Breaking the Glass Ceiling: Women in Glass by Wayne Art Center

breaking the glass ceiling women in glass

ARTIST STATEMENT BOOK presented by

Wayne Art Center DECEMBER 8, 2017 - JANUARY 27, 2018

breaking the glass ceiling women in glass

December 8, 2017 - January 27, 2018 Wayne Art Center Executive Director Nancy Campbell Wayne Art Center Director of Special Projects

Karen Louise Fay

Wayne Art Center Graphic Designer Abby Ober Breaking the Glass Ceiling: Women in Glass Curator: Dr. Arlene Silvers National Library Museum in Philadelphia Cover Art: Anna Boothe, Sure-footing

Breaking the Glass Ceiling: Women in Glass Curator: Dr. Arlene Silvers

Curator of Contemporary Glass National Library Museum in Philadelphia

Artists:

Micaela Amateau Amato, PA Jen Blazina, PA Anna Boothe, PA Mary Van Cline, WA Pearl Dick, IL Robin Grebe, MA Anja Isphording, Vancouver BC Laura Kramer, RI Carmen Lozar, IL Lucy Lyon, NM Flora Mace & Joey Kirkpatrick, WA Elizabeth R. Mears, VA Carol Milne, WA Janis Miltenberger, WA Kari Russell-Pool, OH Marlene Rose, FL Tommie Rush, TN Mary Shaffer, NM Stephanie Trenchard, WI Karla Trinkley, PA Toots Zynsky, RI

Micaela Amateau Boalsburg, PA

Gioia Cast pâte de verre glass. 11’ X 10” x 9” $16,000

I am first generation American, and my cast glass portrait heads and figures have hybrid ethnic and racial physiognomies that mirror my heritage from the ancient Iberian, Mediterranean, North African and Middle Eastern worlds. Portraits of both my ancestors and heroes attempt to bridge the tragic cultural divide between national identities of immigrants, ‘people of color,’ and ‘white people’ — the ‘us’ vs. ‘them’ tribal mentality that too often ends in violence. For this exhibition I have chosen sculptures of three of my heroes, all symbolically green cast glass: The Young Eleanor Roosevelt (who I met in early 1950s and drew portraits of when I was 8, 9, 10 years old); Dona Gracia Nasi (16th century “Sephardic heroine who defied kings and Inquisitional edits across Europe”); and ibn Sina, the renowned 10th century Persian physician, philosopher, scientist, whose texts for five centuries were the basis of European and Arabic medicine combining Galen with Aristotelian metaphysics and Persian and Arab lore). Over the decades I have also made cross-disciplinary works, where paintings are simultaneously sculpture and photography using neon text and form. These composite works are intended to protest a singular perspective, a tyranny of so called ‘purity,’ by emphasizing hybrid voices and cross cultural sensibilities that are America.

Jen Blazina Philadelphia, PA

Home Cast glass, screenprint. 13” x 12.5” x 2” $3,000

Jen Blazina resides and has a studio in Philadelphia where she is a working artist exhibiting with solo and group exhibitions nationally and internationally. Blazina has been awarded numerous residencies including: Bezalel Art and Design Academy in Jerusalem, Israel; Corning Artist in Residency in Corning, New York; European Ceramic Work Centre in Tilburg, Netherlands; Djerassi Resident Artists Program in Woodside, CA; Frans Masserel Centre in Kasterlee, Belgium; Creative Glass Center of America in Millville, NJ. Among her awarded grants are: Leeway Foundation Grant; Independence Foundation Grant; a NEA grant supported by the Women’s Studio Workshop in Rosendale, NY. Her work is in the collections of various private collections and museums internationally, including the California Community Foundation; the Toledo Museum of Art; Corning Museum of Glass; Neuberger Museum of Art; Museum of American Glass; Cranbrook Museum of Art to name a few. Jen Blazina received her MFA in printmaking from Cranbrook Academy of Art, her BA from Sarah Lawrence College in New York and her BFA, cum laude, from the State University of New York at Purchase College. She is currently a Professor of Fine Arts at Drexel University.

