handmade glasshandmade glass

zoë dove-many

zoe dove-many

3 methods

handmade glass

02 the studio01introduction

00contents

03methods 04history

Glass is very firm, yet easily breakable. It appears to be halted in time. All of its visual cues lead us to believe it is liquid; it has bubbles and streams and flowing lines within it. However, it is cold and hard to the touch. It is self-contained.

Its mystery lies in its paradox: flowing yet frozen, its intricacies gorgeous, yet created by happenstance in a few seconds. It glows and shimmers when the slightest amount of light is cast upon it. Even a small paperweight

is full of millions of twists and turns, reactions, and evidence of movement left by the formerly alive, white hot material. In a way, handmade glass objects are like fossils or photographs, immortalizing exactly what ocurred at one moment.

In each piece can be found miniature lanscapes, every bit as complex and beautiful as the world around us. The following pages will inspire and answer questions about how to look at glass and how it is made.

01introduction

7 methods

All of its visual cues lead us to believe it is liquid

looking into glass

ornament, St. Louis, Missouri

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a landscapeone can find

sand, Wellington, New Zealand

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in a glass ball

ornament, St. Louis, Missouri

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the arctic circle

ice floes, Nunavit, near arctic circle

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in a quiet object

paperweight, St. Louis, Missouri

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lava

volcano, Piton de la Fournaise, Island of Reunion, France

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in something a person made

ornament, St. Louis, Missouri

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something the earth made

amethyst, Bethlehem, Pennsyltvania

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a range of colors

glass ornament, St. Louis, Missouri

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gives way to

Sierra Madre Oriental Mountain Range, Coahuila, Mexico

a range of mountains

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in a hard object

glass ornament, St. Louis, Missouri

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in a hard object water

swimming pool, Tel Aviv, Israel

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Each of these objects appeared on the preceding pages.

glass objectsin

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fruits of careful labor

21 introduction

02 the studio sharp

hot explosivefast-moving

In a glass studio, extremely hot materials are in constant motion. Glass must be heated to 2700 degrees Fehrenheit to become malleable, and then kept continually rotated on a blowpipe so as not to break its shape.

Workers in a studio are always aware of their space and who is around them. They move in an almost choreographed way, keeping in the back of their minds which spaces they can move freely in and which spaces to be cautious in.

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choreography in the studio

the studio25

Harvey Littleton

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When working with glass, temperature is the most critical variable. When glass is hot, it moves. When glass is cold, it becomes rigid. Most of the studio tools are designed to cope with the temperature of the glass to better manipulate it.

glass furnacemarverpipe cooler

parts of the studio

Raw molten glass, or batch, is kept in the furnace.

When glass touches the marver, which is at room temperature, the spot that makes contact becomes cooler.

Sometimes a blowpipe or punty gets too hot to hold. !e pipe cooler brings the pipe back to a tolerable temperature.

27 the studio

glory holepipe bucket bench

A glassblower uses all of his or her tools at the bench, where a pipe with glass on the end of it can lie horizontally and the glass can be shaped.

!e glory hole reheats the glass to a temperature where it is malleable.

!e pipe bucket is full of water, so that when a glassblower is finished using a blowpipe or punty, the remaining glass on it will break o" and can be recycled.

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tools

Jacks can make grooves in the glass where it needs to be broken.

Tweezers can grab, stretch, and shape hot pieces of molten glass.

A wood block makes glass into a round, cup shape.

Duckbill shears cut hot glass.

29 29 the studio

Diamond shears cut hot glass. Newspaper, when wet and covered in carbon, can be worn like an oven mitt and used to shape the hot glass.

When glass stays out of the oven or glory hole too long, it explodes from thermal shock. Glasses protect workers’ eyes.

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03methods of glass making

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Harvey K. Littleton !ree Bottles #$%&

free-blowingFree-blowing is challenging and tedious. However, its process lends itself to collaborative work, leading to what often turns into inadvertent performances by glass artists. At many museums and glass studios, artists will offer demonstrations to spectators.

The method is very old and was adopted by the Romans in the first century A.D. The Syrians brought the blowpipe to Italy, changing glassblowing significantly. The blowpipe opened up grand possibilities in size and shape of vessels. Also, the vessels could have thin walls, so they became more light-reflective and thus decorative.

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Wood Burning Glass Factory

“!e Art of Glassmaking, #'(#–#''&”

Glass is gathered on a blowpipe.

furnace

blowpipe

free-blowing

batch

ga"er

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met

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!e bubble is shaped.A bubble is blown inside the glass.

wood block

!e glass is marvered.

To marver means to roll the glass on a steel table (called the marver) to cool the material.

marver

02 blowing a bubble

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A punty is a steel rod with a nubbin of hot glass on the end. It holds the vessel by the bottom so that the top can be worked on. Once a piece is on a punty, a glassblower can open up the mouth, curve the lip, stretch the neck, or manipulate the shape in a number of other ways.

A punty is prepared.

free-blowing03 attaching the punty

blowpipe

vessel

A punty is stuck to the vessel.

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Water cracks the glass at the vessel’s neck.

If the vessel is not stuck well onto the punty, it will fall and shatter.

punty

!e vessel is broken o" the blowpipe.

04 detaching the pipe

free-blowing

Jacks are used to open up the mouth of the vessel.

Water cracks the glass below its base.

!e vessel falls o" and is put in the annealer.

heat-resistant gloves

05 finishing38

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Lino Tagliapietra Untitled #$$#

An annealer is an extremely hot oven that slowly and systematically cools the glass to room temperature. If a glass object were just left out in the air to dry, it would crack from thermal shock.

