An array of luminous symbols in saturated colors tell a fantastical story on windows at the end of Seattle-Tacoma International Airport’s Concourse A. In I Was Dreaming of Spirit Animals, Cappy Thompson blends modern, traditional, and astronomical allegories—all drawn from a series of dreams she once had.

Created with vitreous enamels at Derix Glasstudios in Germany, the artwork was made using a technique called grisaille or gray-tonal painting, which medieval European artisans developed while making stained-glass panels for cathedrals. It depicts a couple asleep on the top floor of a tower, surrounded by raptors, evergreens, and celestial animals. Owls and a thunderbird perch in the treetops like sentries. Fifteen constellations fill the night sky of the northern hemisphere, including Cetus the whale, Aries the ram, Draco the dragon, Cygnus the swan, and Monoceros the unicorn. Two winged horses, Pegasus and Equileus, draw a chariot carrying the sun and the moon, as they sprinkle stars into the room of the dreamers.

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My aim in presenting this composition is to invite people from all walks and ages of life into the realm of the imagination. –Cappy Thompson

I Was Dreaming of Spirit Animals is the largest single-image glass painting in the United States and the largest artwork the artist has ever created.

Based in both Olympia, WA, and Seattle, Thompson is a master practitioner of transparent enameling in the American art glass movement and has been painting glass since 1976. Exhibited throughout the world, her works are found in such collections as the Museum of Arts and Design, the Corning Museum of Glass, the Museum of Glass, and the Hokkaido Museum of Modern Art.

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Seattle-Tacoma International Airport

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