Anna Boothe Zieglerville, PA

Sentience Lost-wax, kiln cast and assembled lead crystal. 14.5” x 4” $4,500

Anna Boothe, a glass artist with 30+ years experience, has exhibited her pâte de verre and cast lead crystal sculpture and decorative works worldwide and is included in numerous public and private collections, including the Corning Museum of Glass and the Tacoma Museum of Art. She holds degrees in Sculpture and Glass from Rhode Island School of Design and Tyler School of Art, where she taught in the school’s glass program for 16 years. She later helped develop and chaired Salem Community College’s (New Jersey) Glass Art Degree Program, where she also chaired the school’s International Flameworking Conference. In addition to having been a visiting artist at many US universities and schools in Belgium, Canada, Israel, Japan, Switzerland and Turkey, Anna has taught at Pilchuck School of Glass, the Studio of the Corning Museum of Glass and Urban Glass. In the summer of 2017, she and NYC area sculptor Nancy Cohen exhibited “Between Seeing and Knowing,” their 46’ long, 300- element glass installation at the Philadelphia Art Alliance. It will be featured again in 2018 at the Philadelphia International Airport. Anna’s work received the Cohn Family Award - Best in Glass at the Philadelphia Museum of Art Craft Show in 2015 and the American Craft Council’s Award of Excellence in Baltimore in 2016. A former Glass Art Society President and Board member, Anna also served as Director of Glass at Philadelphia’s National Liberty Museum.

Pearl Dick Chicago, IL

Heads Blown glass. Ranging form 8” - 18” $1,100 - 1,650 each

Inspired by what connects us, Pearl is on a lifelong quest to create art that speaks to our unity, harmony, discord, similarities and differences. She seeks to capture and illuminate our human interactions – real, imagined, or perceived. This study has nurtured her exceptional ability to connect people with the captivating and challenging medium of glass; she takes great joy in facilitating those learning relationships. Pearl believes in the power of the glass arts to heal, spread joy, empower and connect.

Robin Grebe South Chatham, MA

The Gardener Cast and slumped glass, mixed materials. *This piece is only representative of artist’s work.

With a BFA in Ceramics from the Mass College of Art and an MFA in Ceramics/ Glass from the Tyler School of Art, Massachusetts, artist Robin Grebe uses cast glass, ceramic glazes and transparent enamels to create monolithic, haunting human forms. These works typically contain a transparent inner cavity, cast within an outer torso, containing metaphorical imagery. Originally inspired by Greek Cycladic Fertility Goddesses, Grebe’s sculptures seem both fragile and strong. To her, they illustrate the paradoxes of human life. Grebe’s work is enjoying sold-out shows in numerous galleries throughout the United Staes, and can be found in many private and public collections worldwide, including the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Taft Museum of Art in Cincinatti, the Corning Museum of Glass, and the Hokkaido Museum of Modern Art in Tokyo.

Anja Isphording Vancouver BC

#144 Kiln cast glass. 7” x 21” 8.5” $15,000

All my works are kiln cast in the lost wax technique, which is a very time consuming process. First I build a positive model out of wax; every little piece is formed by hand and then put together to eventually create the envisioned piece. A plaster silica mold is poured around the model, the wax steamed out - and therefore “lost” - and the mold placed in the kiln. The firing and the subsequent annealing often take up to three weeks, after which I dig the piece carefully out, clean it, cut and polish it. If I want to add details, all casting and annealing steps have to be repeated. This very slow growing process suits the organic character of my works. Out of a very little piece of wax the work grows a little every day until it’s whole and mature. Working with this technique provides me with the necessary time to make the right decisions about form, colour and appearance .

Laura Kramer Barrington, RI

Crystal Bowl Blown glass, cane, mirrored. 20” x 7” x 15” $4,760

Artist and designer Laura Kramer holds BFA and MFA degrees from the Rhode Island School of Design and Ohio State University, as well as an MA in Anthropologie & Material Culture from Columbia University, where she also studied archealogy. She has worked on excavations in the Dutch Antilles, cast bronze at Paolo Solari’s Arcosanti, has been an artist-in-residence at Kitengala Glass in Kenya, and worked with Danish glassblower Tobias Mohl. Her objects bring together art and nature. Like barnacles on a boat hull or paper wasp nests, they mimic and question the hybridity of made and natural materials. They seem to defy accepted systems of classification contained in a cabinet of curiosity and explore the liminal. Kramer’s pieces and installations have been featured in Elle Décor, New York Times Magazine’s Home Issue, InStyle, Architectural Digest, as well as American Craft Magazine.

