Contributing Writers: Mollie Copley Eisenberg, Amanda Sterling, Debra Ruzinsky, Danielle Hayden, John Erwin Dillard, Emma S. Ahmad, Caitlin Jade Greenburg and Nancy Yu.
Editor: Robin Babb
Graphic Design: Marja Huhta
Staff
Brandi P. Clark, Executive Director Jennifer Hand, Conference + Events Manager Marja Huhta, Digital + Design Assistant
Amanda Sterling, Communications Manager
Julie Thompson, Development Manager
KCJ Szwedzinski, Operations Assistant Robin Babb, GAS news Editor
Cathy Noble-Jackson, Part-time Bookkeeper
Glass Art Society Board of Directors 2024-2025
President: Natali Rodrigues
Vice President: Lisa Zerkowitz
Treasurer: John Moran
Secretary: Mika Drozdowska
IDEA Chair: Kim Thomas
Conference Chair: Eric Goldschmidt
Phillip Murray Bandura
Michelle Bufano
Lothar Bottcher
Janine Christley
Ben Cobb
James Devereux
Kate Dowd
Percy Echols II
Annabelle Javier
Kayla Natividad
Julia Rogers
Danielle Ruttenberg
Sunny Wang
Martha Zackin
Zach Abella
Jocelyn Chan
EDITOR’S LETTER
Dear GASnews readers,
This issue of GASnews came together amidst the frenzy of our Berlin conference, Where Art + Design Meet, where many of our members and readers were able to meet and learn from each other and come away with new ideas. We hope that those new ideas are still nourishing you, and that the conference was a source of renewed energy and inspiration for your own art and life.
For this issue all about Expansion, we asked writers to look at the ways glass art is expanding: across mediums and styles, across the art/craft divide, and, yes, across national borders. Our features include a review of the de la Torre brothers’ Upward Mobility exhibition in Dallas, a report from the expanding frontier of glass art in South Africa, and the massive expansion of Firebird Community Arts in Chicago.
These stories show an expanded view of what glass art is and can be in the future—a daringly optimistic lens to look through, but not, we think, an unwarranted one.
Robin Babb GASnews Editor
DIRECTOR’S LETTER
Dear GASnews readers,
The theme for this issue is “expansion.” We looked at not only the many ways that glass as a material is expansive but also how our community can be. At GAS, we are constantly considering the ways we contribute to the expansion of our community and how we can best tell the stories of contemporary glass. To that end, we have made the decision to put GASnews on hiatus as we explore more community-focused ways of storytelling.
I want to thank our GASnews contributors, particularly our outgoing GASnews Editor Robin Babb, for all the hard work they put into each issue of GASnews. Our Communications Committee will spend time evaluating different storytelling ideas that better suit our community over the coming months. Please share your ideas–whether it is producing a regular podcast or having community-provided resources on our website–by December 31st.
We hope you enjoy this issue with articles covering everything from cross-national divides to a global TV sensation. Thank you to everyone who has enjoyed reading GASnews over the years; we can’t wait to bring new storytelling methods to the glass community.
Happy reading,
Brandi P. Clark Executive Director
“IN THE SLIVER”: SODA GLASS HOUSE EXPANDS THE MOLD
by Mollie Copley Eisenberg
When I arrive at the Soda Glass House studio, Jon Watanabe and Alessia Arregui have something of a rolling emergency on their hands. A couple of weeks before my visit, their landlord cut the building’s power to do necessary electrical work—without enough notice to shut the Soda Glass House equipment down safely. Now their furnace is out of commission. It doesn’t just need to be rebuilt—it needs to be replaced.
They had hoped to be up and running at full speed by this time. After forming Soda Glass House as a partnership at the end of the summer of 2023, Watanabe and Arregui spent the winter designing their line and their process as collaborators. The line, now fully launched in a catalog on their website, focuses on tableware and decor, including a wide range of vessels as well as decorative glass elements and pieces that show off Soda Glass House’s range, like a salt cellar with a brass spoon and a tapas board shaped like a glassblowing paddle.
Their first launch already displays a perspective. Their palette blends vintage influences with shots of neon, featuring vividly moody mauves and teals. Classic curves and contemporary minimalism both make appearances among their thoughtfully proportioned shapes; their cups tend to swell gently in a way that invites the hand. The occasional bursts of rippled shapes and faceted surfaces that speak to the collaborators’ particular interest in optic molds, too, weave classic and contemporary into a characteristic look. By the time the furnace died, they already had work with stockists in Providence, Newport, and New York, and orders coming in through their website.
They’re now fulfilling those orders by renting blow time at another studio, cutting into their already-thin margin. The logistical challenges, too, are hitting an alreadyoverfull plate: They’d been hustling to finalize their line for a full launch, and now they’re doing all that while they “do surgery on the core of the studio,” as Arregui puts it. “We’re in the tiniest sliver right now,” she says, “of being able to make it.”
That they’re in that sliver at all is itself remarkable. Watanabe, 38, and Arregui,
31, are young to own their own shop, and they’ve started Soda Glass House on a comparative shoestring, without deeppocketed investors, in a challenging economic moment. Both come from glass art backgrounds, and most of the startup capital for Soda Glass House comes from competitive grant funding—but it wouldn’t be enough to launch them if they couldn’t support that artistic vision with craft, technical skills, and a willingness to expand the mold of the studio glass movement that they’ve inherited to meet the challenges of the future in the present.
While Arregui works on the catalog they’re finalizing and the business card they’re revising for an upcoming sale, Watanabe shows me around. The Soda Glass House studio is a large, light corner of a postindustrial building in Pawtucket, just outside Providence, and was once home
to the studio of prolific glass artist Jose Chardiet. The wide range of its current form and function attests to both the ethos and the skills of its contemporary occupants. In addition to the hot shop, the cold shop, the office, the appealing sitting area furnished courtesy of Watanabe’s days as an antiques dealer, and the storage for glass and art books, there are setups for metalwork, woodwork, and photography. They’ve recently moved the wood shop across the hall into its own space.
Watanabe has been quietly assembling the studio for far longer than he’s believed his own studio could become a reality. When he won what was then the Windgate Fellowship (now the Windgate-Lamar) from the Center for Craft in 2008 after graduating from MassArt, he spent the money primarily on equipment. Much of the studio is secondhand: the workbench fitted
Jon Watanabe and Alessia Arregui, photo courtesy of the artists.
with custom tool storage, the annealer with the magnetic closure. “My favorite thing is to find it good, used, and then make the modifications needed,” he says.
Watanabe wouldn’t be able to do these things without skills that aren’t on the typical art-school syllabus: “George Greenamyer taught me how to weld, in a forging class, ’cause he was generous … I’ve welded professionally since then in all sorts of jobs.” While he worked as a metal fabricator, an antiques dealer, a props carpenter, and a production glassblower, Watanabe kept collecting, scouring Facebook groups and Marketplace and eBay, “flipping equipment … finding, buying, using it as currency in the same market to get the thing I actually need.” By the time he won a 2021 DesignxRI Catalyst Grant, enabling him to rent his own studio space, and then a Center for Craft’s Career Development Grant in 2022, he already had the skeleton of a studio setup and a growing collection of tools.
Tools are a particular passion for Watanabe: “Ivan Smith tools are really beautiful to hold—I don’t use them very often, but I do love them and cherish them—but my go-to tools are made by Dino Tedeschi, by Gaio Arturo, and some of my favorites are old, unmarked Italian jacks.” That passion is on display not only in the studio, but also on @glassworks_ toolbench, an Instagram page he started in 2020 to document some of his finds.
“Through that I’ve gotten some leads, some equipment there, some tools … being able to contribute to the greater knowledge pool so that other people can then identify what they have or tell the story of the stuff they already have … it’s a really fun community.” (Soda Glass House’s official Instagram page can be found @soda.glass.house.)
Community is also a feature of Providence’s vibrant glass scene and broad community of creatives and makers. Watanabe and Arregui mention the camaraderie they’ve
found in their studio building, and their gratitude for the mentors who’ve been willing to come over to the studio and provide technical guidance, including Dan Clayman, Michael Scheiner, Tracy Glover, Joe Upham, and Toots Zynsky, in whose studio Arregui is also currently an assistant.
It was in that community that Watanabe and Arregui initially met while working production glassblowing in 2020—they worked well together when they worked together, until Watanabe left their employer to start up his studio. In 2023, when Arregui won her own DesignxRI Catalyst grant in 2023, she bought a 3-D printer and rented time in Watanabe’s new studio to produce her own line, Alessia Arregui Glass, exploring what digital tools could bring to materiality. As she and Watanabe worked side by side, though, they found their work converging. Arregui recalls showing a friend around the space and being asked whose work was whose: “‘Did
A view into the studio, photo courtesy of the artists.
you make that?’ No, Jon did. But like…we made it together.” When the grant period for Alessia Arregui Glass ended, she and Watanabe had a talk about the future. They decided to put aside their solo projects and focus on collaboration.
Soda Glass House was born as a partnership in August 2023. They bring complementary skill sets to the management part of the business, they agree, and they’ve found their groove as a production team. While blowing glass, they communicate chiefly by means of wellhoned intuition and a vocabulary of subtle gestures, “communicative behaviors” for which Watanabe, who was born deaf and wears hearing aids, expresses particular appreciation.
