In the Studio with Rick and Tracey Bewley

ABOVE: The Gossips, wood, metal RIGHT: Tracey and Rick Bewley under their sculpture Slam Dunk in Red Andrews Park, OKC

By Carleigh Foutch

Tell us about yourselves. You’re both mixed media artists—do you have a preferred medium? How did you get your start? Is there a favorite project you’ve worked on together?

RICK: So, we collaborate on everything. If you look at our work, it’s typically just signed ‘Bewley’. We don’t differentiate, normally, between a piece I made or a piece Tracey made. There are exceptions, some of the 12x12 [fundraiser auctions] we enter separately.

TRACEY: It’s almost a little bit of a competition for us. We joke around, try to see who sells for the most money...but that’s an unusual exception.

RICK: Typically, we’re very collaborative, whether it’s the conception of a piece or the actual fabrication; it’s almost always a joint venture. We got started with glass. Tracey has a degree in art [from Oklahoma City University], and I’m an old fabricator/ carpenter/plastic worker, that kind of thing.

And you’re self-taught?

RICK: We are self-taught. We took an intensive course with a glass artist in Minnesota almost 20 years ago and then went from there. We sold a project before we even had glass or a kiln—that was very, uh, intense. We got the money down and then bought all of our supplies and materials, and halfway through we realized there wasn’t enough time for us to finish, ‘cause you know, a piece has to sit in the kiln for a finite time (about 12 to 14 hours), and there’s no adjusting that. So, we had to buy a second kiln that was twice as big as the first one and ended up delivering the last piece still warm. But that’s how we got our start! Shortly after that, the Oklahoma City Community College art festival noticed my brother, who we shared a shop with, laid an article on our table about them looking for artists and we thought, “Hey, let’s do that!”

TRACEY: You asked about our primary medium, and that’s fused glass. Originally, that was kind of entirely what we did. Glass plates, bowls, particularly in the early stages and we were totally enamored of it. We’d come home from work at lunch and rush to peek in the kiln and see how the pieces we’d done the night before were doing. So, yes, primarily fused glass, but particularly over the last few years, as we’ve acquired more equipment and added to our skillset, we’ve made it much more mixed media, including the wood, metal, acrylic, and everything up to our sculptural work and even furniture.

I have a BFA in art, but it was primarily a degree in your basic drawing and painting, which is what I focused on at the time. So, when we first started dating, we wanted to find a medium that we could both learn and work on together, and that was when we ended up being introduced to the fused glass. We thought that would be a fun thing we could bring our different skill sets to and were unfamiliar with, so that it was something we could learn together.

RICK: We also both have manufacturing and commercial backgrounds, which is a skill we’ve been able to bring here [to the studio], since there’s only two of us. And in order to get as much work done as possible, we’ve really embraced technology. We have our own water jet cutter…

TRACEY: Also, our own plasma cutter, sander…[laughs]. They’re all different pieces of equipment we’ve added over time when we’ve wanted to work in other materials and we’ve needed to find another way to have the designs that we draw on the computer and then have the equipment help us finish it out.

The Bewley’s Art Fusion studio, located in OKC.

Tell us a little bit about Art Fusion Studio. How long has it been about? What are you working on now?

RICK: The building itself we bought in 2007, so it’s been about 15 years. We bought it when there was no Plaza District, no midtown—it was just a sketchy neighborhood, which meant we could afford it at the time. So, we were able to buy it at a reasonable price, but we were also stupid artists buying in a sketchy neighborhood…’course now we’re visionaries!

TRACEY: Yeah, you know, the Plaza is just a couple blocks over, within walking distance, and midtown is the same way just in the other direction. So, we literally became sandwiched between two really hot, new districts that didn’t exist when we bought the building. It’s been great.

RICK: We also live upstairs, and we eventually bought the building next door. We’re also getting ready to add on to the back of the place. We’re going to build an additional house. The top will be a loft for rent and the bottom will be excessive garage space that could end up being used for more shop space. It’ll be a completely separate residence.