Carmen Lozar Normal, IL

Blue Striped Set Materials. Techniques. 8” x 12” x 3” $5,000

Born in 1975, Carmen Lozar lives in Bloomington-Normal, Illinois where she maintains a studio and is a member of the art faculty at Illinois Wesleyan University. Carmen has taught at Pilchuck Glass School, Penland School of Craft, Pittsburgh Glass School, Appalachian Center for Crafts, The Chrysler Museum, and the Glass Furnace in Istanbul, Turkey. She has had residencies at the Corning Museum of Glass and Penland School of Craft. Her work is included in many collections, including the Bergstrom Mahler Museum in Wisconsin and the Museum of Art and Design in New York. Carmen Lozar was the 2008 keynote speaker and demonstrator at the International Flameworking Conference in Salem, New Jersey. In fall of 2016, Carmen traveled to New Zealand to present at the New Zealand Society of Artists in Glass conference. “The sculpture I create with glass is meant to inspire and provoke imagination. Telling stories has always been my primary objective. Some narratives are sad, funny, or thoughtful; but my pieces are always about celebrating life.”

Lucy Lyon Santa Fe, NM

Blue Cast glass. 17”x 13.38” x 10.5” $35,000

I have always felt that, even though we are all meeting up with each other and interacting in twos or threes or crowds, each of us is essentially alone. That brings up a bit of melancholy but it also makes the individual unique and therefore very important. I started working in glass simply because it is a very seductive material. I have chosen to focus on sculpting figures. What interests me most is trying to convey the intellectual and emotional state of the individuals in my pieces, relying on subtle gestures, a turn of the head or twist of the hips, to express the figure’s state of mind. The setting or environment for these figures has been pared down to simple geometric forms. Refining the figure has absorbed much of my time. Throughout the years, I have tackled the technical challenges of increasingly larger work. The increased scale allows for more nuance of expression in each sculpture. Recently I began casting in metal. The contrast between the metal and glass has been an exciting new adventure. But I believe that I will always revere glass with a sense of wonder. It holds the light, like the soul.

Flora Mace & Joey Kirkpatrick Tacoma, WA

Fruit Bowl Blown glass on wood bowl. 14” x 29” $20,000

Joey Kirkpatrick and Flora C. Mace have worked collaboratively for the past 37 years after meeting at the Pilchuck Glass School in 1979. They have created a diverse body of work that includes both blown glass vessels with applied imagery and sculpture fabricated with wood, glass and other mixed media. The artists, respected for their innovative work, have recently concluded the series for which they are most known: large scale blown glass fruit and vegetable forms. They continue work on lifesize figurative wood and glass sculptures as well as outdoor bronze installations. Their newest glass work includes blown vessels and cast panels with illustrations of the ‘first facts’ of bird identification realized through applied glass powder drawings. They are also developing a series of blown vessels combining applied word with image, the subject organized by the alphabet. Joey (born in Des Moines, Iowa, 1952) and Flora (born in Exeter, New Hampshire, 1949) have exhibited, lectured and taught extensively throughout the world. They taught for 12 years at Pilchuck Glass School. Their collaborative work is included in collections and museums around the world including the Corning Museum of Glass, New York; The Detroit Institute of Art Detroit, Michigan; The Boston Museum of Fine Art, Massachusetts; Hokkaido Museum, Japan; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Musée des Arts Decoratifs, Lausanne, Switzerland; Seattle Art Museum, Washington; Toledo Art Museum, Ohio; The National Museum of American Art, Renwick Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. Kirkpatrick/Mace were elected to the American Craft Fellows in 2005, interviewed for the Smithsonian Archives of American Art in 2006 and given the 2001 Chateau Ste. MIchelle Libensky Award by Pilchuck Glass School honoring outstanding contemporary artists working in glass. Kirkpatrick served as a trustee

