Pieces from Blown Away on display in the museum's amphitheater hot shop. courtesy: corning museum of glass

Friday June 21, 2019 | by Gabriela Iacovano

Glass reality show Blown Away to premiere July 12th on Netflix, Corning Museum of Glass sets up exhibition of show artifacts

The Corning Museum of Glass (CMoG) in Corning, New York, has intensified its involvement with Blown Away, an upcoming glass-art reality television program, by displaying pieces made during taping of the show. The exhibit is set up in the museum’s Ampitheater Hot Shop, and not the main exhibition spaces. The reality show, which premiered on Canada’s newly launched Makeful satellite channel in February, is scheduled to debut in the U.S. on Netflix on July 12, 2019. Perhaps sensing the show's potential to introduce new audiences to the beauty of glassblowing, the Corning team, which had joined the production as evaluators and offered hands-on assistance to the glass artists during Blown Away's final rounds, is upping its involvement in the reality television program with the exhibition as well as planned appearances at the museum by the show's as-yet-unreleased victorious contestant. The winner of the competition will visit the museum for two working sessions this summer and a “Blown Away Residency” is planned in October, where the artist will perform demos for museum visitors.

Richard Royal, Illusion, 2019. Hot sculpted glass. H 23, W 11, D 5 in. courtesy: schantz galleries

Thursday June 20, 2019 | by Meghan Hayfield

EXHIBITION: New larger-scale work by Richard Royal on view at Schantz Gallery

On view through the summer at Schantz Galleries in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, is an exhibition of new work from Richard Royal, one of the pioneers of the Studio Glass movement. Three years in development, Royal’s latest body of work is a geometric series that achieves a larger scale and features a commanding palette of primary colors. After 11 years of developing a process and system, Royal’s geometric series is playful but structurally complex, with titles offering homages to famous figures in art and architecture.

Carissa Grace, Comforter, 2019. Argon, phosphor coated glass. courtesy: Carissa Grace.

Saturday June 15, 2019 | by Gabriela Iacovano

EXHIBITION: Recent Alfred University grads in group neon exhibition in New York City

Today, June 15, 2019, neon works from eight recent graduates from Alfred University’s School of Art and Design in Alfred, New York, will be shown in an exhibition on New York City’s Governors Island. Curated by assistant professor of glass Sarah Blood, the exhibition, titled “Language of Light,” includes the work of BFA graduates Carissa Grace, Astrid Hunter, Bryanna King, Caroline LaCava, Natalie Schults, Olivia Piazza, Adam Taylor and Gil Travers, whose undergraduate study with Blood focused on light.

Lorraine Peltz, Landslide, 2019. Oil and acrylic on canvas. H 48, W 36 in. courtesy: the artist

Thursday June 13, 2019 | by Gabriela Iacovano

An artist and critic's life partnership explored in a Chicago exhibition

On view through August 25, 2019, at the Ed Paschke Art Center (EPAC) in Chicago, the exhibition “Lorraine Peltz: This Must Be the Place” investigates the multi-layered relationship between painter Lorraine Peltz and her late art-history professor husband (and prolific Glass magazine contributing editor). James Yood, who died suddenly in 2018, was a longstanding champion of Chicago artists working in many different media, and a prominent figure in the glass-art community, penning essays for numerous books in addition to his writings for this publication. He was also a charismatic professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where he taught for many years.

An image of Judith Schaechter with a taxidermy armadillo that was presented along with the presidents award in San Antonio, Texas, on June 4th. courtesy: judson studios / kyle j mickelson

Wednesday June 12, 2019 | by Gabriela Iacovano

Judith Schaechter, who bridges contemporary and traditional approaches to stained glass, is honored by stained-glass associations

Artist Judith Schaechter has single-handedly pioneered traditional stained glass as a medium for contemporary exploration, staunchly advocating for the celebration of decorative and craft arts in academia and beyond. At a stained-glass artist conference in Texas on June 4, 2019, Schaechter was presented with the first-ever joint president’s award (and a taxidermy armadillo) from the American Glass Guild (AGG) and Stained Glass Association of America (SGAA). In addition to recognizing Schaechter’s contributions to the worlds of stained glass and glass art at large, the award commemorated the consolidation of the two groups for their first joint summer conference, which took place in San Antonio, Texas.

Jane Rosen, Ladder Morandi, 2019. Handblown pigmented glass, limestone, and fossil limestone. H 72, W 69,D 18 in. courtesy: traver gallery.

Wednesday June 12, 2019 | by Meghan Hayfield

OPENING: Traver Gallery highlights art inspired by nature in two adjacent exhibitions

Adjacent exhibitions now on view at the Traver Gallery in Seattle feature work by artists Jane Rosen and Hiroshi Yamano, both of whom look to the natural environment in appreciation for the world around us. Though united in general interest, Rosen and Yamano use distinctly different approaches to glass and varied materials to illustrate a sensuous connection to the natural world.

