Before There Was Glass Blowing Part 2 – The Bronze Age: As the Chalcolithic Age slowly gave way to the Bronze Age and primitive settlements began to coalesce into powerful urban centres, the desire for individual expression and status – conveyed through personal adornment – intensified rapidly. It is therefore little wonder that the very […]
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How Early Man Used, Traded, and Manufactured Glass Part 1: Origins For centuries, it was believed that our love of glass—like so much of what we enjoy and take for granted today—probably began in ancient Rome. This assumption was largely based upon the writings of the Roman historian Pliny the Elder, who suggested that Phoenician
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Long before the artisans of Western Europe discovered how to perfect the art of glassblowing, some of the greatest glass masters in history—whose names have largely been lost—were active in ancient Rome, making everything from plain cups and jugs to intricate cameos and vases. While many of the more impressive works of Roman glass, such
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Futurism is an art movement that embraced the modern world and the technological advancements of the early 20th Century. Technology and speed were the ‘new beautiful’, and Futurist art was crammed with hurtling trains, diving bi-planes and racing cars. Futurists tried to evoke a palpable sense of urban modernity in their various art forms; the
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For as long as people have been accessorising their homes, art glass has played a major role in adding to the beauty of a space. The glass art movement has been alive and well for many millennia now, and many of the methods used to create delicate-looking sculptures are still used today. There is an
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Sometimes, an optic glass sculpture artist comes along who breaks all the rules and grinds out their own path. One such artist is Jack Storms, who has become the master of an achingly laborious glass-making process that combines lead crystal with dichroic glass. This physically demanding cold-glass process can take around 18 weeks of work
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The term “Murano glass”, widely used to describe the colourful, intricate pieces that flow out of Italy into the eager hands of collectors even today, does not refer to a specific glass manufacturer; instead, this label is born of location. The Murano islands, a small cluster of land masses that dot the turquoise waters of
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Coloured glass ornaments are created using a variety of metal oxides. For those with ‘boffin leanings’ here are some of the metals that are used to create colourful art glass. Cadmium Sulfide Cadmium sulfide is used in the making of coloured glass to turn the glass into a beautiful shade of yellow. Gold Chloride Gold
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Glass is a bit of a conundrum… It is made with sand, yet is opaque It is strong and durable yet smashes easily It behaves like a solid but is actually a liquid. Glass is made from liquid sand and will always remain an extremely thick liquid. That is why antique window panes are
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The Modern Masterpieces of Sarah Hall: Art Glass For the Planet There is no doubt that Sarah Hall’s work holds its own against the best of Canadian art glass; from the shimmering, twisting blues of her panels at B.C.’s Regent College, to the vivid golden-umber autumn scene placed outside York University in Toronto, to the
Canadian Art Glass Artist: Sarah Hall Continue Reading »