Watanabe and Arregui share a foundational sense that fine art can not only coexist with craft but thrive in synthesis with it. Watanabe mentions the value of craft experience to his sense of the artistic possibility to be found in design. “Things are settling now,” he says, “but when I was in college there was a rule: no production in the shop. We’re here to make art. There was a real strong, blunt aversion to it. Then the stock market crash[ed], in 2008, and we found ourselves needing to make craft, and still it was this embarrassing thing ... to hustle, ‘cause it’s not fine art. But look, man, it’s respectable, and I’d rather hustle doing this, making it good, and bringing my aesthetic sensibilities, and my knowledge and experience in design, fabrication, and history to this craft. And it’s an interesting place to be.”
“It’s also so much more accessible,” Arregui agrees. “That fine art world is all about [the] desire of some things that you can’t attain. Where I want my art to be is in my friends’ rooms. That’s the best experience.” Their time working production honed their precision, their appreciation for simplicity. Now they’re bringing that experience back to Soda Glass House, which offers them the chance to explore those possibilities under their own ownership and aesthetic judgment.
The collaborative aesthetic of Soda Glass House reflects a balance of history and futurity, art and craft.
Watanabe’s reference set is historical and artisanal. He speaks fluently of the origins
of glass art in the Venetian tradition and its evolution in the American Studio Glass Movement, and flips through a book of De Chirico paintings that suggest some of his own forms and color palette, russets and mustards and luminous blues. The clean lines and colors in a Bauhaus book also resonate. Watanabe is also interested in Japanese design elements, though they largely live under his own mark, Watanabe Glassworks, currently on hiatus. (Soda Glass House does make a sake set.) Arregui brings a futuristic counterbalance in her process and aesthetic. The cofounder of digital multimedia art collective n00n, Arregui blends the skill and ethos of craft with new methods, showing me a loom weaving based on a digitally generated scatter pattern in a palette that echoes their glass. For Arregui, the 3-D tools she brings to both the aesthetic and the process of Soda Glass House are both effective craft tools and art exploration. “I learned 3-D printing because I wanted one device that had endless materials in it,” Arregui says. It felt to her like a “miraculous experience” to “be able to make anything that was immaterial.”
Optic molds have become central to their work, a neat encapsulation of a process that blends historicity with futuristic vision and new tools with old ones. They use
antique optic molds from Watanabe’s collection; they also make unique new ones based on Arregui’s original designs. “It’s like creating a flat drawing with points, and altering that, and introducing depth to that flat drawing to create the angle of the mold,” she explains. She prints a plastic model on the 3-D printer, and then they make a plaster version. If they decide they want to work from it, they commit the thousand dollars to have it made in graphite. The result is a growing set of completely original craft tools that blend the past with the future and serve as both aesthetic trademark and pragmatic workflow streamlining.
They’re approaching the furnace problem with a similar blend of respect for tradition and interest in innovation. The industry standard can cost upwards of $30,000 to buy new and about $2,000 a month to run—not the kind of money Soda Glass House has lying around. Instead, they’re leaning on their technical skills, their creative thinking, and the wisdom of their community to design something that doesn’t exist yet. “What we’re faced with is, we can’t rebuild, we have to scrap, and we have to design an energy-efficient, serviceable electric furnace,” Watanabe explains. “That doesn’t exist. Because our landlord will periodically cut our power
Jon Watanabe's antique pinneapple optical molds, courtesy of the artist.
without notice, we need to make something that can survive that kind of abuse. So we’re designing a modular electric wire melter furnace that doesn’t quite exist yet, and we’re designing it so it can possibly be replicated if it needs to be … we’re designing all the parts in the computer, we’re having the steel laser-cut, and we’re building it with accessible components.”
What they’re looking to build is a new generation of equipment. “It’s going to be 50% more powerful than the last one and still have a very modest energy footprint,” Watanabe says, and cost around a hundred dollars of electricity each month. It has them thinking that tools and equipment could be part of their long-term sustainability strategy. “A furnace that anyone who’s starting their own shop can buy,” Watanabe muses, “without making a crazy financial commitment—not just now, but in the future, because of utility costs.” They expect the new furnace to be up and running by the end of June.
Once the heart of the studio is beating again—this time to its own drummer— Watanabe and Arregui are looking forward to getting back to developing their vision for Soda Glass House. They find themselves “wanting to go back to our roots a little bit in terms of experimentation, exploring of the material, and finding an artistic voice with the resources that we have. It’s been building the studio, building a line of functional work and marketing it, and branding Soda Glass House, and now we’re interested in bringing our artistic selves into it a little bit.” What might that look like? After tablewares, lighting. “It’s the thing that’s gonna make us,” says Watanabe, who’s looking forward to doing the brass and wood fittings himself. They’re interested in other housewares, too, and in featuring Arregui’s textiles: they mention cutting boards, paring knives, tablecloths, runners, placemats, even small furniture. Because of the way they’ve set up the studio, all of that can be done in-house. They’re looking forward to experimenting, seeing what takes off and what fits into a sustainable workflow as they find their groove. They’re playing with the idea of limited-edition batches, Arregui says—out of an interest in artistic forms, the desire to offer something special, and concern for the production process: “if we get an order for something that we made six months ago, it takes a day of warming up to understand it again.”
At the end of the work day they’re cleaning up, deciding on what they need to take to the rental space in the morning to prepare for the upcoming RISD craft show (which will turn out to be their highest-earning craft show yet). I ask them if they have anything else on their minds about the sliver they’re in at the moment. “What’s keeping us alive right now, spiritually,” Watanabe says, “is the fact that we have several ongoing projects, and some future projects, clients that are going to be there for us. The fact that we’re so busy is a good sign. It’s crazy. It’s really intense. But the fact that we have a lot of stuff going on is an indication that something’s working. Feels hopeful.” And Arregui? “I have what we have to do for tomorrow on my mind.” Tomorrow, they’ll wake up early and spend another day in the sliver.
Mollie Copley Eisenberg is a Brooklyn-based scholar and writer with a focus on structural issues in culture industries. Recently a research fellow at the University of Southern California with USC Mellon Humanities and the University of the Future, she holds a PhD in English from Princeton and develops programming to support humanist scholars pursuing impact beyond the academy.
Occhio vase + bud vase, photo courtesy of the artists.
BIGGER, BOLDER, HOTTER: GASNEWS Q + A WITH BLOWN AWAY SEASON FOUR STAR JONATHAN CAPPS
by Amanda Sterling
Recently, the Glass Art Society’s executive director Brandi P. Clark had the honor of serving as a guest judge in season four of Netflix’s hit glass blowing competition show Blown Away. Contestant Jonathan Capps won the challenge, with a prize package including a $1,000 cash prize, a coveted demonstration slot at the Berlin 2024 Conference, and features in GASnews and the GAS Journal. Amanda Sterling, GAS communications manager, chatted with Capps about Blown Away, his Fulbright Fellowship in Nuutajärvi, Finland, and demonstrating in Berlin.
Amanda Sterling: One of my favorite moments from this season was when you shared that your daughter hoped you made new friends on set. What was the atmosphere like on set?
Jonathan Capps: Before the show, I knew about half of the competitors personally and knew most of the rest by reputation. Kathy [Gray] was spot on in her acknowledgement that several of us on the show had learned sculpting from Karen [Willenbrink-Johnsen]. We all knew what we signed up for: Somebody’s gonna go home and that sucks. But with that set aside, it felt like there was a lot of camaraderie and it felt almost like a Pilchuck type of experience.
AS: What was the process of applying to be on the show like?
JC: I applied for season three originally and I made it to the final fifteen pre-screened contestants that the production company sends to Netflix for approval, but I didn’t make it on that season. I didn’t intend on reapplying for season four and it was three or four days to the application deadline when I got an email from the production company asking if I wanted to reapply. I was walking my dog in the woods when I uploaded the video. It’s really goofy—at one point, my dog, Beef, gets into something, and I’m on camera saying “Beef, get away from that.” It was so last second and I was relaxed so maybe that’s why I made it to this season.
AS: You faced a lot of challenges this season and I was so impressed with how you recovered from them. What’s your approach to those moments where things aren’t going to plan?
JC: I think it was John Moran who said something along the lines of, “Most of the contestants in the competition are making these decisions because they’re forced to with timing,” and that really resonates with me. You try to roll with it and don’t make a big deal of it. Sometimes you end up with a wonderful moment when things don’t turn out the way you planned. After making it through the first challenge, I just thought, “let’s make it through the second challenge,” and kept moving the goalposts as the competition went along. It was actually kind of helpful that the challenges pushed me out of my comfort zone–I focused on getting through them rather than worrying about the competition. To the viewer, it might have looked chaotic, but you kind of get to this really zen place where nothing else matters and you can focus on what you’re doing. Pushing through challenges is something I also
learned while thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail: I went into it with romantic notions of making a piece of art every day while on the trail and there were many days where we didn’t think about anything else other than putting one foot in front of the other to get our miles in. That experience was a lot like working with a team in a hot shop—you could keep going because your partner was and we got this euphoric feeling of accomplishment when finishing the hike, just like you get when you put a huge piece into the annealer.
