2017 SAXE EMERGING ARTISTS CATALOGUE 7SixtyTwoThousand
2017 SAXE EMERGING ARTISTS CATALOGUE
CATALOGUE DESIGNED BY ERIKA ENOMOTO
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ABOUT Over the years, the Glass Art Society has selected and commended a number of emerging artists for their promising talent based on a rigorous, competitive jurying process. Applications of qualified individuals, who were nominated by professional academics and curators, are evaluated and deliberated over by a small jury based on the criteria listed below. • • • •
An emerging artist using glass as their primary medium Not currently enrolled in a training or education program (including MFA or PhD) Have five years or less of professional experience since graduating from a study or training program Not a current or past presenter of a lecture or demo at a GAS conference
In 1980, Dorothy and the late George Saxe began collecting glass art. Over the course of their marriage, they built one of the most premier contemporary glass collections found in the United States. As collectors, the Saxes supported artists, galleries, institutions, and have played an immense role in elevating and increasing appreciation of glass art. At the 2015 GAS conference, the Saxes were honored with a tribute event which helped establish the Saxe Emerging Artists Lecture Fund, an endowment to support future generations of glass artists. Donations can be made online at www.glassart.org/donate.html. At the 46th GAS conference in Norfolk, Virginia, this year’s three talented artists will have the opportunity to introduce themselves and their work to a large audience of artists, academics, educators, collectors, critics, and peers.
2017 SAXE EMERGING ARTISTS
REBECCA ARDAY Rochester, New York
JULIA CHAMBERLAIN Seattle, Washington 3
GINA ZETTS
Oakland, California
REBECCA ARDAY ARTIST STATEMENT
I make work using glass and mixed media influenced by contemporary American political culture, its evoking attraction, repulsion, sentimentality, sorrow, and longing. I create pieces that draw inspiration from Victorian era objects which beautifully embody feelings, often on a very small and personal scale. My interests span craftsmanship and design, and veer towards the more abstract with a deep interest in the poetic ability of objects –those with an ability to ‘speak’ to us – and remind us of life, love, and mortality. Mourning jewelry, portrait miniatures, and daguerreotypes all serve to commemorate and hold loved ones close in life and death. My work is of an intimate scale, referencing these and other memory devices for private reflection. Glass’ ephemeral nature, scientific history, transparency, and ability to transmit and hold light aid and inspire the work as well. These properties lend way to transformation and the creation of illusions and an element of the unexpected.
BIOGRAPHY
Rebecca Arday is an artist and educator who works in glass and mixed media. She is based in Rochester, New York, where she is part of the More Fire Glass Studio team. Arday is an adjunct professor and studio resident in the glass department at the Rochester Institute of Technology. Her work has been exhibited internationally, included in the New Glass Review, and in the permanent collection of the Glasmuseet Ebeltoft. She has taught at Pilchuck Glass School and Penland School of Crafts. www.rebeccaarday.com
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JULIA CHAMBERLAIN ARTIST STATEMENT
I make glass castings, neon installations, and performances that examine the physical relationship between people and devices. Technology has a glassy sleekness to it, from phone screens to new tech headquarters buildings. I’m interested in how the presence of humans spoils that perfection. As a tech industry worker myself, I see Seattle’s tech-fueled construction boom as both my means of survival and a force driving art out of the city. My performances capture the human effort of trying to keep pace with the rate of technological change. In my work, fingerprint grease maps the interface of each application on my phone, glass lungs repeatedly fill with my breath, and my hands try to hold on to data downloaded from the internet. Glass remains my medium of choice because it outlines space in a way that looks unreal like a phantom object. At the same time, the ubiquity of glass as screens on devices and windows on buildings allows me to play with the meaning of glass as we all experience it every day. Using light, touch, and time, my work presents our human imperfections with their own eerie beauty.
BIOGRAPHY
Julia Chamberlain is a visual artist based in Seattle, Washington. Her cast glass and performance work focuses on the relationship between technological objects and the human touch. Chamberlain was an Artist-in-Residence at Pilchuck Glass School and S12 in Bergen, Norway. Her glass work has been featured in New Glass Review and Sculpture Magazine, exhibited nationally and internationally, and in multiple public art installations. She received her BFA from the University of Washington in 2015. www.juliachamberlain.com
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GINA ZETTS ARTIST STATEMENT
It is in our nature as humans to want for a home, a point of origin to start from, and safe place to return at journey’s end. When that place is lost, we risk becoming lost too. This body of work is an exploration of how the spaces we occupy shape us. I am particularly interested in socially and geographically vulnerable locations. Places that are in liminal states of existence because of environmental tragedy or economic failure. When our economic decisions overshadow our human and cultural needs we risk far more than just losing the building we call home or the streets that collectively makeup that location. We risk losing our values, morals, history, and even future. The particular interest of this body of work comes from personal experiences as well as borrowed stories. Born in a Pennsylvania oil refinery town, I am no stranger to the perils of the over-consumption of natural resources. As a resident of Oakland, California, a socially vibrant city, perpetually in an economically and geographically vulnerable position, I have developed sensitivity to the unique relationship that a cultural sense of belonging has on the urban psyche and landscape. As a resident of Rochester, New York, a rustbelt city living in the shadow of the monoliths of its cultural prowess, I have cultivated an appreciation for the historical significance of specific local and the role that memory plays in shaping one’s sense of home. It is places like these that stir my imagination and sympathies. I have gathered and collected these homes that have shaped me. They now travel with me as memories and stories that guide this work, to honor the very idea of “home” in all of its manifestations.