TRACEY: Yes, we’re still in the very early, preliminary stages with that, but it’s coming! We do a lot of local art here in the studio,

though. Most of our pieces that we sell are commissioned one way or another. We sell a few things through the showroom, but it’s not our primary income. Most people that we deal with are wanting some sort of special, custom commission. We’ve also been applying to a lot of public art projects, so those are probably the ones you see around town.

What is the ultimate goal of having a place where the two of you can collaborate together? How has it shaped you as artists?

TRACEY: We are so pleased with how things have ended up. I can’t imagine working with anyone else. I can’t imagine even doing any of this by myself! And what’s particularly worked for us is with me coming from a more traditional art background of drawing and painting versus his handmade stuff...he’s always built and created and made things out of all kinds of materials. Well, I’d never built anything in my life that wasn’t a pen drawing or painting or something. So those two very different skill sets tend to blend very well.

Say we’ve got a public art project we need to work on. We generally start by having a drink and then start discussing the basic direction we want to go in. Then usually the next step is for me to try and illustrate that concept. I’ll work out the illustration, and we’ll bounce that back and forth and tweak it the way we want it, and then I may need to do some technical drawings for it (you know, in case there’s any specific dimensions or pieces that need to be cut on different equipment, I may start setting those up), but then that’s the point when [Rick] starts getting involved with the production side of things. He may draw some spec pieces of things that need to get built, but then he generally does a good portion of the building and the making of a piece. I may lend a hand on the glass elements, but anything besides that, he’ll be working on it. It really does end up a collaboration throughout the whole process.

What draws you to creating work with such interesting juxtapositions? You play around with light a lot...why does that appeal to the two of you?

RICK: You know, it’s one of those things...

Rick and Tracey Bewely, fused glass & steel sculpture for NBC Bank in Oklahoma City, 9’ x 9’ x 9’

there’s just something about reflections and colors that are transmitted that’s just something that everyone seems to be drawn to. The second surface, “free art”, accidental whatever-you-want-to-call-it is just fun and interesting. Then I think when you have a piece of glass—fragile and breakable—next to a hard piece of metal or granite or concrete, there’s just something about that that’s always appealed to us.

Where do you see your work taking you in the future? What kind of statements do you think you’ll be making?

TRACEY: I don’t see any great changes from what we’re doing now, which is always moving forward and looking for the next fun project to come our way. One of the fun things about working with commissions is that they frequently take you in directions you don’t expect or might not necessarily go on your own. With a customer’s influence saying, “I want this or that,” and I’ve never done that before, it really makes me stop and think, “Well, how would I do that?” Having to figure that out and develop new ways of doing things just through, you know, trying to work out a customer’s concept is what we always look forward to doing. That’s part of the fun of what we do.

Is there anything else you want the Art Focus readers to know?

RICK: I know that whenever we’ve purchased our equipment, part of our justification has been, “Well if somebody ever needed something done, we’d gladly do it for them,” but we’ve never really reached out to anybody. There’s artists out there that might need something engraved or a laser cutter or plasma cutter. At some point I think we’re going to try and reach out and offer up our services of custom cutting.

The Bewley’s get creative with colorful fused glass plates.

TRACEY: Definitely. And we’ve definitely noticed throughout our own career that we might need a sample of something, or just one or two pieces made for an art project. Most people with the equipment we now have are looking to mass produce business, they don’t want to mess with little one-offs or anything. It can be a difficult thing sometimes for an artist to find, someone who’s willing to work with them to make something experimental. So, we’d love for that to be our next new phase, now that we’re talking about getting all of this new equipment, and be able to share that with other artists.

To learn more about Rick and Tracey Bewley and to see their work, visit: artfusionstudio.com n

Carleigh Foutch is a writer and activist living in Oklahoma City. She received her BA in Journalism from the University of Oklahoma and continues to write stories of all kinds in her spare time. To learn more about Carleigh and her work, visit carleighfoutch.weebly.com.