Allan Wexler, Vessicles, 2019. Glass, fiberglass, plumbing fixtures. courtesy: wheatonarts

Tuesday June 4, 2019 | by Meghan Hayfield

OPENING: The third "Emanation" exhibition at WheatonArts brings fresh perspectives

The third iteration of “Emanation,” the biennial exhibition launched by former WheatonArts’ glass studio creative director Hank Adams in 2015, features a different approach as well as a new curator. While under the leadership of Adams, the 2015 and 2017 exhibitions brought well-known high-profile contemporary artists, such as Judy Pfaff, Donald Lipski, and Mark Dion, to the remote Millville, New Jersey, glass center to work with skilled assistants and realize new work in glass. The 2019 edition was overseen by independent curator Julie Courtney, Adams’ hand-picked successor to organize the exhibit, and she has focused on prominent but somewhat less well-known artists, many from the Philadelphia area where she is based. The resulting artwork is varied and sometimes unexpected, and overall offers a more youthful and spontaneous feeling.

Thursday May 30, 2019 | by Andrew Page

In Memoriam: Critic and Glass contributing editor Victoria Josslin (1946 - 2019)

Victoria Josslin, a critic and contributing editor to the print edition of Glass: The UrbanGlass Quarterly, died suddenly at her home in the desert Southwest on May 12, 2019. She would have turned 73 in December. Josslin divided her time between homes on Bainbridge Island outside of Seattle, and Albuquerque, New Mexico, where she began to live part of the year after she married her former high-school boyfriend David Margolin in 2011. She is survived by her husband, her two children from her first marriage, two of her younger siblings, her mother, and her granddaughter. Josslin was the author most recently of the Spring 2019 cover article "Intense Quiet" on the new series of glass-on-glass paintings by Dale Chihuly (Glass #154), and her insightful, clearly articulated articles and reviews had been a regular feature in Glass magazine since she began writing for us in 2007. Born in 1946 in Dunnigan, California, Josslin grew up in Washington State and later Arizona, where she played in a folk band in high school with her future second husband. Majoring in painting, she graduated from Occidental College in Pasadena, California in 1969, where she met her first husband, Richard Josslin. They had two children and moved to Bainbridge Island, Washington, in 1986. There, she would go on to earn her MA in art history from the University of Washington in 1995, and became a regular art reviewer for The Seattle Post-Intelligencer. She also founded the successful arts blog Artdish.com, which she ran for five years. Josslin also spent a decade at Bainbridge Arts and Crafts, an arts center where she served as director of education and information until 2013. Just last year she published her first novel, The Bookstore of Other Languages.

Photo: Courtesy Johana Němečková

Tuesday May 28, 2019 | by Eve Aaron

A new source for cullet offers glass studios another post-Spectrum choice

In the Spring 2019 edition of Glass (#154), I wrote about the impact of Spectrum's decision to stop producing their nuggets (Reflection: "Back to Batch," p. 64). After the last of the backstock of Spectrum nuggets shipped in Summer 2018, the effects were felt across the industry, with one small Midwest studio shutting down and university hotshops retooling to melt batch instead. I briefly discussed Cristalica, an alternative source of cullet from Germany, but the international shipping costs and different chemical composition that affected its compatibility and performance seemed to be keeping it from being a replacement for Spectrum. Now a new product is hitting the market, one that promises Spectrum-like qualities, though the pricing is more on par with its fellow European producer Cristalica. This new cullet is being offered from Bomma, a Czech company that designs a variety of glass products, like Cristalica, so it has the existing infrastructure to produce bulk quantities of cullet. Working with American artist and entreprenur Charlie Parriott, Bomma has developed a recipe for a cullet with a low melting temperature that is compatible with Reichenbach Colors as well as other color manufacturers. We spoke with Bomma marketing director Eva Kozarová to get some more information.

Thursday May 23, 2019 | by Andrew Page

HOT OFF THE PRESSES: The Summer 2019 edition of Glass (#155)

The Summer 2019 edition of Glass: The UrbanGlass Art Quarterly (#155) is hitting newsstands and subscriber mailboxes this week. On the cover is a collage of images from Mary Van Cline's "Documenta Project," an ongoing photographic quest to capture the images (and personalities) of the unique community of artists, dealers, and collectors who coalesced around glass as an art medium. In her cover article, critic and curator Patricia Grieve Watkinson writes: "Perhaps it says something about those involved in the Studio Glass movement that they are willing and used to collaborating with a fellow artist in a way that might expose their vulnerability, and that there are so many -- artists and collectors -- who are willing to ham it up in front of the camera for a slice of posterity."

Glass: The UrbanGlass Quarterly, a glossy art magazine published four times a year by UrbanGlass has provided a critical context to the most important artwork being done in the medium of glass for more than 40 years.