselves for generations to sculpture, literature, music and goldsmithing, some of whom have left their mark on their respective generations. His mother, a stage director, gave him the name of the protagonist of Shakespeare’s The Tempest.
He trained at the German School in Barcelona and later at the Massana School of Design. It was there that he discovered blown glass, beginning a journey of apprenticeship in various schools and workshops: the United States (Penland School of Craft), Belgium (Provincial Archeological Museum), Switzerland (Glassworks Matteo Gonet), Austria (Glashütte Comploj) and France (JMW_Studio and Fluïd); and especially at the Glasfachshule Zwiesel and Bild-Werk (Germany), the birthplace of Studio Glass Mouvement. To the acquisition of this training, we must add his research on the mastery and transformation of the sphericity of blown glass, its sculptural expressiveness, the appearances of glass as a material, geometry and the symbiosis light-form-colour, works that he has shown in national and international group exhibitions.
The choice of The Glass Apprentice is not accidental, if one takes into account that the art of glass is an ancestral technique and its learning has been considered until a few years ago as an initiatory process. In fact, with this name, Pròsper wants to express that experimentation and learning form the core of his philosophy and his work, and that in his action the artisan discipline of Northern Europe and the playful and exploratory spirit of the Mediterranean go hand in hand.
The pandemic brought him back to Barcelona and from there he established several links and professional agreements with the Glass Museum Workshop of Vimbodí and Poblet (Tarragona), and with the Royal Factory of La Granja (Segovia), in order to be able to move his project forward.
He currently has a workshop in Barcelona in the San Martín district.
Pròsper Riba Vilardell has recently received the National Crafts Emprende award from the Generalitat de Catalunya. He was also selected as Best of Spain 2023 by AD magazine, along with 23 other talents.