FUSE Glass Prize

Words by Margot Osborne Margot is an independent arts writer and curator.

In its second iteration, JamFactory’s biennial Fuse Glass Prize captured a moment of counterpoint in contemporary Australian glass. On the one hand, there were extrovert Venetian-inspired tendencies, with blown and hot-worked glass, characterised by dazzling transparent and translucent colour, complex pattern and intricate embellishments. On the other, there were introspective tendencies, revealed in quiet, understated forms, muted monochromatic tones, elusive imagery and subtle play with ephemeral effects of light and shadow.

Various female glass artists in FUSE, most notably Jessica Loughlin, Kate Baker and Mel Douglas, encapsulated these latter tendencies, taking the medium in new directions centred around poetic realisation in glass of experiential states of being-in-theworld. Loughlin, who on May 18 was awarded the 2018 Fuse Glass Prize of $20,000 has been at the vanguard of innovation in this field, not only within Australia but in the international arena.

Over a number of years she created an evolving body of wall panels in an infinitely subtle tonal spectrum of greys and whites, alluding to her cerebral responses to the expansive landscapes of Australia’s interior. In her recent work she has moved into new but related territory, shifting from wall panels to free-standing fused glass forms, which may be viewed as a refinement of her interest in abstract distillations of space and light. Loughlin’s winning work in FUSE, receptor of light V, 2018 responds to shifts in ambient light throughout the day as the sculpture’s opaline crystals capture light, holding the yellow and reflecting the blue in a gradually shifting aura of warm light. This small work exerts a quietly powerful presence amidst the clamour of colour within the exhibition.

Sydney artist Kate Baker’s standing floor work, Within Matter #2, 2018 is imbued with a darkly enigmatic poetry. Applied to the surface of a large sheet of glass, angled away from the viewer and supported by a metal stand, there is a blurred, translucent image of a man in the act of turning away from the viewer’s gaze. While Baker’s moody

“Fuse goes from strength to strength and will hopefully become a biennial fixture in JamFactory’s calendar.”

urban noir image is in many ways a contrast to Loughlin’s sculpture of light and space, both artists are re-occupied with poetic meditations on perpetual flux and fugitive moments of perception.

Holly Grace uses shadows and light to great effect in her suite of three glass billy cans, Gulf hut – the story of Jimmy Gavel, 2018. Her imagery, skilfully applied to the glass surface of the blown glass in layers of enamel and decals, alludes to the ‘fable of Jimmy Gavel’. It is problematic that we are reliant on the accompanying label for a narrative to make sense of the images on the glass. The fashion, especially amongst young art school graduates, for using text to explain the artist’s intentions rather than working out how to embody meaning in artwork, is an unfortunate tendency from my perspective.

Amongst those artists whose work draws out the optical allure of hotworked coloured glass, Brendan Scott French stands out for his impressive nine-panel wall piece Lake’s edge, in murrine, 2018 which pays 21st century homage in glass to a painterly post-impressionist interpretation of landscape. Using myriad slivers of fused coloured glass tiles, he has composed complex colour shifts and rhythmic patterns that allude to the seen, and unseen, dimensions of landscape. In his single panel entry on a similar theme for FUSE in 2016 he left the surface roughly textured, but in Lake’s edge he has ground the surface to a smooth finish to create a more effective illusion of shimmering colour.

Tom Moore must be unique amongst Australian glass artists for his fascination with taking glass into a performative dimension. For FUSE this year he created a wondrous globular puffer fish, Vitreous interface, embellished with twisted filligrana patterns and protrusions. Open at the bottom, the sculpture allows the artist’s head to be inserted so that the transparent glass fish may be worn as a spectacular surrealist helmet. If the originality of his contribution to FUSE is any guide, Liam Fleming (who has only just transitioned from the emerging to established category) is an artist to watch. Blow horn #3 is a small tower of four coloured cylinders, reminiscent of children’s plastic building cups, topped with a precariously slender stem of black glass, on which sit first an opaque black sphere, and finally at the apex, a shining crystalline egg filled with impossibly perfect tiny bubbles that glow with light. Liam adroitly balanced humour and skill in a piece that appeals to the undiluted pleasures of looking.

In the Emerging Artist Category, Ursula Halpin was a clear winner for the originality and fragile beauty of her suspended pate de verre installation, Náire orthu, 2017. Hannah Gason’s panoramic wall-panel, Getting to know you, 2017 an abstract composition of translucent and opaque glass, would benefit from back-lighting to accentuate her rather lovely sense of the interaction of line, colour and light. In this respect, Thomas Pearson’s transparent blown forms, Clepsammia, 2018, filled with glistening crystals in a playful riff on the old-fashioned egg-timer, were a joyful celebration of colour and light.

In summary, although it is not possible to mention each of the finalist here, overall there was not a weak work to be seen. Taking into account the few quibbles noted above, FUSE goes from strength to strength and will hopefully become a biennial fixture in JamFactory’s calendar.

Previous page: Left: 2018 FUSE Glass Prize Winner (Established Artist Category) Jessica Loughlin, receptor of light V, 2018. Photographer: Rachel Harris. Top right: Kate Baker, Within Matter #2, 2018. Photographer: The artist. Bottom right: Thomas Pearson, Clepsammia, 2018. Photographer Pippy Mount.

Right: 2018 FUSE Glass Prize (Emerging Artist Category) Ursula Halpin, Naire orthu, 2017. Photographer: Grant Hancock.