AS: The recognition that we’ll never perfect working with glass was a key part of your MFA work at Ohio State University too. Tell us about some of the experiments you did during your MFA.
JC: The pursuit of perfection is what I find exciting. We’re always trying to get to perfection. But if we were always perfect, then it becomes really boring really fast, right? For my MFA, I tried to become the bubble, so I was driving around with bubbles. I was like, putting GoPro cameras inside of them and then smashing them to
Mirrored cloud forms by Jonathan Capps, 2016, for his MFA at The Ohio State University.
see what it felt like, to be inside a bubble when it blew up, and just all kinds of stuff like trying to get a different perspective of this material because our usual perspective is we’re sitting here, the material is there, and you can only get so close—and it was a great exercise and it was amazing to develop a new relationship with the material.
I was trying to kind of inject energy into it because we’re so used to making the thing and putting the thing on the pedestal and whatnot and then it goes off into the world.
AS: I love that you were working with the bubble as this foundational item in glassblowing. You also worked with the movement in the studio and in the bubbles themselves as part of your thesis. How did you come to collaborate with dancers and what was that experience like?
JC: We’ve all heard about how glassblowing is like a dance, but I hadn’t really thought of it that much until I took a yoga class to fulfill a non-art requirement for my degree, which was really good for me in terms of feeling good while blowing glass. I got to know David Covey who was one of the backstage guys, and I thought of him as this sculptor of light, which I could relate to as a glassmaker. We connected about that
and our relationship snowballed into an ongoing collaboration from there. He brought his students in the hot shop to experience what it’s like and then we went to the dance studio to collaborate on a structured improv where each student had a glass bubble as a partner, which were made as large as possible and these bubbles became anthropomorphized. I let them all take their bubbles home and they kind of connected with that bubble. It was really cool because they really had a relationship with that bubble and all the bubbles moved differently.
AS: Thinking back to when you were a student of Stephen Rolfe Powell at Centre College, what did you take from that experience?
JC: I was nineteen when I started working with Steve and it’s hard not to go back to those early moments because he was always pushing the material. His process was very regimented, but also tweaked constantly at the same time. From day one, he let you know you were part of this larger team and we all have to communicate and work together to get this crazy thing in the box. I live for those moments in the studio where artists are supporting each other. I’m kind of quoting Dante [Marioni] here, but glassblowers get to work with their friends.
AS: Your Fulbright Fellowship in Nuutajärvi, Finland seems like a natural extension of the collaborative work you started with Steve and continued in grad school. What drew you to collaborating with Finnish glassmakers and exploring that unique glassmaking culture?
JC: I was a resident artist there in the late 2000s and returned to teach an Americanstyle glassmaking with hot torches class in 2010 when the factory was still open and a thriving part of the community. The factory had brought a certain rhythm and identity to the village–the factory was internationally renowned and was one of the oldest glasshouses in Finland. It had produced some of the most famous designers like Oiva Toikka.
The factory closed when I was in grad school and I immediately thought “how are my friends in Finland dealing with this?”; my Fulbright evolved out of that question as an opportunity to engage with the Finnish glass community and share an American Studio Glass perspective. My idea of collaboration really expanded during the Fulbright—literally, it could be as big as working with thirty different artists, factory workers, students, and people straight out of vocational school. With this wide range
"180 Days in Random Order," Kirsti Taiviola, 2019; mold-blown glass, assembled. Included in Jonathan Capps’ 2019 exhibition, “Why Not? Finnish American Glass Art,” in Nuutajärvi, Finland.
of people, each one was incredibly different to work with and I learned something, if not a ton, from everybody.
Sometimes I was directly involved with making objects in Finland, and other times I wasn’t there at all. I met Kirsti Taiviola because she was working with the vocational students in town and she had gotten a grant to make this huge project making abstract objects where each one represented a different sunset photo taken from a building in Helsinki. In my unique situation as a Fulbright scholar, we had the opportunity to bring her into the project, to offer space, and have a co-curatorial opportunity in this final exhibition where we set up this installation from the works she had already made. That form of collaboration was completely new for me; I was collaborating from an administrative point of view. There are a lot of things I take away from that whole experience and I’m still learning from it, I’ll probably be doing that for the rest of my life. It taught me a broader and more humble view of what collaboration can be. If you want to get something done, in my experience, diplomacy is the best thing you can possibly learn to do.
AS: To bring it full circle to Blown Away, it was beautiful to see how well you and Morgan worked together on the Chihuly Glass and Garden challenge.
JC: It was one of the highlights of the whole experience for me; we just locked in together. We realized we brought very different but complementary things to the table. She’s super used to working on a team, working at The Boathouse on Dale Chihuly’s team, and so am I from working with Steve and having collaborative experiences. But as a teacher, I’m constantly working with students and working as a group to get something done.
Morgan and I realized immediately that we could riff off of each other and it’s funny— the episode shows us breaking a lot of stuff in the beginning, but that was really just the first 15 minutes of a six-hour challenge; after that, boom, we were off to the races. It was the most fun experience working with another artist like that; I would work with her any day of the week again. She pushed me, too; there were some times where my energy was flagging, but she was still going, so I said, “all right, you’re going, I’m going, let’s do this.”
AS: I think that’s one of the things that I love so much about working on a team is that you can do that. It’s harder to keep motivated if you’re working by yourself, but if somebody else is with you, it’s easier to keep going.
JC: The theme of that piece was so cool too. It was a very unexpected connection that the two of us found where Chihuly visited Finland in 1995. We titled the piece Lasikoulu, which translates to “glass school” in Finnish, connecting both of our experiences together. We used birch trees in our design because Nuutajärvi is this beautiful village in the middle of the woods, nestled between two lakes.
AS: This connection to nature popped up in your Berlin 2024 demonstration where you recreated the glacier piece you made on Blown Away–what was that experience like to demonstrate at the GAS Conference?
JC: Presenting in Berlin was amazing and I’m honored that the judges felt I’d be a good ambassador for glass on such an international level. GAS provides glass artists and enthusiasts a global platform for information and cultural exchange. The conference brings people together in solidarity over a shared passion for this material!
Amanda Sterling is the Communications Manager at GAS.
Above and below: Jonathan Capps glass blowing demonstation at GAS Berlin 2024. Photos by Mary Barfield.
THREE STUDIO EXPANSIONS IN THE WORKS: CORNING, PITTSBURGH, AND CHRYSLER
by Debra Ruzinsky
Growth is in the air! Three important centers for glass in the United States are opening expanded facilities. The Corning Museum of Glass (CMoG), The Pittsburgh Glass Center (PGC), and The Chrysler Museum Perry Glass Studio are all celebrating launches of amazing new facilities in 2024 and 2025.
CORNING MUSEUM OF GLASS STUDIO
CMoG announced it will officially inaugurate its new, state-of-the-art studio on October 17, celebrating the successful completion of the StudioNEXT campaign and expansion project.
Phase 1 of the Studio expansion project opened in December 2023 to guests. The Visitor Entrance is the public entrance for guests participating in a Make Your Own Glass experience. Courtesy of Corning Museum of Glass
CMoG established a 24,000-square-foot studio in 1996 to offer instruction across a spectrum of techniques and skill levels, host residencies for artists, and provide rentals of furnace, kiln, and cold-working spaces and equipment, along with a variety of other special programs. The now 60,000 square-foot studio builds on a successful first chapter to:
•become the only facility in North America for artists to cast large-scale glass works, and serve as an important center for teaching large-scale casting techniques;
•give artists unprecedented opportunities
to push boundaries and establish new frontiers of glassmaking by providing a new technology center with next-generation equipment, including CNC machines, 3D printers, neon-making facilities, a mold shop, a metal shop, and a wood shop to support glassworking;
•create a new year-round Residency Center in The Studio, where artists will be encouraged to conceptualize and experiment with new techniques and forms to push their practice in new directions;
•increase the number of Artists-inResidence (AiR) that The Studio can accommodate annually and extend residency duration for participants in the world-renowned program;
•introduce the two-year Glassmaking Institute certificate program, which will offer intensive practical training in glassmaking and professional development opportunities to twelve students annually, outside a formal BFA or MFA program;
•scale up its Make Your Own Glass (MYOG) experience for Museum visitors by expanding the number of participants each day and the number of available slots for glassmaking with a new in-depth glassblowing and a new engraving and printing on a glass plate experience.
Amy Schwartz, the Director of The Studio of the Corning Museum of Glass said: “We are thrilled by the early and enthusiastic responses of our MYOG participants, who began using that new space this winter, and our visiting artists who are making glass for the first time in portions of our new facilities.”
In Fall of 2024 the new 5,000 square-foot Casting Center will come online—the only glass foundry in the United States and the only facility equipped with state-of-the-
group
The new Make Your Own Glass workshop features four pods that can accommodate twice as many visitors each day as the previous space—along with flexible, multi-purpose spaces to support
glassmaking and artist glassblowing space rentals.
