David Graeber: Preserving Nature for Eternity in a Paperweight
Talking Out Your Glass podcast
Early in his career, Paul Stankard used to trade paperweights for gasoline and car servicing with John Graeber. In 1989, through his uncle John, David Graeber wound up casually visiting Stankard’s studio and weeks later was invited to come and work with him. Young Graeber started learning about glass in the deep end of the pool. Thirty-five years later, he continues to work with Stankard about a day a week. Having mastered numerous glassmaking techniques and having developed his own working style and visual aesthetic, in 2009 Graeber started his own art glass...
info_outline
Morgan Peterson: Winner of Blown Away 4
Talking Out Your Glass podcast
Said Blown Away Season 4 winner, Morgan Peterson, “I’m not just the creepy weirdo lurking in the background anymore. I’m right up front.” As champion of Netflix’s 2024 glassblowing competition series, the Seattle-based artist received a whopping cash prize of $100,000, a paid residency in Venice, Italy, with glass legend Adriano Berengo, and a residency at the world-renowned Corning Museum of Glass. Growing up in Boston, MA, Peterson’s watched horror films and Unsolved Mysteries with her Godmother, introducing her to the unnerving and creepy style so associated with her...
info_outline
Clifford Rainey: A Life's Travelogue in Cast Glass
Talking Out Your Glass podcast
Principally a sculptor who employs cast glass and drawing as primary methodologies, Clifford Rainey creates work that is interdisciplinary, incorporating a wide spectrum of materials and processes. A passionate traveler, his work is full of references to the things he has seen and experienced. Celtic mythologies, classical Greek architecture, the blue of the Turkish Aegean, globalization and the iconic American Coca-Cola bottle, the red of the African earth, and the human figure combine with cultural diversity to provide sculptural imagery charged with emotion. A British artist...
info_outline
The State of Stained Glass
Talking Out Your Glass podcast
Enjoy this stained glass panel discussion with top industry professionals and educators Judith Schaechter, Stephen Hartley, Megan McElfresh, and Amy Valuck. Topics addressed include: what is needed in stained glass education; how the massive number of Instagrammers making suncatchers and trinkets affect stained glass; how to promote stained glass in a gallery setting; and how to stay relevant as stained glass artists. The panelists: By single-handedly revolutionizing the craft of stained glass through her unique aesthetic and inventive approach to materials, Judith...
info_outline
Kazuki Takizawa Uses Glass Art to Address Mental Health Issues
Talking Out Your Glass podcast
Kazuki Takizawa’s 2015 installation entitled Breaking the Silence represents the artist’s interpretation of a person’s breaking point and the juxtaposition of balancing inner struggles with oppressive external forces. The installation incorporated performance aspects and sound, where slanted vessels filled with water until submitting to the liquid’s weight, falling over onto a table. Takizawa’s work provided a new perspective for interacting with glass, going beyond form and technique to provoke a deeper level of engagement. Impressed by how humble and open Takizawa was...
info_outline
Jessica Loughlin’s Kiln Formed Glass: An Homage to the Observation of Light
Talking Out Your Glass podcast
Jessica Loughlin’s work is characterized by a strict reductive sensibility and restricted use of color. Fusing kiln formed sheets of opaque and translucent glass together in flat panels or in thin, geometric compositions and vessels, she alludes to shadow, reflection and refraction. Loughlin’s work is influenced by the flat landscapes and salt lakes of South Australia, and the recurring motif of the mirage appears in much of her work. Each piece makes its own poetic statement. “My work investigates space, seeing distance and understanding how wide-open spaces, particularly of the...
info_outline
The Glass Galaxies of Josh Simpson
Talking Out Your Glass podcast
Apollo 8, which launched on December 21, 1968, was the first mission to take humans to the moon and back. While the crew did not land on the moon’s surface, the flight was an important prelude to a lunar landing, testing the flight trajectory and operations getting there and back. Capt. James A Lovell, Apollo 8 astronaut, shared his memories of that historic mission: “Then, looking up I saw it, the Earth, a blue and white ball, just above the lunar horizon, 240,000 miles away…I put my thumb up to the window and completely hid the Earth. Just think, over five billion people,...