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A bubble is forced into a mould.

mould-blowingMould-blowing arose out of free-blowing to make decorative grooved cups and bowls. For a piece created by an optic mould, the blower uses the same technique as free-blowing, but additionally shapes the form by putting glass into a grooved mould.

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Glass ornament made with optic mould

fusingFusing relies on the melting and sticky nature of glass. In fusing, pieces of glass mesh together much like cheese on a pizza.

Francis Stewart Higgins Vessel !"#$–!"#"

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Toots Zynsky

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Long rods of glass, called canes, are placed side by side in a furnace.

As the canes melt, they fuse together.

!ey create a flat sheet of glass.

fusing

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!e sheet of glass is cooled.

Lino Tagliapietra Coperta Indiana !""%

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Kreg Kallenberger View at Black Mountain #$$)

casting

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Tom Patti Ascending Red #$$*

molten glass used for filling a mould

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A cast object is

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Barry Saunter Umbilical Male

not hollowA cast object is

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A wax model of the object is made.

!e wax model is used to create a rubber mold.

!e mold is drained of wax.

Casting is a very old form of object making, and it is used not only to make glass objects, but also objects made of metal, plastic, and many other materials in manufactured goods. A mold can be made of rubber, plaster, or clay.

One of the tricky parts of casting glass is getting the glass to melt in the correct way. When molten, glass is gooey but very viscous, so getting it to move into the tiny details in a mold is difficult. The

“large ingot” method is shown below, but artists sometimes fill the mold with crushed glass that melts, or they melt the glass in a separate container and pour it into the mold.

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A large ingot (piece of glass) is placed atop the mold.

!e glass and mold are fired. !e glass melts into the mold.

!e piece is cooled and taken out of the mold.

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Glen Lukens Plate, !"&'s

slumping

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Torso Series John Gilbert Luebtow #$+*s

slumping

methods

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Cini Boeri and Tomi Katayanagi, Ghost, !"$$

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dsslumpingSlumping relies on the sagging quality of molten glass. It takes careful preparation, but the work is done without actually handling the material. The glass simply shapes around a mould.

A piece of sheet glass is lain across two bricks and a mould. All objects are set up in a kiln, where they are slowly heated.

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!e bricks fall away and the glass melts around the mould.

!e piece slowly cools.

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04context

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how glass came to be

(ird Degree Glass FactorySt. Louis, Missouri

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Dale Chihuly

61 context

Glassmaking was first practiced in ancient Egypt, although the blowpipe was not discovered until the Romans conquered Egypt. Glass disappeared during the dark ages and did not reappear until the late fourteenth and early fifteenth century. It flourished in Italy at the time, spreading through vigorous trade with the West. In Venice, glassmaking evolved explosively and became famous to the area. It spread throughout the West, until the industrial revolution made

glassmaking easier by making it with a machine. Consumers purchased machine-made glass, and glassblowing phased out of the common consciousness.

In 1962, the studio glass movement began with Harvey Littleton’s workshop in Toledo, Ohio. He and fellow artists began with glass in the molten state, and worked with it to make vessels purely for artistic purposes. The artists brought glass into the world of art criticism, museums, and galleries. Since then,

workshops have sprouted up internationally with the new glass studios. While glassblowing was part of an industry in the past, it is now a creative art medium, with studios for individuals rather than shops for multiple workers.

history

Giorgio Ferro/AVEM Flowing Handle Vase #$(&

62so

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sbibliographyBlonston, Gary, and William Morris. William Morris. New York: Abbeville Press Publishers, #$$%.

Cummings, Keith. Techniques of Kiln-formed Glass. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, #$$'.

Goodearl, Tom, and Goodearl, Marilyn. Engraved Glass: International Contemporary Artists. Woodbridge, Su"olk: Antique Collectors’ Club Ltd., #$$$.

Hoyt, Homer L. Glassblowing: An Introduction to Solid and Blown Glass Sculpturing. Golden, CO: Crafts & Arts Publishing Co. Inc., #$+$.

Lynn, Martha Drexler. American Studio Glass "#$%-"##%. Manchester, Vermont: Hudson Hills Press LLC, &**).

Sarpellon, Giovanni. Lino Tagliapietra. Verona, Italy: Editoriale Bortolazzi-Stei, #$$).

Schmid, Edward T. Beginning Glassblowing. Bellingham, Washington: Glass Mountain Press, #$$+.

Schmid, Edward T. Ed’s Big Handbook of Glassblowing. Jamestown, Colorado: Glass Mountain Press, #$$,.

Schuler, Frederic and Lilli. Glassforming: Glassmaking for the Craftsman. Philadelphia: Chilton Book Company, #$'*.

Warmus, William, and the Norton Museum of Art. Fire and Form. West Palm Beach: Norton Museum of Art, &**,.

63 sources

Arthus-Bertrand, Yann. Earth From Above. Harry N. Abrams, Inc. New York. Copyright &**&.

Mike Bodnar http://mgbodnar.googlepages.com/

Cummings, Keith. Techniques of Kiln-formed Glass. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, #$$'.

Philip Greenspun http://photo.net/philip-greenspun/

www.jitzul.com

!e Landsat Program http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/

Other photos by Zoe Dove-Many of work at !ird Degree Glass Factory, St. Louis, Missouri.

image sources

written and designed by Zoë Dove-Many Washington University Sam Fox School of Art and Design &**+ set in DIN and Chaparral