Courtesy of Corning Museum of Glass
The Jim & Doreen Clappin Make Your Own Glass Pod 1 space is designated for hot glass projects. Courtesy of Corning Museum of Glass
The Make Your Own Glass Pod 2 Space is designated for cold working experiences like sandblasting and fusing projects. Courtesy of Corning Museum of Glass
art equipment and personnel to support artists, take on commissions, and share knowledge of this exciting sculptural medium. The comprehensive new center will accommodate all stages of casting works in glass, including: extensive space for mold-making, a dozen large-scale specialized kilns, extensive cold working facilities to shape and polish large forms, and a 500-lb gravity-fed hot casting furnace. The Casting Center will also provide established and emerging artists with the opportunity to learn skills and access resources available nowhere else on the continent. It will be an important disseminator of knowledge, encouraging experimentation with new techniques and sharing those investigations through publications and other platforms.
The Artists-in-Residence (AiR) beginning their residencies in September will be the first to experience the Wendell Weeks & Kim Frock Residency Center. Boasting seven well-equipped studios surrounding a light-filled lounge, the Residency Center will serve as a central space for creative collaboration and interaction among residents. Studio residents will also have full access to the new technology center’s resources, which include CNC machines, 3-D printers, neon-making facilities, a mold shop, a metal shop, and a wood shop. Residents will have access to dedicated furnace time and the full breadth of
PITTSBURGH
decades of experience.”
The Wendell Weeks & Kim Frock Residency Center boasts seven well-equipped studios surrounding a bright lounge, that will serve as a central space for creative collaboration and interaction among residents. Studio residents will also have full access to the new technology center’s resources, which include CNC machines, 3-D printers, neon-making facilities, a mold shop, a metal shop, and a wood shop. Residents will have access to dedicated furnace time and the full breadth of resources of CMoG’s collection and library. Courtesy of Corning Museum of Glass
resources of CMoG’s collection and library. “The opening of the Glassmaking Institute starts a new chapter in glass education in the United States. Nothing else like this program exists,” said Richard Whiteley, Senior Programs Manager at The Studio, who will oversee the Institute. “CMoG provides a unique campus for learning,
GLASS CENTER
Pittsburgh Glass Center (PGC) began construction of its $15 million expansion in March 2023. Despite the disturbance, PGC saw major growth and earned $1,088,000 in 2023, a 9% increase from 2022. Class registration excelled during construction and reached $860,000 for 2023, breaking all previous records. In 2023 PGC also paid over $450,000 to artists by employing them as instructors to teach workshops and classes; hosting artist residencies; and selling their work in the retail space and through exhibitions in the Hodge Gallery. Indovina Associates Architects designed a plan that would allow PGC to add 11,000 square feet and nearly double its capacity to keep up with demand for glass programs and studios and allow space for more community programming. The third floor will be home to a second glassblowing
state-of-the-art equipment that supports critical hands-on learning in many different techniques, and an unparalleled teaching staff comprised of glassmakers with
Pittsburgh Glass Center, photo courtesy of PGC.
studio specifically for professional artists who live in Pittsburgh and rely on PGC to make a living, a spacious outdoor patio facing Penn Avenue, and administrative offices. The third floor, opening in May, will be open to the public to explore and watch glass artists at work. This new studio will be the main venue for glassblowing demonstrations during free open-house events at PGC.
“From the start, Pittsburgh Glass Center has been committed to reducing its energy consumption and doing all that we can to reduce our carbon footprint. A grant from the Frankenthaler Foundation and partnership with Vitro Architectural Glass allows us to truly make a difference for the environment inside and outside of our building. Immediately visitors and staff will benefit from the warmth that this technology provides,” said Heather McElwee, the executive director of PGC.
The Vitro Patio is a large outdoor deck overlooking Penn Avenue into East Liberty and will serve as an overflow area for increased capacity for the growing attendance at glassblowing demonstrations, and a place for students to take a break and enjoy the fresh air. An accessibility and inclusion grant from Allegheny Regional AssetDistrict (RAD) makes PGC accessible to all visitors including people with physical disabilities and limited mobility, using a new elevator and wheelchair lift. This includes all free, ongoing programming, such as exhibitions, open-house glassblowing demonstrations, and self-guided tours.
A bright retail boutique, supported by the Hans and Leslie Fleischner Fund of the Pittsburgh Foundation, will open on Penn Avenue this spring. It will showcase both aspiring and established glass artists, makers, and designers. “With properly staged products in a dedicated retail footprint, PGC will become a shopping destination for art, giftware, and home decor. Providing a welcoming first impression for visitors, the store will provide increased revenue to support all PGC programs and build visibility for local artists,” said McElwee.
PGC has doubled the size of the kiln, flame, and cold studios to make room for more students and add room for visiting artists in residence to experiment with glass and display their art. New additions include a
neon studio and a fabrication lab with new technology such as 3D printing and water jet cutting.
“Expanded facilities will be transformational for Pittsburgh Glass Center, the East End of Pittsburgh, the constituents we serve, and the wider international glass art community as they will strengthen our capacity to advance a more diverse, vibrant, and accessible glass art community,” said McElwee.
PGC has also begun renovation of a second 6,500-square-foot building located at 5431 Penn Avenue, at the corner of North Graham Street and Penn Avenue, two blocks away from the existing facility. This building, the former Horoscope Lounge, will be transformed into a flexible space for emerging artist exhibitions and community programming, as well as additional housing for technical apprentices and visiting artists. Grand opening festivities took place as part of the Art on Fire celebration
The Vitro Patio is a large outdoor deck overlooking Penn Avenue into East Liberty. Photo courtesy of PGC.
Clockwise from top left: New hot shop, flame shop, cold shop and kiln shop in April 2024. Photos courtesy of PGC.
THE CHRYSLER MUSEUM OF ART PERRY GLASS STUDIO
and auction in mid-September. The Perry Glass Studio originally opened in November of 2011 as an experiment for the Chrysler, to teach and excite folks and to bring more attention to the museum and increase attendance. Initially the thought was that two people would run it. Robin Rogers, Glass Studio Manager and Program Director, now has twentyfive people involved, with staff and studio assistants.
Expansion has been in discussion since 2016, with seed money again from the Perry family. The expansion broke ground in March of 2023. Rogers shares that “we didn’t invent glass performance but we’ve done over 120 performances by the time of this conversation. We’ve been champions of performance since we started. It even became the theme around the 2017 GAS Conference that took place here in Norfolk.” Because of this focus, a unique addition to the expansion plan will be the addition of full professional theatrical rigging and equipment in support of performance programming.
June 20 was the last day using the current studio space in its present form. The Studio expects a soft opening of new space in August of 2024, and to complete renovation of the original space by the end of 2024, with a grand opening planned for March of 2025.
Work Program Architects have created the plan to:
•Triple the square footage of the existing studio and include a second hot shop, growing from three to eight workstations and enabling concurrent student and demonstration programs;
•Double the number of classes available for community members to interact with glass;
•Accommodate larger audiences for demonstrations, educational sessions, and events in a new 220-seat theater;
•Double the time available for local artists to use glass-blowing equipment and space;
•Grow partnerships with collegiate institutions, as well as build new relationships;
•New neon, fusing, and mold-making shops, expanding the cold shop (from one of each machine to three);
•Add a catering kitchen for events and a green room for visiting artists;
•Add a stormwater management plan integral to the landscape design.
The studio has been fortunate to have the full support of the museum. The architecture team and the museum team took the time to visit other glass studios and hold meetings with heads of glass shops around the county while planning the expansion. Several on the architecture project team even caught the glass bug, and are now regular students at Pilchuck and other programs!
Soon it will be time for the rest of us to take some trips around the country to check out all these wonderful new and improved facilities.
Special thanks to:
Kelci Sibley at CMoG, Heather McElwee and Paige Ilkhanipour at PGC, and Robin Rogers and Ashley Grove Mars at Chrysler for sharing latest information with us.
Debra Ruzinsky is a glass artist, educator, and Executive Director of an arts nonprofit organization on Bainbridge Island, Washington.
Renderings of the planned expansion of the Perry Glass Studio, Images courtesy of Work Program Architects
THE FIREBIRD SPREADS ITS WINGS: A GENEROUS GRANT ALLOWS FIREBIRD COMMUNITY ARTS TO INCREASE ACCESS AND OFFERINGS
By Danielle Hayden
Evidence supporting the communal benefits of the arts is long-standing and irrefutable. From improved mental wellness to opportunities for professional and personal growth, having a creative outlet helps support stronger communities. An excellent example of this is Chicagobased studio Firebird Community Arts, which offers classes and programming in glassblowing and ceramics, aiming to provide access and affordability to quality arts instruction, often more challenging to find in certain communities.
Firebird serves people impacted by trauma, including youth who have experienced violence, veterans, formerly incarcerated individuals, and many others. Their program Project FIRE, which is celebrating its tenth anniversary this year, is a glassblowing and trauma recovery program. Firebird also offers SELF groups (Safety, Emotion, Loss, and Future), which allow people to gather outside of instructional time and learn about the effects of trauma on the body, to better understand and regulate their feelings and triggers. Firebird serves several hundred people a year at varying skill levels in their East Garfield Park location. Outside of the art itself, it offers a safe space, connections to other services when needed, and a positive pathway for underrepresented communities in the area.
