Pac- Man Ghosts
4 works
Dylan Martinez Water Bag : F21 For Sale
Dylan Martinez
Water Bag : F21, 2026
Glass Sculptures - Hot Sculpted, Sandblasted, Acid Etched
10.75 x 5.75 x 4”
About this work
Dylan Martinez has established himself as one of the most technically accomplished glass artists working today, pushing the boundaries of what the medium can achieve while maintaining a conceptual rigor that distinguishes his practice from purely decorative glasswork. His Water Bag series, of which F21 is a compelling example, demonstrates his signature approach of transforming familiar, disposable objects into permanent monuments that interrogate our relationship with impermanence and material culture. Water Bag : F21 exemplifies Martinez's meticulous process, combining hot sculpting with sandblasting and acid etching to achieve surfaces that oscillate between transparency and opacity, solidity and apparent fragility. The work captures the tension inherent in a plastic bag filled with water—that precarious moment before rupture—rendered permanent in glass. At 10.75 x 5.75 x 4 inches, the sculpture maintains the intimate scale of its everyday referent while demanding close examination of its extraordinary surface treatment. Martinez's work has garnered significant institutional attention, with pieces entering permanent collections and commanding strong interest from collectors who recognize his position at the intersection of craft tradition and contemporary art discourse. The Water Bag series represents a mature phase in his practice, where technical virtuosity serves conceptual ends rather than existing as spectacle alone. Each work in the series is unique, with subtle variations in form and surface treatment that reward sustained looking. Guy Hepner is pleased to offer this work from our New York gallery, and we welcome inquiries from collectors interested in acquiring this exceptional piece.
Price on Application
Edition & Provenance
- Year
- 2026
- Medium
- Glass Sculptures - Hot Sculpted, Sandblasted, Acid Etched
More from this series
Related Reading
More series by Dylan Martinez
About the H20/sio2 Water Bags Series
Dylan Martinez makes glass sculptures of plastic bags filled with water. The bags are tied at the top, slightly misshapen from the weight of the water inside, and completely convincing. They are made entirely from hot-sculpted, sandblasted, and acid-etched glass, and they look nothing like it.
The work is built around a simple premise: glass and water share enough visual properties that, handled correctly, one can pass for the other. Martinez has spent years refining exactly how to do that. The surfaces on these pieces replicate the transparency of plastic, the stillness of water, and the way light moves through both. The series also includes Bubble Fish 15, a water bag with a skeleton fish suspended inside it. It extends the concept of the water bag beyond the container itself and introduces something that was once living into the illusion. It is among the more unusual works in his catalog.
About Dylan Martinez
Dylan Martinez is a contemporary glass artist based Washington State, USA. He holds a Master of Fine Arts in Glass from Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana, and a Bachelor of Science from the University of Wisconsin-River Falls, where he studied broad field science with a minor in outdoor education. His path to glass began as a college elective that quickly became a lifelong pursuit.
Martinez works entirely in hot glass, hand-sculpting each piece without molds or casting. His practice centers on perception and illusion, drawing on the technique of Trompe L'oeil to create works that challenge what the eye believes to be true. He is best known for his water bag sculptures, objects that are indistinguishable from plastic bags filled with water, made entirely from molten glass shaped between 650 and 1150 degrees. The work is animated by his own experience of red-green colorblindness, which has given him a lifelong interest in how perception shapes reality.
He has trained with master glassmakers across the United States and completed a residency with Venetian glass masters in Murano, Italy. His most recent series introduces color for the first time in years, with sculptural works referencing water balloons and Pac-Man imagery that signal a move toward pop art territory.
Martinez's work is held in the Imagine Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida and the Kelime Müzesi in Ankara, Turkey, among other public and private collections. He has exhibited across the US, Italy, France, Switzerland, the Netherlands, and Taiwan, and has been featured in Interior Design Magazine, American Craft Magazine, Elle Decoration, Aesthetica, and Colossal.