On the "WAY" fun side ... Tom Moore

A true new artist in every sense of the word - Tom Moore - looking at all of the modern possibilities of expressing himself - object, photography, video ... a colorful land of adventure and out-there fantasy.

Moore’s glass blowing expertise enables him to create a plethora of hybrid personalities. His works definitely never suffer from a sense of the predictable. His anthropomorphism's have closer links to the illuminating world of illustrated children’s stories, where nothing is impossible - defying gravity and melting the coldest heart.

Michael Janis: a fresh look at glass art

Inspired by ways we transform ourselves, I work at creating creates glass pieces that have both visual and spatial depth. By layering and fusing sheets of glass with overlapping elements, I strive for an interactive commentary using simple forms with intricate glass powder drawings. These works are a continuation of my frit powder drawings that I have been working on for some time now. The layered compositions allow me to make unusual juxtapositions of imagery.

I work hard to create some kind of meaning out of my artworks - dream-state surrealism using figures, text and common objects, and hint at questions. The artworks suggest meanings but they encourage the viewers to draw their own conclusions. The work has an intrinsic meaning for me, but they remain open to multiple interpretations. I want to encourage the possibility of exploring meanings beyond those I put there – I count on the viewer bringing something to the work. More on MICHAEL JANIS

Material Matters: Lisa Cahill

Lisa Cahill creates dreamlike images, which allow viewers to draw associations with their own remembered landscapes, resulting in a meditative and or emotional response. Inspiration for this work ranges from the colours, textures and limitless space of the Australian bush to the harsh winter landscape of Denmark, her mother's homeland. Having spent many years living and travelling the world, much of this time spent in Denmark, Lisa's kiln formed glass connects structures of urban architecture, the associations and memories they invoke, and her innate respect for the natural landscape. Lisa's minimal wall panels are a record of her memories of these different landscapes and the transitory nature of the urban experience. Rather than a direct reproduction they are more her own interpretation of the quiet intensity to be found therein. Lisa's art is a document that ponders the reality behind the visible and becomes a place for quiet contemplation.

Jeff Wallin: Fine-art meets glass

"What is seen on first glance? What catches the eye before interruption of thought and reason? What single detail expresses the whole? We can be affected by where we are, as well as where we are not." - Jeff Wallin

Jeff Wallin has spent his life in the Pacific Northwest. He studied under Professor Keiko Hara at Whitman College, graduating in 1995 with a B.A. in Studio Art. He continued to pursue drawing and painting after moving to Portland at The Drawing Studio with Philip Sylvester and more recently at Hipbone Studio with Jeff Burke.

His introduction to glass came in 1999 at Ray Ahlgren’s FireArt Glass studio, where Jeff continues to work, gaining new understandings in how to apply the challenging medium of glass to his ongoing exploration of the human form.

He says that drawing teaches him to see. Taking inspiration from emotionally and psychologically complex figure painters such as Francis Bacon and Lucien Frued, Wallin’s portraits have the marks of a painter’s perspective and a painter’s intuition, the relaying of an idea by brush– all that expressed in the language of glass.

His studies have been represented in galleries in Portland and Chicago, SOFA-NY, SOFA-Chicago, WheatonArts, and at Glasmuseet Ebeltoft in Denmark, where he was awarded the Sybren Valkema Prize in the 2007 Young Glass competition. The museum acquired his entry, "The Great Romantic" for its permanent collection and awarded him a four-week creative residential stay at Vrij Glas Studio in Holland in 2008.

During that residency, Jeff began working directly on glass using live models, eliminating the intermediary step of charcoal/conte drawings which he’d previously used.

He now begins each piece as a quick sketch from a model, working directly with glass powders on a glass sheet surface. No preliminary drawings are used, no tests or experiments. Each new work is itself the test, the experiment, the first impression developed and pushed to a final form.

He explains, "My methods of kiln forming purposefully ignore most of the strict adherence to process normally associated with the medium. The work is driven by a dialogue between material and subject, where instinctive response to what happens in the moment is often more crucial than following a predetermined notion of how the composition should appear. A solid understanding of the ‘rules’ of kiln forming glass is essential. It is against this backdrop of knowledge that I attempt with each new investigation to push the boundaries of my experience, applying that understanding and not simply repeating techniques. My intent is to maintain an attitude of spontaneity and preserve the raw moment when the piece first began. By avoiding strict narrative structures, I provide a framework on which viewers can apply their own memories and experiences."

Jeff’s art exemplifies the future direction of studio glass - that continued blurring of any line between disciplines labeled as craft, glass, or art.

Anne Wolff

WOW! I have to say I really enjoy these prints (vitreographs). Ann Wolff is best known for her 3D contemporary works in glass - here we see her visions on a 2D level - what a creative mind!

Ann Wolff studied first at the School for Fashion Design in Hamburg and then at the Academy of Design in Ulm, where she majored in visual communication. She entered the glass industry when she married the Swedish glass artist Goran Wärff. Accompanying him to Sweden, she worked from 1960 to 1970 as a designer of decorative and household glass, first for Pukesbergs Glassworks in Nybro, and then at Kosta Boda. After her divorce from Wärff in 1970 she established Studio Stenhytta with Wilke Adolfsson, a master glassblower from Orrefors, on the grounds of her home in Tranjö, Sweden.

During the 1970s Wolff's glass forms were multi-layers vessels which she sandblasted and etched with narratives relating to the experience of Woman as wife, mother and homemaker. In the 1980s she began to move away from narrative in favor of the depiction of female heads on large round plates. From the mid-1980s to the 1990s Wolff experienced a period of dissatisfaction with glass that resulted in her working more in drawing, painting and printmaking. She rediscovered glass in the mid-1990s as a sculptural medium through the technique of casting. The abstract, cast glass forms with which she now works relate strongly to her continuing interest in the female face and figure.

Ann Wolff has won many distinctions for her art. Among them were the Coberg Prize for Modern Glasswork in Europe, 1977; Central Switzerland Glass Prize, Lucerne, Switzerland, 1980; Gold Medal, International Glass Art, Kassel, Germany, Gold Medal, Bavarian State Prize, 1988 and the Rakow Commission, Corning Museum of Glass, 1997.
Museums that hold her work include the Hokkaido Museum of Modern Art, Japan; Düsseldorf Art Museum, Germany; Lobmayr Museum, Vienna, Austria; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City; Mint Museum of Craft + Design, Charlotte, North Carolina; National Museum of Art, Tokyo, Japan; Toledo Museum of Art, Ohio and Albert and Victoria Museum, London.

PRINTS and DETAILS CAN BE SEEN AT: http://www.vitreographs.com/

Glass PYROGRAPHS and Etsuko Ichikawa

My work is a continuing investigation of what lies between the ephemeral and the eternal. I work with a range of materials, in particular glass, paper, and thread, and in various scales including large installations.

Moment and memory, absorption and evaporation, light and shadow are some of the triggers that inspire me and relate to my work. My “glass pyrograph” drawings are made by imprinting hot glass onto paper, which is one way to capture and eternalize the immediacy of a moment, while my hanging and floating installations are about ever-changing states of mind. Born and raised in Japan and having lived in the United States for over the last decade, I recognize my dual cultures as defining influences and psychology as my primary source of inspiration.