This year, Firebird was awarded a grant for over $2.5 million as part of the Chicago Recovery Plan. The funding will help Firebird build a new 12,000-square-foot community glass and ceramic studio with improved ventilation (especially beneficial for their growing community of flameworkers), along with a healing and meditation garden, gallery, store, and a pop-up snack café. A parking area will also be added to the new campus. Construction is set to begin later this year and projected to go into early 2026. In addition to structural expansion, this will allow Firebird to increase their programming as well: In the new facility, Firebird will triple the number of youths served, double youth studio hours per week, and offer more
programs to the community at large. The garden will be added to their program offerings, giving Firebird the opportunity to incorporate learning about local ecology, environmental responsibility, and sustainability.
Firebird also hopes to expand their strategic community partnerships as well. They hope to join with additional workforce development organizations, hospital-based violence intervention programs, schools, and arts institutions. They are also looking to revamp and formalize their internship program. The new facility will allow them to add 100 more paid creative professional and youth positions within the next five years. They intend to increase classroom space and invite more visiting artists from around the country. Pearl Dick, Artistic Director of Firebird, is excited about the expansion, especially to help young people impacted by violence in Chicago, one of Firebird’s core focuses through Project FIRE:
“A new, larger facility will allow us to tailor our space to our specific needs—like quiet and comforting counseling rooms for youth to meet with their caseworkers and mental health professionals. It has been in the works to add a younger group of students to our arts programs—currently we serve mostly teenagers and young adults ages 14-24. We have seen that
many of the young people in our programs have their first experiences with guns or street violence when they are much younger—sometimes 8-9 years old. All of our programming [currently] happens in essentially one big space and as most of our students are school age, there are very specific times when they can come to the studio. Having more dedicated classroom space that allows for some separation of programming will be more conducive to working with these different age groups at the same time. Hopefully we can start getting young people into a supportive community before they are injured by gun violence as our current Project FIRE participants have been.”
With so many plans for the new building, Dick is still conscientious of people’s need for downtime, too: “There are so many ways we will utilize this new space. I imagine every corner of it being activated but also there being room to get away and sit quietly too when someone needs a break from the activity—as this is something our young people as well as teaching artists don’t get enough of in our current space.”
Firebird has taken students to study glass and present at conferences in multiple parts of the country. This, year they are bringing a group to Venice, Italy to collaborate with a group of students there. “Seeing that there is so much outside of
Rendering of the planned new Firebird Community Arts. Image courtesy of Wrap Architecture.
their neighborhoods in Chicago and gaining new perspectives from the people in the different places we’ve gone to expands our students’ views of the world and their places in it,” says Dick.
N’Kosi Barber, who has been involved since Project FIRE was a pilot program and now serves as its longtime Program Manager, shares this enthusiasm for exposing youth to new opportunities. He is currently preparing to take students to Italy, helping them to get their passports and materials in order in preparation for the trip. A visit to Pilchuck for a youth program is on the horizon as well. Locally, he recently took some of his students to the aquarium and then led them in a workshop to craft glass pieces based on the sea creatures they saw there. Barber also serves as a member of Firebird’s board. With the receipt of the grant, he also hopes to expand their residencies to further their education in glass.
Having grown up on Chicago’s South Side, Barber knows firsthand about Firebird’s outreach and influence on his community. He started out in the hotshop as a senior in high school and quickly found his creative medium. He was unsure of how to continue
″They come here to learn, be safe, and create a bond. And there’s other people who’ve been hurt, just like them. And just to be able to share experiences and stuff, and to know everybody that’s outside your neighborhood that’s around your age is not your enemy.
-N’Kosi Barber, Project FIRE Program Manager
Rendering of the planned garden at Firebird Community Arts, image courtesy of Wrap Architecture.
Students at Firebird Community Arts, photo courtesy of Firebird.
post-secondary work, but got connected with Project FIRE and soon developed an interest in working with youth from similar backgrounds.
But Barber’s role is not just teaching; it is also mentorship. He encourages the students he works with to foster a sense of trust and camaraderie, cultivating connection and a feeling of allyship. “They come here to learn, be safe, and create a bond. And there’s other people who’ve been hurt, just like them. And just to be able to share experiences and stuff, and to know everybody that’s outside your neighborhood that’s around your age is not your enemy.”
The group often eats dinner together and shares things about what they are going through. Barber also likes to help young people apply for residencies to help further their knowledge and skill in glass, or to find jobs elsewhere, even outside of glasswork, “so they can flourish,” he says—though many of his former teen mentees now have staff positions at Firebird. Barber often acts as a liaison, assisting mentees in locating good opportunities and connecting them with other community resources. The upcoming expansion of Firebird will enable him to do even more of that: to purchase more equipment to keep making art, and expand the gallery to display the art that students have worked hard to create. He sees not only the possibilities to serve, but also what can come from the increase in exposure that this grant and expansion are affording them. The more people hear about them, Barber says, the more likely they are to get involved: “…More opportunities for other people to want to help with the vision…once people see you on TV, see you doing some good, they want to [join].”
Firebird Community Arts has already proven itself as a valuable source of educational, professional, and socioemotional opportunity. The generous grant will only broaden their positive impact, not only for this generation but also for posterity.
YOUR WORK LEAVES, YOUR TOOLS LIVE WITH YOU
Seattle.
Danielle Hayden is a multigenre writer based in
Students at Firebird Community Arts, photo courtesy of Firebird.
EXPANDED METHODOLOGIES ON VISION
By John Erwin Dillard
In a prophetic vision mystic scholar Saint Hildegard Von Bingen describes the beginning of the universe: “… I saw a vast instrument, round and shadowed, in the shape of an egg, small at the bottom. Outside it, surrounding its circumference, there was bright fire with it, as it were, a shadowy zone under it. And in that fire there was a globe of sparkling flame so great that the whole instrument was illuminated by it, over which three little torches were arranged in such a way that by their fire they held up the globe lest it fall.” Bingen’s illustration of her revelation describes a unique perspective on vision. Vision, as she described, is both a perceptual mode and a state of being. The above illustration details an event that made vision possible. Its illustrative message describes an original point at which viewer and subject could homogenize. Bingen expanded our understanding of sight from an objective sensory perception to a conception that sensory information is subjective, interpretable, and unfixed. In the mutability of vision is a slippage between the visible and invisible. In the overlap between the two is a profound model that favors reciprocity. Under von Bingens model the witness and the witnessed share a mutual understanding in curiosity. This modality offers an antithesis to the patriarchal systems of today.
This method of seeing has been undermined in post-modernity, in large part through the conceptualization and understanding of “the gaze.” The gaze is a theoretical model of perception in which the viewer is placed in a position of domination. This perception, often referring to male viewers, was implemented to provoke the identity or personhood of the viewer. The viewer’s vision was suddenly understood as an instrument of power rather than a fixed, objective state of being. The gaze entered artistic discourse in the very end of the of 19th century.
With the advent of the photograph the world entered a new era of images. Later, through the commodification of photography and film our understanding of vision became sensationalized. Ethical dilemmas began over the ownership of
The Western World, Medieval Period, 11th - 12th Centuries, MSS (not alchemical) [religious]
Image courtesy of The Archive for Research in Archetypal Symbolism (ARAS).1
images, and the ownership of images became imbued with a power to disrupt authentic viewership. Authenticity in this context refers to the viewer's objective ability to interpret an image. Particularly when an image has been monetized it calls into question who benefits from the speciation. Thus, looking became an immense tool of political power. Objectification became the political lens through which the gaze was understood. To look at something was to take power
over it. The subject became subservient in its compressed two-dimensional form and therefore the image depicted became morally degraded.
Artist Natali Rodrigues, quick-witted and with mastery, slays the postmodern ideologies laid out here. Rodrigues opens a trap door in her work that drops its viewer into an unknown territory. This artist’s work exists in a perpetual state of invisibility. As if under a spell, the objects Rodrigues
Hildegard of Bingen, Liber Scivias , fol. 14r. STYLE/PERIOD Medieval Period: 11th - 12th Centuries
DATE ca. 1151-79.
produces bend and obfuscate the material world. In her solo exhibition A Sliver of Moonlight/ A Branch of Flowering Plum, 2024, curated by Brynn Alexis Hurlstone at Automat Collective in Philadelphia, Rodrigues slices the distinction between the surveyor and the surveyed. The solid masses of glass representing cellular mitosis and proliferation to tear down the binary conceptions of vision after modernity. The benign seeming lumps of glass at first appear to offer little to the viewer. It is in the close inspection of these objects that the world is bent, contorted, magnified, and obscured. Upon approaching each individual sculpture our gaze is rendered useless. In this realization that our perception is fallible, the artist opens a series of portals to alternate realms of seeing. Each object in its unique formal shape reveals the fallacy of vision as power. The conceptions of domination are feverishly snatched away, and the viewer is left to wonder what it is they should be looking at.
To better understand the work of Rodrigues in these terms, let us examine the idea of nakedness. Nakedness, from antiquity to post-modernity, is defined by the power dynamic prescribed in the politics of
seeing. The function of nakedness in art was to define the human body, particularly female bodies, as a site of spectacle. The body was irrevocably marked as an objectified thing to be viewed for pleasure. In her exhibition, Rodrigues reimagines how we can view the body as an instrument for viewing. The cellular structures she recapitulates in this body of work takes a microscopic lens to the politics of looking.
