Anjali Srinivasan turns unwanted glassware into beautiful ornaments in her Dubai workshop ChoChoMa Studios. Reem Mohammed / The National
Anjali Srinivasan turns unwanted glassware into beautiful ornaments in her Dubai workshop ChoChoMa Studios. Reem Mohammed / The National

Artist is blowing new life into UAE’s discarded glass



DUBAI // Artist Anjali Srinivasan is breathing new life into unwanted glass by turning discarded bottles, jars and even window panes into beautiful ornaments.

Glass is one of the easiest items to recycle but tonnes of it still ends up in landfills. Ms Srinivasan hopes to encourage residents to create their own art and stresses the need to act more responsibly with glass waste.

“As someone who works with glass I respect it,” says the graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design. “I don’t want it to be rubbish.

“The idea is to give people a better option. We always tell people we upcycle their waste, we make it better.”

Ms Srinivasan’s interest in glassmaking started about two decades ago when she studied at the National Institute of Fashion Technology in her native India.

She was given an assignment to design glass tableware which led her to the town of Firozabad, where glass is made on a large scale.

“The town is actually really scary,” says Ms Srinivasan, 37.

“When I went there the working conditions were abysmal.”

Despite the conditions, she was fascinated with “the beautiful rhythm glass has when it is hot”, and decided to find out more creating with it.

She soon discovered the work of American glass sculptor Dale Chihuly and contacted him to ask for advice about where she should study glassblowing. He wrote back, giving her some benefit of his experience.

It was only when she was enrolled at the New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University that she realised how important he was as an artist.

“I should have saved that email,” she says.

After an apprenticeship in Sweden and a job at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, Ms Srinivasan returned to India to work as a consultant for the government, helping to re-energise traditional crafts.

She decided last year to set up shop in Dubai in Al Quoz.

It took almost 12 months to design and build her workshop, which she has called ChoChoMa Studios.

She had to hire an electrical engineer to instal the glassblowing and sculpting equipment she uses to create her works.

Her pieces vary from tiles to separation walls and large-scale installations.

She also gives glassmaking classes in basic, one-hour modules to allow students to try relatively simple tasks such as making beads.

People can also learn the more complicated process of blowing glass – no mean feat as the glass has first to be melted in a furnace at 1,200°C before being pliable.

“We are trying to be as flexible as possible with people’s desire to learn,” Ms Srinivasan says.

Tirtha Chatterjee, 28, helped Ms Srinivasan collect 150 glass bottles from Bianca Mozzarella and Co in Jumeirah and other restaurants, turning what was regarded as waste into decorative ice cream scoops and tumblers.

“It is good to see how the trash becomes a treasure,” Ms Chatterjee says.

vtodorova@thenational.ae

UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Kumulus Water
 
Started: 2021
 
Founders: Iheb Triki and Mohamed Ali Abid
 
Based: Tunisia 
 
Sector: Water technology 
 
Number of staff: 22 
 
Investment raised: $4 million 
In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe

Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010

Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille

Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm

Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year

Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”

Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners

TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013 

Starring: Jamie Foxx, Angela Bassett, Tina Fey

Directed by: Pete Doctor

Rating: 4 stars

The White Lotus: Season three

Creator: Mike White

Starring: Walton Goggins, Jason Isaacs, Natasha Rothwell

Rating: 4.5/5

The specs: 2019 Mercedes-Benz C200 Coupe


Price, base: Dh201,153
Engine: 2.0-litre turbocharged four-cylinder
Transmission: Nine-speed automatic
Power: 204hp @ 5,800rpm
Torque: 300Nm @ 1,600rpm
Fuel economy, combined: 6.7L / 100km

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The smuggler

Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple. 
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.

Khouli conviction

Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.

For sale

A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.

- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico

- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000

- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950

Company%20profile
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The specs: 2019 Haval H6

Price, base: Dh69,900

Engine: 2.0-litre turbocharged four-cylinder

Transmission: Seven-speed automatic

Power: 197hp @ 5,500rpm

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Fuel economy, combined: 7.0L / 100km

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