Eighteen months ago, I found myself influenced by something I had no control over—a new work environment in the porcelain capital of the world, Jingdezhen, China. The environment led me to develop the experimental project “Lapi Boli”—lapi is the Chinese word for the ceramic throwing technique; boli is glass. It was so exciting, but also so very far out of my comfort zone. Aside from the technical challenge, for me, it is also an emotional challenge to experiment and to give myself the space to walk this new path of becoming an artist/researcher.
10 Innovative Glass Artists on the Challenges and Joys of their Medium
Christine Tarkowski, Copper Pour, 2018. Courtesy of the Corning Museum of Glass.
Glass is a volatile material. Working with it as an artistic medium can involve physical and mental strain, great expense, and a high chance of failure. And yet artists and designers who work with glass can shape it into anything from ethereal vessels to dynamic installations that resemble liquid. Glass is unmatched when it comes to the creative potential it offers.
Dutch artist Krista Israel sees working with glass, at times, as an obsession. “For me, it is not just any material I work with—I live, breathe, and think in glass,” she said. “It gave me a voice to tell my narrative and shape concepts.” Arriving at such a stage of mastery requires finely honed skills and trustworthy collaborators, not to mention a keen understanding of the medium.
“Glass is often used by artists, designers, and makers who don’t have much background in it,” explained Irish artist Karen Donnelan. “I think understanding some of the properties of glass and its history is a good starting point to making great work with the material.” A lack of this understanding, she added, can lead to derivative work.
Ayako Tani, Ghost 3, 2010 . Courtesy of the artist.
Advertisement
But glass artists who focus solely on the medium have often been overlooked in the past. As American artist Deborah Czeresko noted, glass has “been pigeonholed as a craft material.” Only recently, she added, it has caught the attention of the larger art market.
Glass institutions like the Corning Museum of Glass and UrbanGlass have helped make the material accessible to more artists, Czeresko said. The Corning Museum’s show “New Glass Now,” which runs from May 12, 2019, to January 5, 2020, features 100 works by artists working in more than 25 countries who are taking fresh, innovative approaches to the medium. Below, we share the insights of 10 of the participating artists on the greatest challenges and rewards of working with glass, and what it takes to excel with it. (Editor’s note: The artists’ responses have been edited for length and clarity.)
Rui Sasaki
B. 1984, Japan. Lives and works in Kanazawa, Japan.
Rui Sasaki, Liquid Sunshine/I am a Pluviophile, 2018. Courtesy of Yasushi Ichikawa and the Corning Museum of Glass.
Can you tell us a bit about your work?
Liquid/Sunshine/I am a Pluviophile (2018) is inspired by unstable weather in the Hokuriku region, where I live in Japan. There are more than 200 raindrop-shaped glass pieces with phosphorescent material hanging from the ceiling in a darkened room with a motion detector.
What does it take to excel with glass?
I need a lot of practice and have to experiment often to get skills and learn knowledge to know glass enough to fully explore it in my work. There are so many failures in the process. However, I believe that failures and experiments are the only way to break through and to let me achieve what I am most interested in with glass.
What is something you can do with glass that you can’t do with other mediums?
Glass has so many characteristics and phenomena as a material—such as reflection, transparency, fragility, strength, and so on—to work with to make a project. What other mediums have these unique characteristics to work with?
Stine Bidstrup
B. 1982, Denmark. Lives and works in Copenhagen, Denmark.
Stine Bidstrup, Bifurcation, 2017. Courtesy of Corning Museum of Glass.
Stine Bidstrup
ARCHITECTURAL GLASS FANTASIES SERIES – OBJECT NO. 9
Heller Gallery
Sold
Can you tell us a bit about your work?
My work exists at the cross section of sculpture, craft, and installation art; it’s inspired and informed by the history of architecture and design.
My work in “New Glass Now” is based on an interest in patterns of people, infrastructure, architecture, and systems that have grown so large and out of proportion to their original purpose that they lose touch with human reason and understanding.
What is the greatest challenge you face in working with glass?
Glass is far from an easy material to work with, generally speaking, and I tend to make a hard thing harder by developing several complex ways of creating form and pattern and combining them into one work. I use a spectrum of techniques—glassblowing, glass-casting, fusing and stretching, cold-working, gluing, painting, etc.—in my pieces to create dense layers of information and meaning.
What does it take to excel with glass?
In order to be able to develop your own voice with glass, I believe it is important, early on, to be in a learning environment where you are led to question established notions and potential clichés of what glass is in an art and design context.
It takes a very determined willpower to continue working with it for years and stick with for a lifetime. For me, it has to make sense in a conceptual way to keep working with glass, because there are many other materials and mediums that are more approachable. I do it because glass triggers curiosity and an engaged and complex viewing relationship between the objects and the audience.