Elizabeth R. Mears Riner, VA

Open Book: Molecules Only Flameworked, fused and sandblasted glass, carved wood, painted, original poetry. 36” x 156” x 4” $12,500

Elizabeth Ryland Mears is a full time, award-winning, studio artist. She creates works in glass and mixed media using primarily the glassblowing technique of flamework. After a successful career in flat glass and teaching those techniques in such places as the Smithsonian Institution and the Building Museum in Washington, D.C., Mears began flameworking in the early 1990s. She intensively studied that glass technique at Penland School of Crafts, Pilchuck Glass School and The Studio of The Corning Museum of Glass. She was a scholarship student at the latter two and has now taught at many of the venues (where she was a student), as well as others. Her book, FLAMEWORKING: Creating Glass Beads, Sculptures & Functional Objects, was published in April 2003. Mears’ creations are represented by galleries throughout the nation and are included in numerous private, corporate and museum collections.

Carol Milne Seattle, WA

Wiggle Room Knitted wax, lost-wax cast glass. 14” x 10” x 10” $6,100

Carol Milne received a degree in Landscape Architecture from the University of Guelph, Canada, in 1985, but realized in her senior year that she was more interested in sculpture than landscape. Her senior thesis, “Landscape as Art/Art as Landscape,” drew her into the realm of sculpture and the dye was cast. She attended two years of graduate school in sculpture at the University of Iowa, and has been working as a sculptor ever since. In 2000 Carol took her first glass class at Pratt Fine Arts Center. She began kiln casting in 2002, and in 2006 became the lone pioneer in the field of knitted glass. Pushing the limits of glass through persistent and relentless experimentation, she developed a variation of the lost wax casting process to cast knitted work in glass. She now travels worldwide to teach workshops. The most exotic places her art has taken her are Istanbul, New Zealand and Tasmania, but she also teaches extensively in the U.S., and will teach at The Studio at the Corning Museum of Glass in the summer of 2018. Carol exhibits her work extensively throughout the United States, and in May 2017 had her first European solo show at Schiepers Gallery in Belgium. Her work is included in collections of the Notojima Glass Art Museum in Ishikawa, Japan, The Asheville Art Museum in Asheville, North Carolina, the Kamm Teapot Foundation in North Carolina, and the Glasmuseum Lette in Coesfeld, Germany. Recent honors include two Honorable Mentions at Cheongju International Craft, Korea; Silver Prize, International Exhibition of Glass Kanazawa, Japan.

Janis Miltenberger Lopez Island, WA

Sweet Redemption Lampworked glass, gold luster, oil paint. 29” x 18” x 16” $18,000

I began working with hot glass in 1978. Initially apprenticing with Richard Marquis at Marquis Deluxe Studio, Berkeley California. I had been taking Ceramics classes at Laney College in Oakland, California, studying with Nancy Selvin. While working with Dick, I also continued my clay work. About a year into working with Dick I enrolled and concurrently studied with Marvin Lipofsky at California College of Arts and Crafts, Nancy Selvin (ceramics) at Laney College and Ron Nagel (ceramics) at Mills College, California - all while working part time at Dick’s shop. Several years later I had the opportunity to explore lampworking at Pilchuck Glass School in Washington state. Over the course of three summers at Pilchuck, I had the privilege of studying with; Susan Plum, who introduced me to working with Borosilicate glass, James Minson, who has an innate knowledge of the medium, and Cesare Toffolo Rossit. I think it was Cesare who resonated with my own style, using the hot glass tools which were already familiar to me. These summers became a pivotal turning point in my relationship with glass. Working at the torch has allowed me to feel more autonomous than working with a team of people at a glass furnace. The solitude of torch work provides me space to focus. Working alone has helped me define my voice and recognize what it is I want to narrate and share.