Her main tool against the misogynist conception of vision is the highly polished surfaces of her sculptures. With almost machine-like precision Rodrigues polishes each glass object to reveal the power of total transparency. In her fastidious and masterful cold-working techniques Rodrigues created a series of metaphoric mirrors. The mirror, referential to the vanity genre of painting in European antiquity, is
Natali Rodrigues solo exhibition, A Sliver of Moonlight/ A Branch of Flowering Plum, 2024. Photo courtesy of Natalia Purchiaroni.
Natali Rodrigues, detail of A Sliver of Moonlight/ A Branch of Flowering Plum, 2024. Photo courtesy of Natalia Purchiaroni
now weaponized by the artist to produce a reversal in the politics of viewership: The qualities of transparency are subverted, and the viewer is placed in the position of being both the viewer and the viewed. In the distorted lens her work produces, we are invited to reimagine how seeing can be a place for self-reflection rather than a demonstration of power. Baldness is the strength of these sculptures. We see this work unfold in a state of nature, free from the shameful garb of modernity. Nakedness in this circumstance describes a mode of perception that unabashedly prioritizes the viewer's perception.
I define nakedness in this text as a theoretical idea rather than a state of physical undress; a means to realize new methodologies on vision. From the paintings of the pre-Raphaelites to the identity art of the 1990s, we are to understand the experience of viewing visual art as transactional. The transaction between the viewer and the autonomous object are historically intertwined in the dominator model of the white supremacist capitalist patriarchy which has reigned over Western perceptual models for centuries. However, it is in nakedness that our understanding of sight may heal from the psychic rift opened previously. An artist who also activates this radical type of nakedness in their work is Payton Cahill.
In her specific work Plant Drawing Machine, Cahill calls the principles of nakedness into the material world. The work is a drawing machine which uses plants as a pseudo-scientific instrument to measure the magnetic fields of the earth. The mechanized arms of the sculpture, each holding a pencil, create a series of patterns that describe the invisible perceptions of non-sentient life. This sculpture expands on both the possibilities realized in the work of Bingen and Rodrigues: Visual art becomes an expanded methodology through which complex and traditionally unperceivable knowledge becomes embodied. This utilization of creativity positions Cahill’s work to unpack the unknowable aspects of Bingen’s conception of vision.
As users are invited to interact with the flora attached to the machine, the pattern suddenly changes. When a viewer activates the work, the mechanized arms abruptly
Above and below: Natali Rodrigues, detail images of A Sliver of Moonlight/ A Branch of Flowering Plum, 2024. Photos courtesy of Natalia Purchiaroni.
change their systematic pattern drawing. If the viewer continues to touch the flora the two energies of machine and person are synchronized into a new harmonious representation on the page. Regardless of the viewer’s duration in interacting with the machine, its pattern is inevitably and irreversibly altered. Within this exchange is the undeniable evidence that the viewer and subject are inextricably linked; not as dominator and subject, but as two reciprocating bodies in a world composed of loose atoms.
Within this work is a pathway to dismantle the hegemonic governance of viewership. The dynamics of power are stripped away, and the sculpture re-introduces us to the great and mysterious interconnectivity of the world. Cahill proposes that all life is linked. This proposed linkage merges the concepts of site and sight. We are naked with the sculpture; the flora sees past our personhood and translates our primordial energy into a work of art. Matters of identity are rendered irrelevant and models of domination are broken apart before the eyes of the viewer and the viewed equally. Seeing the systematic drawing of the whirling mechanized arms has the potential to revert vision to an original and holistic form.
Cahill, in this work, defines an opportunity to again experience vision as a state of being. Most importantly in this exchange is that there is no transaction. The energies embodied within us are omnipresent, existing in perpetuity, and only made visible by the drawing machine. It is in this moment that visibility and invisibility overlap in powerful vibrations. Coupled in this text with the work of Rodrigues is an expanded methodology on vision. Vision in all its complexity which I have described is profoundly realized in-between the two artists’ work. In the designation between visible/invisible or transparent/ opaque in this expanded methodology ruptures out. From Eduardo Glissant’s For Opacity we can understand opacity as a method for living which favors the private. Glissant argues that through personal transparency we are denied more complex aspects of ourselves. However, as I have described here, it is the overlap between transparency and opacity that may free viewership from the shackles of domination. The two artists foil and disrupt the post-modern understanding of vision. We see transparency become obfuscation and opacity reveal the omnipresent energies around us.
The two artists here reach these expansive modes through the common ground of
glass. Both artists extensively use glass in their practice and were formally educated in the material discipline. Glass is the ideal material of the 21st century to develop methodical reform around our wounded conceptions of site, sight, transparency, opacity, and vision. Both artists use
Payton Cahill, Plant Drawing Machine. Photo courtesy of the artist.
Payton Cahill, Plant Drawing Machine. Photo courtesy of the artist.
the transparent nature inherent to its physical form directly and indirectly to reconceptualize vision without subjugation. The culmination of scientific knowledge and creative pursuit reopens our narrowed consensus on vision in post-modernity. In a world which operates on an entirely post-structural conception of our reality, these two artists provide a perspective in which the viewer is no longer dominant. The viewer is repositioned as part of a much more complex whole. Through glass, our world view can be expanded, and our perceptions of self are heightened. In the transmutation of material and creative spirit an equilibrium is reached between viewer and the viewed. Within this reciprocal position we may utilize both the transparent and opaque as expansions into our most complex selves. Just as Hildegard Von Bingen described in her own vision, the world here is held up by the flame. The literal flame which these artists use in their practice, as well as the transcending embers of their creative spirit.
When the world opened from its cosmic egg and became what we know, the thunderous claps, whirlwinds, and bright fire echoed continually into our world. Through the instruments of glass, we harness that same energy—visible and
invisible. Rodrigues and Cahill draw us closer to the original flame, which we see embodied in their respective work. A reminder to us all that the ability to see is one of our greatest gifts in creativity. Vision is not a system of power or ownership, but an integral thread woven into the fabric of our very lives. In this knowledge may we realize the power of creativity to guide us towards enlightenment.
John Erwin Dillard. B. Gulfport, MS, USA 1995. May generosity exist in us.
1. Part of The Archive for Research in Archetypal Symbolism (ARAS) RIGHTS NOTES
Contact information: Allison Tuzo, Online Editor, ARAS, 28 East 39th Street, New York NY 10016; Tel No: 646-536-2632; Fax No: 212682-2024; email: info@aras.org. This item is part of an Artstor Collection.
Payton Cahill, Plant Drawing Machine. Photo courtesy of the artist.
Furnace Cullet
IN GORY DETAIL: THE ART OF THE DE LA TORRE BROTHERS
By Emma S. Ahmad
Defining the artwork of sibling artist duo Einar and Jamex de la Torre is far from a simple task. Singularly labeling them glass artists is a bit reductive, seeing as their work’s final form is a montage of objects and imagery, typically culminating in an immersive installation. Although glasswork has its roots in being a decorative and functional medium, the de la Torre brothers, like many contemporary glass artists, use the art form to tackle bigger political issues. And for their first solo exhibition in San Antonio, titled de la Torre Brothers: Upward Mobility, the brothers delivered a critical take on the future of our world–one that is both surreal and horrifying.
Einar (b. 1963) and Jamex (b. 1960) de la Torre are sculptors born and raised in Guadalajara before moving to California in 1972. Today, they live and work on both sides of the Unite d States-Mexico border, migrating between their studios and homes in the Guadalupe Valley in Baja California, Mexico, and San Diego, California. The duo began working together in the 1990s and quickly developed a signature style within their practice consisting of blown glass, mixed media work, and installation.
Their artwork is imbued with a range of styles and motifs encompassing their multifaceted cultural identities and experiences. You may see a mix of preColumbian hieroglyphs, Classical Greek busts, and various religious iconography such as the Virgin of Guadalupe, Buddha statues, or images of European church ceilings. Traditional or Indigenous Mexican symbols, such as the prickly pear cactus growing out of a human heart, are fused with contemporary references to Chicano culture, like the rim of a lowrider car, as can be seen in the work Mi Chicano Corazón (2023). Their work is a kaleidoscope of cultural collision, combining materials and aesthetics in such a way that new meaning emerges.
Above: Einar and Jamex de la Torre. Photo by Josue Castro.
Below: Einar and Jamex de la Torre, “Mi Chicano Corazón,” 2023, blown glass and mixed media, 40 x 20 x 16 inches. Photo by Paul Feuerbacher, courtesy of the McNay Art Museum.
Upward Mobility, presented by the McNay Art Museum, features a plethora of hand-blown glass sculptures, lenticular prints, large-scale installations and video projections spaced throughout four galleries. The lenticular prints–whose images shift as you move around them— incorporate pieces of blown glass and resin castings attached directly to their surfaces, adding another layer of visual depth to an already illusionary work. Frozen inside the resin casts are objects that look like they were found in a junk drawer or antique shop: old watches, playing cards, dice, beaded necklaces, toy animals, rubber bands, charms, and so on. I would categorize much of their installation work as large-scale assemblage, or perhaps bricolage.
