Playing With Pieces

Some of my glass studio mates cut glass with mathematical precision. Me, I'm often trying to execute on a picture I see in my mind or ideas that Rain gives me after I've fiddled with shards and chunks of leftover glass.

It's the Recycler in me that is compulsive about not wasting the glass. After all, someone spent a lot of time rolling it out in sheets so I could cut into it, play with it, heat it in a kiln, and shape it. How could I possibly throw any of the bits away?

Sometimes I put small oddly-shaped slivers or slices of glass in different colors into a metal trough. The glass is fired in a kiln to make "color bars." Everyone else's color bars are like mathematical soldiers--half a cm square, while my colors push and tumble over each other in the trough. When I put my pieces into the kiln, I don't know what magical surprise will appear when they come out and I slice through the cooled bars.

This plate, which sold at the recent Lick-Wilmerding Crafts Marketplace, has colors that remind me of the sea and the years I studied marine biology and ecology. . . vast pools of deep teal and green, light dancing through the water, colorful creatures hiding beneath kelp. . .





Sometimes I cut leftovers into thin strips and lay them in a seemingly random pattern.



Other times, I'm chunking it down, layering irregular shapes of glass over one another, playing with "striker" glass that changes color when it is fired. This purple striker dish is an example. It combines iridescent, striker purple (that looked blue before it was fired), strings of black glass and clear. This serving dish sold at the Crafts Marketplace too.




Once in a while I cut a shape and then cut it into other shapes to see what happens. Even though I may have an idea in my mind about how I want the piece to look when it is done, the glass often has a mind of its own. When that happens, it will break into a shape different from what I envisioned.




I've been working on some larger 14" or bigger platters, still playing with pieces. . . like this one made with amber layered with shapes in forest green, stringers and iridescent accents





This week some of my glasslight work will go on sale. It will be fun to see which ones resonate with folks