Kari Russell-Pool Shaker Heights, OH

Ivory and Red Tacoma Series Flameworked and blown glass. 15” x 11.5” $4,800

I graduated from the Cleveland Institute of Art in 1990. After a 19 year tenure in Connecticut, we have moved back to Cleveland, Ohio, where I share a studio, two daughters, and a dog with my husband (and occasional collaborator) Marc Petrovic. Primarily a flame worker, I approach my work in a painterly fashion. Pulling my own cane and coloring it with glass powders allows for crossover between the hot shop and the torch. I am fascinated by the magic of objects. From quilts and teapots to sailor’s valentines, I am interested in the transformation of an object into an heirloom. Filled with personal content and commentary about society, the hard work of relationships and my experience as a mom, my work tells many stories. I celebrate the metaphor found in ordinary objects, and my work often takes visual shape by building form from pattern. Although color has always been central to my work, I am currently exploring the definition of space through line alone. I have taught numerous workshops and classes, both in the United States and abroad. My work can be seen in many private and public collections, most notably the Charlotte Mint Museum of Craft and Design, the Cincinnati Museum of Art, the Corning Museum of Glass, the Racine Art Museum, the Seattle Museum of Art, the Smithsonian Museum of American Art and the Tacoma Museum of Glass.

Marlene Rose Clearwater, FL

Bearded Boy Sand cast glass, steel. 20â&#x20AC;? x 7â&#x20AC;? x 5â&#x20AC;? $6,500

Marlene Rose is an internationally-known, award-winning sculptor who produces stunningly beautiful works of art in her chosen medium, sand-cast glass. Seen in museums and galleries across the U.S. and Europe, her works are sought by glass connoisseurs, fine art collectors and Hollywood A-list celebrities. Each piece is hand cast from molten glass into a unique, modern work of art that resonates with references and allusions to ancient cultures and civilizations. ABOUT THE PROCESS... While the process Rose uses is relatively new, having been developed in the mideighties, it is based on the thousands-year-old tradition of bronze casting. Rose pours liquid molten glass into carefully prepared sand molds, then cools it for six days or more in a specially controlled oven before cracking open the mold to see what is revealed. There is a rawness and immediacy to working the sand of the mold, and the thrill and the danger of pouring this magical lava, thousands of degrees hot. There is the patient gestation of the work in the cooling oven. Then, at last, there is the joy of meeting the product of sand, glass, fire and thought as the piece is finally brought out into the light. Marlene Rose quite simply breathes life and beauty to whatever she makes.

Tommie Rush Knoxville, TN

Tulip Vase Blown glass, bit work, acid-etched. 19” x 10” x 9.5” $6,500

Tommie Rush, a native of Mobile, Alabama, is a glass artist who lives and maintains a studio, Tomco Inc., in Knoxville, Tennessee. She began her early studies in ceramics which ultimately lead her to working in glass. By 1980, Tommie Rush began to share a studio space with renowned artist Richard Jolley, whom she married several years later. Through tireless experimentation and the development of custom-blended glass mixed in the studio, Tommie Rush has created a unique and identifiable style, which has been celebrated in over 75 exhibitions and honored in a retrospective exhibition at the Mobile Museum of Art. Her work can be found in numerous private and museum collections throughout the United States including the Sheldon Art Museum and Sculpture Garden in Lincoln, Nebraska, the Renwick Gallery in Washington D.C., the Tennessee State Museum, Nashville, Tennessee, among others. Most recently Tommie Rush completed a glass and welded steel, site-specific commission for the headquarters of Scripps Networks in Knoxville, Tennessee. As a tireless supporter of the arts, Tommie Rush has served on several national boards, including the Glass Art Society in Seattle, Penland School of Craft in Asheville, North Carolina, and the American Craft Council in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She is very active with her local arts community.

Mary Shaffer El Prado, NM

Greg Threads Slumped glass mixed with bronze. 24” x 24” x 10” $18,500

A founding artist of the American Studio Glass Movement, Mary Shaffer is celebrated for her pioneering work with glass, which she has been crafting into small, individual objects, mixed-media sculptures, immersive installations and public projects since the early 1970s. “The reason I like glass is its responsiveness to heat, its responsiveness to gravity, one of the strongest forces in the universe,” she explains. Early in her career, she capitalized upon gravity to develop an innovative method for shaping glass, which she calls “midair slumping.” By holding the molten-hot glass aloft and subjecting it to gravitational pull, she creates undulating, flowing forms. These appear as sheets, waves, lapping tongues, and oozing, liquid masses, which Shaffer often combines with cast bronze, found tools, stone, light, fiber optics, sound and fire—the element in which her pieces were forged.

