Taking a closer look at the artist's affiliation with charities

By his own count, Chihuly donated to 335 nonprofits in the past three years. Donations ranged from artwork to use of his studio. A spokesman said most art is donated, but Chihuly also sells some through charities, treating them as sales agents. Here's a look at two of his nonprofit associations:

KCTS

It was the kind of advertising money can't buy.

For several hours last November, fundraising pitchmen for Seattle public-television station KCTS hawked Dale Chihuly's art to a viewing public that had tuned in to watch a film about Chihuly's installation at the Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew, England.

What viewers weren't told is that the film about Chihuly was produced and distributed by the artist's publishing company, Portland Press. The glass, drawings, books and DVDs offered to contributing viewers also came from the company.

Given the appeals to viewers to support the not-for-profit station, it would be reasonable to assume that Chihuly had donated the work. But that assumption would be wrong.

The station paid Chihuly for the art offered during the pledge drive. No donation was involved, said KCTS chief financial officer Michal Anderson Jacob, who described it as "similar to a gallery-type" arrangement.

The movie, however, was obtained for free.

KCTS and other PBS stations repeatedly have aired Chihuly-produced programming, a practice that is explicitly prohibited by the Public Broadcast System's ethical guidelines. The guidelines, which are meant to protect the commercial-free nature of public television, prohibit any connection between the producer or funder of the program and the programming contents.

Station General Manager Randy Brinson said by e-mail that an exception was made for Chihuly because the station had some input into the films during editing, its producers have a long history with the artist, the movies draw "larger-than-average viewing audiences," and they help attract donations.

Other exceptions have been made, Brinson said, citing a movie about a producer whose mother struggled with Alzheimer's disease and one about a filmmaker who was trying to understand why his father's apple farm was failing.

But, he added, in those cases the connection between producer and subject was obvious.

"It is likely that many viewers were not aware of the connection between Chihuly and [Portland Press]," Brinson wrote in the e-mail. "In the interest of better serving our viewers, we believe there would be merit in making that connection more explicit during any future broadcasts."

One station in Florida has aired four of Chihuly's films.

"Portland Press actually gave us — they didn't charge us rights to air their programs," said Bernadette Siy, manager of WLRN, a PBS station in Miami that aired eight hours of programming about the artist in January. "... I knew Portland Press is a distributor of his art books, so this will help them to sell more of his work. It's a nice exchange."

KCTS buys Chihuly's work at a contracted price that station officials would not disclose. The station then offers the merchandise to viewers for donations, called premiums, that are slightly above retail price. It's the same type of arrangement the station has with other personalities whose products tie in with programming, although premiums for Chihuly's products are higher than most.

"We show Chihuly about 12 hours a year," Jacob said. "It's popular with our viewers. We normally do it before Christmas as a kind of a gift item." She estimated that dollars raised during Chihuly programming represent 3.5 percent of the station's pledges.

Pledge levels for Chihuly's work during the last fundraising drive were $200 above the retail prices for each work, including a lithograph, valued at $1,600, and two glass sculptures, one valued at $3,500 and the other at $5,000.

"We do not sell it below retail, ever," Jacob said.

— Susan Kelleher