BIOGRAPHY
Gina Zetts was born and raised in northern Pennsylvania. She holds a BFA in sculpture from Alfred University and an MFA in glass from the Rochester Institute of Technology. She was a recipient of Alfred University’s Purchase Award and winner of the Bronze Award in Bullseye Glass Co.’s Emerge 2014 competition. Her work has been featured in New Glass Review and American Art Collector Magazine. Zetts has worked as an instructor at the Rochester Institute of Technology and Bullseye Glass Co. She currently lives and works in Oakland, California with her husband and collaborative partner, Spencer Pittenger. www.ginazetts.com 16
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2017 JURORS ADAM HOLTZINGER
After receiving a BFA in glass from the Cleveland Institute of Art, Adam Holtzinger moved to Brooklyn, New York to pursue a career in glassblowing. Once in New York City, he began designing and fabricating work for designers and artists, as well as other glassmakers. Since 2003, Holtzinger has taught, lectured, and demonstrated glassblowing nationally and internationally. He currently lives in Brooklyn, New York where he makes custom work for various clients, and in 2015 founded KEEP lighting company with partner Susan Spiranovich. www.KeepBrooklyn.com
@KeepBrooklyn
MIREILLE PERRON
Mireille Perron is a visual artist, critical writer, and educator. She was born in MontrĂŠal, QuĂŠbec and is the founder of the Laboratory of Feminist Pataphysics (LFP) and its auxiliary institutes. Perron has published over 80 essays related to visual arts and craft practice in Canada and abroad. She was nominated Calgary 2012 First Francophone Laureate. Since 1989, Perron has been working and living in Calgary, Alberta, where she teaches at the Alberta College of Art and Design.
SHANNON R STRATTON
Shannon R Stratton is the William and Mildred Lasdon Chief Curator at the Museum of Arts and Design in New York, New York. Prior to her position at MAD, she was the founder and director of Threewalls, a artist-centered organization established in 2003 in Chicago, Illinois. Her writing and curatorial work has bridged contemporary craft practice with performance and social practice. Stratton was an adjunct professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago from 2007-2015 and a Critical Studies Fellow at the Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan in 2012. 22
Cover (L to R): Julia Chamberlain, Jenga Tower, 2016, window glass, game of Jenga, 15 x 3 x 3 inches. Rebecca Arday, Interference, 2016, glass, fabric, wax, approx. 48 x 36 x 9 inches (as pictured). Photo: Elizabeth Torgerson-Lamark/RIT ETC Photo. Gina Zetts, Sixty-Two Thousand, 2013, glass, fabric, oil paint, thread, 62,000 glass beads. Photo: Elizabeth Torgerson-Lamark/RIT ETC Photo. Pg 5: Rebecca Arday, Put to Rest, 2014, glass, found brooch, mixed media, 9 x 5 x 3.25 inches. Photo: KP Studios. Pg 6: Rebecca Arday, Keeper’s Attempt At Capturing Memory (excerpt), 2016, glass, mixed media, approx. 2 x 4 feet (as pictured). Photo: Elizabeth Torgerson-Lamark/RIT ETC Photo. Pg 7: Rebecca Arday, Re-Emerging, 2016, glass, fabric, wax, 3D printed PLA, 12 x 10 x 16 inches. Photo: Elizabeth Torgerson-Lamark/RIT ETC Photo. Pg 8: Rebecca Arday, Interference (excerpt), 2016, glass, fabric, wax, approx. 6 x 3 x 4 inches (as pictured). Photo: Elizabeth Torgerson-Lamark/RIT ETC Photo. Pg 9: Rebecca Arday, Interference, 2016, glass, fabric, wax, approx. 48 x 36 x 9 inches (as pictured). Photo: Elizabeth Torgerson-Lamark/RIT ETC Photo. Pg 10: Julia Chamberlain, Corporeal Data, 2016, glass, touch, 3 x 4 x 5 inches. Pg 12: Julia Chamberlain, Input Interface, 2013, glass, laptop, light, 12 x 14 x 12 inches. Pg 13: Julia Chamberlain, Jenga Tower, 2016, window glass, game of Jenga, 15 x 3 x 3 inches. Pg 14: Julia Chamberlain, Cranes (detail), 2016, neon lights, Western red cedar, electrical components, 20 x 64 x 64 feet.Pg 15: Julia Chamberlain, Cranes, 2016, neon lights, Western red cedar, electrical components, 20 x 64 x 64 feet. Pg 17: Gina Zetts, Modified Consumption, 2014, glass, poplar, 66 x 32 x 32 inches. Photo: Lisa Barker. Pg 18: Gina Zetts, The Mice Are Jeweled, 2014, glass, oil paint, steel, 16.6 x 12.5 x 19 inches (without stand). Photo: Lisa Barker. Pg 19: Gina Zetts, Non-Potable, 2015-present, glass, enamel, resin, brass, oak, each shelf 65 inches (installation size variable). Photo: Lisa Barker. Pg 20: Gina Zetts, The Apartment, 2012, glass, enamel, silicone, 12 x 12 x 12 inches. Photo: Elizabeth Torgerson-Lamark/RIT ETC Photo. Pg 21: Gina Zetts, Sixty-Two Thousand, 2013, glass, fabric, oil paint, thread, 62,000 glass beads. Photo: Elizabeth Torgerson-Lamark/RIT ETC Photo.
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