Stephanie Trenchard Sturgeon Bay, WI

Pioneers of Russia, Women Artists from the Twentieth Century Sand cast glass with includsions. 15” x 13.5” x 3.5” $9,000

In her cast glass sculptures, Trenchard enlists collective imagery, rendered in sculpted and painted glass that is encased within solid glass, to tell stories. The subject she most often utilizes is that of material culture and by association, biography as it relates to the feminine experience in the arts. She has created her own language of imagery and symbols that become totems, reappearing in many pieces to reveal a vernacular particular to the narrative. Her process is to sculpt and paint objects in glass that tell illusory narratives. The sculpted pieces are encased in sand cast glass forms. The cast pieces are assembled in different sections, often stacked or nestled together and, on occasion, can be reconfigured. A successful work is technically sound, as well as lyrical, in the combining of images. Trenchard holds a BFA in painting from Illinois State University. Her work is in many public collections such as the Museum of Wisconsin Art and the Alverno College. She has had a solo show at the Benedict F. and Dorothy J. Gorecki Gallery at St. Benedict College, Saint Joseph, Minnesotam, and the Mesa Art Center. She has been included in numerous group shows nationally. She has won awards and is in many prestigious collections. In addition to teaching in her studio, she has taught at Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam, Bangkok Glass in Thailand, Pratt Fine Art Center, University of Wisconsin and others.

Karla Trinkley Boyertown, PA

Pod Materials. Techniques. Dimensions $15,000

Pennsylvania-based artist Karla Trinkley is best-known for her unique approach to glass through use of the pâte de verre, (“cast glass” or, literally, “glass paste”) technique. In this process, glass is coarsely ground, placed in a mold, and then heated until the particles fuse. She first became fascinated with the process while a student at the Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia in the 1970s. During this time, Trinkley began to experiment with the connections between the mediums of glass and porcelain. The pâte de verre method allowed her to create a new object that appears deteriorating, aged and even ancient.

Mary Van Cline Olympia, WA

Inochi 19 Cast coral and jade pâte de verre glass. 39” X 8” X 8” $12,500

For Mary Van Cline, time is the riddle of human existence. It pushes one forward and leaves one behind. It exists beyond clocks, but humanity is constantly trying to measure it. Its boundaries can drive one to despai. Its passage can heal. For Van Cline, time has done both; and she has chronicled the changes through her work. From her earliest work to her latest installations, her sculptures depict man’s wish to find a way to another time plane. Like good literature, Van Cline’s work is rich in symbols that work on many levels. Ladders, sundials, hourglasses, flasks, arrows, clocks - all showing movement for Van Cline - evoke broader meanings: escape, movement between levels, transformation over time, transcendence out of the moment. But Van Cline’s work is more than narrative. It invites us to find our own balance within the piece, both visually and spiritually. The architectural aspects – a house shape, a window, a chair – give us a familiar point of departure; however, we are quickly asked to accept the work on a metaphysical, rather than a literal, level. The figures interact with one another but appear not to be in the same space. Some are active, some contemplative. Overall there is a sense of serenity, a sense of time for healing and wholeness.

Toots Zynsky Providence, RI

Sea Fire (from the Tierra del Fuego Series) Filet de verre glass. 14 “ x 25” x 20.5” NFS

Toots Zynsky is known for her distinctive “filet de verre” technique that fuses threads of glass to achieve unmatched explorations of color. While completing her BFA at the Rhode Island School of Design, Zynsky helped found the Pilchuck Glass School, which ultimately made studio glass a mainstream phenomenon. Although her work is constantly evolving, Zynsky consistently experiments with color and form; in her early vessels, Zynsky fused glass with barbed wire and later, nets of glass with blown forms. Through the invention of her “filet de verre” technique Zynsky began melding layers of glass threads inside a kiln to achieve unique manipulations of color—a process that involved teams of people pulling thread. The process was later simplified by her co-invention of a thread-pulling machine, which uses electronic software to create glass thread in a manner comparable to glass optical fiber.

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