info_outline
Wesley Fleming: Flameworking the Realism of the Microcosmos
Talking Out Your Glass podcast
Wesley Fleming brings the fantastic realism of the microcosmos to life in glass. An ambassador for smaller denizens of the earth, his passion for nature sparks awe and curiosity in others. Growing up in the countryside, his favorite pastime was exploring beneath logs and rocks in the woods or reading science fiction and comic books. Hence the natural world and his own imagination became his muse. Says Fleming: “I hope to rekindle awe and curiosity for nature with my fantastic realism. I’ve focused more than two decades honing my flameworking skills and trying to capture the essence of...
info_outline
Robin and Julia Rogers: A Collaboration Resulting in Provocative Glass Sculpture
Talking Out Your Glass podcast
Physically and metaphorically Robin and Julia Rogers put their minds, hearts and hands together to create sculptural works in glass – their chosen material because of its inherent qualities of luminosity, viscosity, and seductive flow. Their inspiration is drawn from the natural world, personal experience, family life, music, psychology, and science. Robin and Julia state: “Complex and mystifying, the human mind drives us, but the subtle inner workings remain, to certain extent, unknown. Delving into the psyche, our work explores the human mind to reveal a metaphorical interior of...
info_outline
Flameworking 2024: Perspectives
Talking Out Your Glass podcast
Talking Out Your Glass podcast kicks off 2024 with our first episode of Season 9! This fascinating panel discussion on flameworking features four of the technique’s most well-known artists: Paul Stankard, Carmen Lozar, Dan Coyle aka coylecondenser and Trina Weintraub. At different points in their careers, these four artists compare and contrast their journeys and experiences working glass behind the torch. Considered a living master in the art of the paperweight, Paul Stankard’s work is represented in more than 75 museums around the world. Over his 52-year...
info_outlineIn a world of technological excess and social turmoil, one longs to return to the simple goodness of the earth and its bounty. Like a trip to the local farmer’s market, Jen Violette’s cornucopia of glass fruits and vegetables renews in the viewer a connection with the ground we walk upon and the faith that we remain part of a plan that makes life on earth sustainable.
A full-time glass and mixed media artist based in Wilmington, Vermont, Violette is known for her colorful, garden inspired glass sculptures that often incorporate metal and wood. Recreating plant structures with molten glass, the artist has mastered the use of glass powders to mimic the colors and textures found in nature. “Since the growing season is relatively short in Vermont, I enjoy gardening with molten glass to extend my growing season.”
A 27-year hot glass veteran, Violette received her BFA in Glass and Metal Sculpture from Alfred University School of Art & Design, Alfred, New York in 1994. She continued her glass art education through courses at The Studio of The Corning Museum of Glass (CMOG), Corning, New York; the Pilchuck Glass School, Stanwood, Washington; the Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, Rhode Island; the Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, Deer Isle, Maine; and Penland School of Crafts, Bakersville, North Carolina. Her mentors and inspirations include hot glass royalty such as Lino Tagliapietra, William Morris, Martin Janecky, Dante Marioni, Richard Marquis, the late Pino Signoretto, Randy Walker, Karen Willenbrink-Johnsen, Jasen Johnsen, Stephen Dee Edwards, Fred Tschida, Walter Lieberman, and Brian Pike.
Violette’s work can be found in private collections worldwide and is represented by a number of fine art glass galleries including Schantz Galleries Contemporary Art in Stockbridge, Massachusetts; Vetri Gallery in Seattle, Washington; Raven Gallery in Aspen, Colorado; Sandra Ainsley Gallery in Toronto, Canada; and Montague Gallery in San Francisco, California. Her work can also be found at Duncan McClellan Gallery in St. Petersburg, Florida, where from October 12–14, 2018, the artist will be featured along with glass artist Claire Kelly in a weekend event including glass demos by both artists.
Currently fabricating larger scale installations and glass sculpturesdirectly mounted to the wall, Violette’s aesthetic now includes forest floor imagery with fall leaves and branches. She moves in and out of the seasons, simultaneously creating a spring inspired installation containing fiddlehead ferns and glass trilliums, as well as an homage to summer with black-eyed Susans and sunflowers, and a wall piece featuring large-scale ferns installed at different angles.
Upon her return from the Glass Art Society conference in Murano, Italy, in May2018, Violette will participate in a Vermont Crafts Council Studio Tour held during Memorial Day weekend. During August 6–11 the artist will teach her first class ever, a Creative Glass Sculpting Techniques workshop, at the CMOG Studio.