The entrance gallery in Upward Mobility is organized in traditional methods of display, with large blown glass pieces on white pedestals spaced throughout the room. These pieces combine culture and
mythology, with figures of luchadores (Mexican professional wrestlers) made of nopales (cactus pads) next to renditions of whimsical swamp creatures from Slavic legends. This first gallery sets the scene for the surrealist and playful innerworld of the de la Torre brothers.
The star of the show lies within the next gallery, which is staged like an interior dining room with an extravagant 20-footlong banquet table as the centerpiece. From afar, the space appears as a luxurious, immersive installation complete with gaudy wallpaper, retro chandeliers, and gold silverware. The maximalist and grandiose aesthetic of the room is overwhelming and quite chaotic, a calculated choice by the brothers. And as you move in closer, little horrors begin to unfold. Instead of appetizers, the plates are filled with mutilated dolls and human body parts, like eyeballs, brains, and hearts. Glass and resin renderings of antique dolls and infants are drenched in bright
red liquid. It is impossible to draw the line between food and carnage.
The half-eaten plates and toppled over wine glasses hint at the presence of once-ravenous diners, though they have seemingly vanished, abandoning their cannibalistic meal. The absence of the diners strikes as deeply unsettling, perhaps because it feels like foreshadowing. The de la Torre brothers are issuing a warning: humanity will not survive, both literally and figuratively, if these examples of extreme wealth and unbridled gluttony continue.
The mangled and bloodied dolls aren’t the only signifiers of violence; taxidermied animals are mounted on the walls and sporadically placed throughout the space. There are exotic birds, deer, antelopes, elk, cows and bulls, and even large predators such as a brown bear and a mountain lion. Some wear heavy gold, bedazzled chains around their necks. Gemstones and shiny gold coins are scattered on nearly every
Einar and Jamex de la Torre, “Le Point de Bascule” (the Tipping Point), 2024, mixed media installation.
Photo by Paul Feuerbacher, courtesy of the McNay Art Museum.
surface. Fur coats hang on the backs of chairs. Guns are incorporated into the resin wall pieces. Gold chandeliers hanging over the dining room table sport human arms which hold broken glass bottles, as if ready for a fight. The banquet table sits on a mirrored platform, showcasing a reflection of the underside of the table which displays intricate designs of raw, ground-up meat.
The title of the banquet table installation, Le Point de Bascule (2024), directly translates to “the tipping point”—a phrase referencing a critical point or stage in a situation, when a significant change takes place that elevates the process past the point of no return. To me, the phrase immediately brings to mind our current predicament regarding climate change. As we continue to cross tipping point thresholds, the damage done to the planet becomes irreversible.
The de la Torre brothers are not subtle in their critique. In Le Point de Bascule, overconsumption is represented in a quite literal display. The grotesque depictions of animals and food showcase the perverse and predatory relationship between mankind and nature. Humanity’s dominance and greed will be our very downfall.
Although much of the de la Torre brothers’ aesthetics consist of fusing ancient or traditional motifs with contemporary and pop culture iconography from both sides of the border, I would categorize their work, above all else, as futurist. Their imaginative creations speak to a dystopian future where the imbalance between humans and nature reaches its peak.
It is impossible to discuss the work of the de la Torre brothers without addressing their relentless humor and wit, which produce satirical commentary on issues of politics, history, religion, capitalism, and consumerism within contemporary society. And it is because of their unique playful and fantastical visual language that these overarching themes don’t present as
hopeless or depressing. The brothers act as heralds and their artwork holds a mirror up to all of us, individually and collectively.
Emma S. Ahmad is a freelance art historian and writer based in Dallas, Texas.
Above + Below: Einar and Jamex de la Torre, “Le Point de Bascule” (the Tipping Point) (detail), 2024, mixed media installation. Photo by Paul Feuerbacher, courtesy of the McNay Art Museum.
EXPANDING HORIZONS: SOUTHERN AFRICAN GLASS FORGES NEW FRONTIERS
By Caitlin Jade Greenburg
In the heart of South Africa’s glass industry lies a story of growth and resilience. Reflecting this journey, the current Tshwane University of Technology (TUT) glass studio within the Fine & Studio Arts programme was born in 1995, which was formerly known as the Pretoria Technikon Consol Glass House. Lothar Böttcher, one of the first alumni students from this glass studio and a pioneering spirit propelling South African glass onto the global stage, inspires a new generation of artists to explore the captivating world of glass.
Böttcher’s ability to bring glass artists together through selfless projects uplifts the glass community within South Africa. The pivotal 2017 creative project Blow Your Sculpture, initiated by Böttcher, has since been repeated across four exhibitions. This exhibition has united glass artists with creators and designers, transforming their ideas into the enchanting medium of glass. It has expanded the recognition of glass as a medium and facilitated the exchange of knowledge between creators within a collaborative creative space.
The glass industry in South Africa, being small and exclusive, faces challenges such as limited studios and the high cost of materials. However, these harsh conditions drive innovation and transformation. In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the TUT glass studio experienced a revival. Under my leadership as the current lecturer and coordinator of glass at TUT, the studio was infused with new energy and ambition. I aimed to push boundaries and forge new connections, aspiring to elevate the studio to an international standard and gain recognition as a premier educational centre for creative glasswork.
The first post COVID-19 group project, International Year of Glass 2022 (IYOG2022), initiated by Böttcher and in
which TUT participated, included a team of dedicated Southern African glass artists, studios, and Ngwenya Glass, a factory in Southern Africa. This exhibition was the dedicated driving force behind establishing Southern African Glass, which consists of Lothar Böttcher (owner of Obsidian Glass), Chas Prettejohn (director of Ngwenya Glass in Eswatini), Martli Jansen van Rensburg (professional glass artist and co-owner of Smelt Glass Studio), and myself (professional glass artist, primary glass lecturer and co-ordinator of the TUT glass studio). This dedicated team has sacrificed personal time to elevate Southern African glass as a whole, ensuring recognition on the global platform.
Croze from Kitengela Glass in Kenya and Sibusiso Mhlanga as well as James Magagula from Ngwenya Glass in Eswatini; and South African glass artists, including pioneer glass artists David Reade, Guido van Besouw, and Sue Meyer. Numerous creative interpretations of the medium were exhibited, including the renowned collection of glass beads from the Wits Origin Centre in Johannesburg. These beads were used as trade currency in extensive continental trade routes and were produced in the first furnaces on the tip of Africa. The diverse applications of the medium by the exhibiting artists reflects the diverse cultural and personal interpretations of African glass. In the IYOG2022 catalogue, Böttcher stated
“Projects such as these exhibitions are of course leading the way in ensuring that glass will one day become a truly South African and African form of generating material culture and heritage.”
- Professor Pfunzo Sidogi, TUT Head of Department of the Fine & Studio Art programme
The results of the dedicated team IYOG2022 are evident in two remarkable exhibitions: Fired Up! (a gathering of South African and African glass artists) and Next Generation (an exhibition that showcased the talents of TUT’s 2022 glass students and alums). A symposium was held at the TUT Faculty of Arts and Design, bringing together artists, academics, and industry professionals to discuss Glass and Its Future in an African Context.
The Fired Up! exhibition was held in September 2022 at the Pretoria Art Museum and showcased sixteen artists. The exhibition included African international artists, namely Anselm
‘Fired Up! is only the beginning of something wonderful. We have initiated a conversation on what is, and what can be art-in-glass, and we continue to focus on the future. Now it is time to pass the torch of knowledge and love of learning, to inspire and create new forms of glass that represent the ideals and fears of the people on this continent. Our strength lies in the myriad of voices harmonised through our love of glass.”
The Next Generation exhibition, also in September 2022, showcased TUT glass students, lecturers, and alums from the Faculty of Arts & Design. The exhibition seamlessly integrated upcoming and
professional glass artists into one cohesive exhibition. It served as a remarkable platform for the next generation of TUT glass studio artists to draw inspiration from and establish connections with past students, fostering new relationships. I observed a surge of revitalised energy within the TUT glass community as new faces joined (including first-year students) and old connections were rekindled. This age diversity demonstrated a promising future for glass art in South Africa. My reflection on the exhibition in the IYOG2022 catalogue was as follows:
“The Next Generation art exhibition was exactly what TUT glass studio needed after the pandemic and being so distant from one another for two years, where we had little contact time with the students in the studio. Teaching glass online was very challenging as we spent so much time designing and planning, but the physical making of glass art was just impossible. Thanks to the IYOG2022, our students were brought closer, and they have rebuilt relationships with other glass artists and industry.”
TUT Head of Department of the Fine & Studio Art programme, Professor Pfunzo Sidogi stated in his opening speech at the Next Generation exhibition:
“For many South African households, a piece of glass is expendable, replaceable, and non-valuable. Other forms of material culture, such as watches, phones, and certain forms of ceramics, hold a much greater social, historical, and heritage value than glass. Glass, outside of its usage in architecture, has not yet transformed conceptually into the realm signifying the middle class in South Africa and Africa generally.”
