'Free Glass' would be the literal translation of the Dutch Vrij Glas, but the phrase contains a more nuanced message: Vrij Glas was the original name for that branch of the global studio glass movement that flourished in the Netherlands and found institutional support in the pioneering glass programme at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy. By vrij it meant free of the long tradition of Dutch factory glass; free for glass to be used as a medium for artists in the same sense as paint or bronze or any other visual medium.