Inspired by Glass
Caleb Morrison
Lori Hamilton
Adam Savage
Brett Lovelady
Chris Lefteri
We asked designers, engineers, and artists all about glass inspiration. Here, they share their insights about what glass can enable as well as the possibilities it creates for the future. What is it about glass that you find special? Share your thoughts and perspectives with us. Tell us why you are inspired by glass.
Albert Paley
Jamie Hyneman
Thomas Phifer
Brandon Tinianov
Dr. Boh Ruffin
The Ultimate Fan Experience
From sending a tweet during the big game to ordering your favorite stadium treat from your seat, see how Corning is enabling the ultimate fan experience
From sending a tweet to ordering your favorite stadium treat, see how Corning is enabling the ultimate fan experience
Guest Author Series
Glass in the Built Environment
Glass in the Built Environment
What is the significance of glass in the built environment? Explore glass’ limitless architectural potential through the eyes of guest author, James Carpenter of James Carpenter Design Associates, Inc.
What is the significance of glass in the built environment? Explore glass’ limitless architectural potential through the eyes of guest author, James Carpenter of James Carpenter Design Associates, Inc.
Reasons Designers Love Creating with Glass
Reasons Designers Love Creating with Glass
Glass has long been a favorite material category (as there are many forms of glass) for designers for wide range of reasons. Learn some of the reasons Brent Lovelady, designer and chief instigator at ASTRO Studios, chooses glass.
Glass has long been a favorite material category (as there are many forms of glass) for designers for a wide range of reasons. Learn some of the reasons Brent Lovelady, designer and chief instigator at ASTRO Studios, chooses glass.
A Window to the World
A Window to the World
Imagine a glass that changes from transparent to opaque — or even somewhere between the extremes — on demand. A glass that helps decrease your energy bill and bring in just the right amount of natural, comforting light. All of this is possible with dynamic glass for windows from View, Inc.
Imagine a glass that changes from transparent to opaque — or even somewhere between the extremes — on demand. A glass that helps decrease your energy bill and bring in just the right amount of natural, comforting light. All of this is possible with dynamic glass for windows from View, Inc.
Inspiration
This is how Albert Paley feels while working with specialty glass. Albert, an American sculptor who works primarily with metal, has spent more than 40 years creating a prolific body of work that includes large-scale pieces such as the Portal Gates for the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. Currently, he is an artist-in-residence at the Corning Museum of Glass (CMoG), where he is integrating two specific types of Corning Incorporated glass into his metal work.
“Specialty glass opens up another dimension I have never explored,” he says.
For more than 15 years, Albert has incorporated glass and metal in a body of sculpture; however, this residency experience is different. Often, when metal and glass are joined, he says, the metal holds a vessel-shaped piece of glass, explaining that in such works, “glass is a secondary material.”
“I’ve always tried deliberately not to create a hierarchy,” he explains. “Instead, I aim for a synergy, where one material expresses the other.”
Albert is using this approach in the CMoG residency, but with an added benefit: With specialty glass, he can place the metal inside the glass.
“Physically embedding metal into glass creates a whole additional dialogue of transparency, optics, and reflection,” he says.
Albert is the first artist selected in this inaugural program — a collaboration between CMoG and Corning — that will support artists in adapting specialty glass materials for the creation of new work.
“The process in the early stages of scientific exploration is very similar to the aesthetic process an artist uses,” says Glen Cook, a Corning senior research associate, who will become the chief scientist at CMoG in January. “Both make careful observations and try new experiments before they reach the synthesis stage.”
Corning, which has developed and patented more than 150 specialty glass formulations, will provide the resident artist with access to specialty glass and staff with technical expertise in glass formulation.
“We are dedicated to innovation and experimentation with glass, and have a long history of collaborating with artists,” said David Morse, executive vice president and chief technology officer of Corning. “We look forward to continuing this tradition and are eager to see how artists will use these specialty materials, and perhaps even add to our understanding of their capabilities and adaptability.”
CMoG will provide access to its extensive resources, including glassmaking facilities and library collection. Resident artists will work closely with the Museum’s glassmakers, curators, and other staff to better understand the historical and artistic contexts of glass.
“Albert is an ideal artist to inaugurate the residency because of his focus on material and form,” says Karol Wight, executive director of CMoG.
Most of Albert’s metal forms deal with complexity. Whether it’s a geometric form next to an organic one, or a hollow form next to a linear one, he regularly deals with contrast, he explains. That’s one reason he feels comfortable integrating glass with metal. Another reason is that while the two materials are different, their forms are both derived from heat.
Albert will primarily use a borosilicate glass that was engineered to bond tightly to a metal alloy. He also will investigate high-purity fused silica, which can be shaped and joined with a torch, similar to the way Paley works with metal.
