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Jeremy Langford (Born London, England, 1956) is a British/Israeli glass sculptor and designer. He is the son of British/Israel television director and producer Barry Langford. His artistic specialties are monumental size stacked glass sculpture, architectural glass, and stained glass artwork. His artwork is internationally known and he has been commissioned around the world in the creation of glass art for governments, private residents, corporations, hotels, and religious organizations. Major works of his include glass pillars at the Chain of Generations Center in Jerusalem, three massive sculptures for the Trump International Towers at Sunny Isles Beach, Florida, and glasswork for the British museum in London. He travels internationally for projects, his studio being based in Israel.

Personal Life & Professional Career
Jeremy Langford was born in London, England in 1956. He moved from London to Melbourne, Australia at the age of 13. His first experiences in experimenting with glasswork followed two year later, melting bottles in an old ceramic kiln, using the raw material to make his first stained glass works. He moved back to the U.K. at the age of 18 and became a glass artist apprentice where he acquired the glassmaking techniques and skill sets he would use as a foundation in his later artistic works. Langford’s belief is that, “Just as a musician trains in classical music, he can then diversify and enter any musical field… I feel that, with such training in traditional glassmaking techniques, I can stretch the limits and even go wildly off the established path of traditional glass working.”

Establishing himself with a studio in London in the mid 1970’s, his time was divided between the U.K. and Israel while he further developed his glassmaking skills. During this time he began experimenting with stacked sculptural glass. Finely honing this skill, Langford has used it in the past few years in the creation of several monumental glass sculptures around the world.

Langford’s projects are featured in a number of US cities. They include three monumental sculptures in the Trump International Towers at Sunny Isles Beach, Florida and a sculpture in the Miami Four Seasons Hotel. His glasswork can also be seen at the Holocaust Memorial in Beverly Hills, California, and a number of private residences in Los Angeles and New York City. Other artistic works have been installed in several synagogues.



Among the best-known of Jeremy Langford’s project is the Chain of Generations Center[http://english.thekotel.org/ ], a heritage center at Jerusalem’s Kotel (Western Wall) created in 2006. Extending down into the catacombs at the edge of the Western Wall, the site features a large and dramatic collection of glass sculptures that document the history of the Jewish people from biblical times to the present day. The project was partly funded by Mortimer Zuckerman, US media magnate. The sculptural glasswork there features uniquely carved and etched layers of plate glass, which required nearly 150 tons of glass to create. The project recently received the illustrious Thea Award from the Themed Entertainment Association as the “Outstanding Heritage Center worldwide 2008”. While archaeologists were excavating the site for the project, a fully preserved mikvah (ritual bath) from the Second Temple period was discovered beneath the Roman Times level. Archaeologists also discovered a portion of a wall from the First Temple period, estimated to have been completed in 950 BCE but was destroyed by the Babylonians approximately 360 years later.

Langford sees a connection between his art and spirituality, and compares the physical material of glass to the state of seeking a spiritual dimension: “As alchemists symbolically sought to change a base metal (lead) into a precious material (gold), so working in glass mirrors this process. Glass begins as sand, a lifeless substance. Though a process of heat and pressure, it becomes a bright, light-transmitting, elastic material; transparent but with defined boundaries and borders.”[www.jeremylangford.com]

Artistic Works
Glasswork projects are included in:

• Supreme Court Building, Jerusalem

• Residence of the President of Israel, Jerusalem

• Western Wall Tunnels, Old City, Jerusalem

• Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel

• Ben Gurion Airport, Tel Aviv

• British Museum, London

• Hilton Hotel, Mayfair, London

• Trump International Towers, Sunny Isles Beach, Florida

• Four Seasons Hotel, Miami

Kabbalah, Mysticism & Spirituality
Alongside his professional work Langford has studied ashlagian Kabbalah and Jewish spiritual teachings since 1977. He was a member of the Kabbalah Research Foundation run then by Pre-Kabbalah Center head Rabbi Fieval Gruberger (Later Rav Berg). Jeremy had a vast following there of thousands of students but left after realizing that what he had been taught there, and what he was therefore teaching was a bastardised version of the Kabbalah. He then became a fulltime student of Rabbi Baruch Ashlag until his teachers demise on September 13, 1991. Since his teachers passing he has continued studying and occasionly teachs individuals and intimate groups.

He is working on a comprehensive website of Rabbi Yehuda Ashlag's teachings that will feature a ful search engine of Ashlagian Kabbalisitc teachings.

Langford is also trained in Classical Homeopathy, natural medicine and is an expert on the use of sound in order to facilite changed and beneficial states of conciousness.

Family
Jeremy Langford’s original surname was Lelyveld, his family being natives of the Netherlands. Langford is related to Joseph Lelyveld, an editor of the New York Times newspaper, and Rabbi Arthur Lelyveld, a civil rights activist. Jeremy Langford’s great grandfather was a royal court entertainer in the United Kingdom (specializing in whistling) who served in the court of King Edward VII and opened the soap factory Sloman’s. Langford’s father, Barry Langford (b. London, England, 1926) was the BBC producer and director who created the first pop-music shows for the BBC network and directed many, including the Tom Jones Show. Barry Langford worked with the Beatles and Rolling Stones, discovered David Bowie, and briefly managed Tom Jones and P.J. Proby.

Jeremy married Yael Langford (née Itach), an Israeli scientist who specialized in quantum chemistry and the relationship between brainwaves and consciousness. They had five children together. The couple in recent years was involved in a beta project involving the connection between art, brainwaves, and consciousness. Yael Langford passed away on September 15th, 2009.