The statement suggests that in South Africa, glass lacks a form of societal significance. While it is valued in architecture, it has not gained broader recognition as a symbol of middle-class status. This lack of status of glass implies a need for education on glass as an artistic medium to elevate its cultural and historical importance. Professor Sidogi continues to state
in the opening speech:
“Projects such as these exhibitions are of course leading the way in ensuring that glass will one day become a truly South African and African form of generating material culture and heritage.”
Reflecting in 2023 on the achievements of IYOG2022, the committed team at Southern African Glass acknowledged the necessity for ongoing growth beyond local confines. It became evident that Southern African Glass needed to garner international attention, to showcase the evolving landscape of glass artistry in Africa as a whole. Our new aim was to understand Southern Africa’s place within the broader glass community and foster positive change and collaboration across environments.
TUT’s glass studio seized the chance to participate in the Pilchuck International Youth Conference 2023 (IYC2023). I travelled to Washington State with three students, where we encountered a glass culture previously unknown in South Africa, opening doors for invaluable cross-cultural exchange. The conference broadened horizons and opportunities for students to share cultural insights, igniting a passion within them. This inspiration fueled my determination to bring similar exposure to all TUT students back home, leading to the current Southern African Glass project, Glass Safari 2024. TUT glass studio extends their heartfelt gratitude to Raya Friday and the entire Pilchuck team for their support and continued relationship.
Southern African Glass organized the Glass Safari project, in July 2024, with a focus on sustainability and international collaboration. The Glass Safari 2024 aims to forge connections within the global glass art community, with a focus on promoting sustainable studio practices. International artists who use diverse glass mediums will have the unique opportunity to work collaboratively with the next generation of TUT glass students to create artwork that embodies both innovation and sustainability.
A testament to the enduring spirit of Southern African glass—a journey of
growth, innovation, and a commitment to a brighter, more sustainable future—are the seven international artists who are generously devoting their personal time to impart their knowledge and passion for glass as a medium. These artists have selflessly contributed pro bono to the glass community in Southern Africa, showcasing remarkable dedication. The Southern African Glass network is expanding, and sustainable glass practices are being emphasised, highlighting the importance of a forward-looking approach. Special recognition is extended to the following artists, listed in no specific order: Katrina Hude (United States), Mary White (United States), Anselm Croze (Kenya), Emil Kovac (Czech Republic), Claudia Virginia Vitari (Italy), Charlie Manion (United States), and James Devereaux (United Kingdom).
In closing, the story of Southern African Glass is one of resilience, innovation, and a commitment to a brighter, more sustainable future. As we continue to expand our horizons, pushing boundaries and challenging perceptions, let us remember that the true power of glass lies not just in its beauty but in its ability to inspire, unite, and transform. With each new project, each new collaboration, we are writing the next chapter in this remarkable journey— one that promises to leave a lasting legacy for generations to come.
Caitlin Greenberg is a lecturer specialising in glass art and design in the Department of Fine & Studio Arts at the Tshwane University of Technology. She holds a Masters Degree (cum laude) from the same institution. Her research focuses on the metaphors and archetypes of art glass. Her recent art practice explores the glass medium as an expression of the shadow.
MEMBER SPOTLIGHT: NC QIN
As the audience enters the exhibition space for Glass Armour, they first encounter a folding screen obscuring the stage. Behind this thin veneer of rice paper stands the artist—only her silhouette is visible. Piece by piece, she is helped into the glass apparel she has meticulously crafted. Once the final section of glass locks into place over the steel body frame, the spotlight dims, and the screen is folded away, revealing a young Chinese woman straining under the weight of an elaborate glass armour suit.
This glass armour, adorned with intricate bas-relief and sculptural details on every surface, envelops her completely. As she stands motionless on the stage, the audience witnesses the physical toll it takes: her skin flushes and pales where blood circulation has been cut off. The air is thick with heaving breaths, the diaphragm rhythmically contracting and expanding behind a heavy plate of lead crystal.
In her endurance performance Glass Armour, NC Qin’s presence simultaneously
unsettles and consoles the viewer. Those familiar with the struggles of facing invisible battles, enduring heartbreak, yet refusing to or not knowing how to surrender, find solace in her stoic stance. Standing naked and vulnerable under the burden of 80kgs (180 pounds) of cast glass, Qin’s expression remains resolute, exuding an unwavering determination amidst adversity. Yet with every heaving breath, the audience cannot help but wonder: when would be her breaking point? Would she fall? If she does, would the glass break? Would the shards cut into her bare skin?
NC Qin, “Glass Armour: Pride and Shame”, 2021.
I am a Chinese Australian artist dedicated to exploring the intersection of cultures and transnational identities. Glass Armour is an idea that incubated within me for seven years before it was finally realised. Initially inspired by a personal heartbreak, the piece has expanded to explore the complexities of inherited values and their impact on individual struggles. Glass Armour represents pride, ego, and shame, reflecting the intricate dance between cultural heritage and personal identity. The personal heartbreak I refer to occurred during a period of deep depression, where I found myself feeling utterly isolated despite being surrounded by friends and family who would have been more than willing to support me. In my private despair, I slowly recognized that the obstacle preventing me from reaching out to my support network was my personal pride and the fear of ‘losing face’, a common concept in Chinese culture, which refers to a person’s loss of dignity, respect, or social standing due to failure, embarrassment, or perceived weakness in front of others. I did not want to be defined by my weakness. However, as I reflected further, I began to understand pride as not the opposite of shame, but rather the source of it.
Although my experience is personal, I discovered it is also shared by others within my cultural background and influenced by collectivistic cultures. Studies like the Cross-Cultural Study of Anxiety among Chinese and Caucasian American students conducted by researchers Dong Xie and Frederick Leong found that, although Chinese American students reported higher levels of trait anxiety, social avoidance, and distress than their Caucasian counterparts, they were less likely to seek help. In collectivistic cultures that emphasise the importance of being part of a whole and knowing one’s place within it, individuals become hypersensitive to interpersonal relationships, their social standings, and others’ evaluations of them. This inevitably leads to the fear of ‘losing face.’
Traces of the value of pride, and consequently the fear of losing face, are evident in the myths and heroes cherished by Chinese culture. This is exemplified in the bas-relief sculptures of Guan Yu and Zhang Fei on the breastplate of the titular glass armour. These two Shu-Han generals from the Three Kingdoms period (220-
NC Qin, Helmet detalil of Glass Armour: Pride and Shame, 2021. Photo courtesy of the artist.
NC Qin, Chest plate detail of Glass Armour: Pride and Shame, 2021. Photo courtesy of the artist.
280 AD) of China have been deified into Guardian Gods, often depicted on temple doors. Traditionally, they are celebrated for their valour and loyalty. To me, however, they symbolise pride and wrath because of their fatal flaws. I am drawn to the oftenoverlooked aspects of history and seek to subvert these narratives for deeper exploration.
Their downfalls are etched onto the backplate of the glass armour: Guan Yu’s arrogance led him into an ambush, and Zhang Fei, consumed by grief over his sworn brother’s death, became abusive towards his men, inciting a mutiny. These stories resonate with me, highlighting themes of pride and isolation. By wearing their stories on my back, I metaphorically bear the weight of cultural traditions that perhaps overvalue pride. This personal connection underscores the performance and invites reflection on the consequences of unchecked pride within the context of both historical and contemporary experiences.
If the primary function of armour is to protect the body by deflecting or absorbing the impact of projectiles or other weapons, then the use of glass in the design of armour fundamentally undermines this
purpose. The solidness and heaviness of the glass could make the wearer feel protected if it weren’t for the fact that any impact that it absorbs in an act to protect the wearer could also cause it to shatter, harming the wearer. This paradoxical nature of glass armour highlights its inherent dysfunctionality, making it a poignant symbol of the fragile and often selfdestructive nature of pride and perceived invulnerability.
Glass Armour is fundamentally grounded in performance art, with the materiality of glass revealing the performer’s vulnerability. The transparency, fragility, and mutable nature of glass underscore themes of endurance and exposure. Everyday experiences with glass, such as its utility and potential for breakage, create subconscious associations of danger and caution. In Glass Armour, these associations are highlighted as the audience witnesses the performer bearing the weight of a delicate, potentially harmful suit. This tension amplifies the drama, making the audience acutely aware of the stakes involved.
There comes a tipping point in the performance of Glass Armour when the audience becomes acutely aware of the
weight of the armour. As the muscles begin to shake and the eyes start to cloud, the performer’s endurance becomes a central focus. The audience can’t help but wonder: How long can the performer tolerate this burden? What if they collapse? Will the glass armour survive? Will the performer be harmed?
These questions prompt a deeper reflection. Rather than solely focusing on the immediate spectacle, viewers are encouraged to turn these questions inward. What cultural behaviours and traditions have we inherited? Do they still serve us in today’s changed world? What cultural burdens do we unconsciously carry? Glass Armour not only challenges the physical limits of the performer but also invites the audience to examine the unseen weights and legacies that shape their own lives.
Australian artist NC Qin explores the histories of ancient battle artefacts with her primary medium of glass to prompt conversations on heritage and values. Appropriating the symbolism of glass and its associated fragility, risk, and preciousness, she uses this medium as a lens to delve into psychological spaces.
Qin, “Glass Armour: Pride and Shame”, 2021.
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