August/September 2024 - Vol. 38, No. 2.
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In This Issue
Stud Earrings — Flat Circles by Yvonne Dieckmeyer
I discovered glass in 1997. I had taken a Tiffany course with Eva-Marie Volkmann and was fascinated by stained glass. One of the Volkmanns’ employees came to me one evening and told me about the possibility of melting glass with a burner and then shaping it into a ball on a mandrel.
I wasn’t very keen about making glass beads. I didn’t know anything about making round marbles. There were no pictures, no other artists, no web; I had no visual templates. Then Marlies started the burner and formed a glass ball on a spike, and since then, I’ve been infected and always on the lookout for my own ideas. The better you know the techniques of glass processing, the easier it is to go your own way, and that’s what I do...
In addition to working as a flameworker, I also studied art history. The combination of craftsmanship and historical backgrounds is particularly gratifying. Historic ornaments or works of art often inspire my own creations. My other, and perhaps even greater, source of inspiration is nature. Natural light effects are particularly fascinating, and that is why I often try to capture them in my glass works.
I am pleased to be writing a third tutorial for Glass Line in addition to two previous ones, which have been about a Lattice Technique Elephant (April/May 2022) and a Twisted Bead (February/March 2023). This tutorial is about an object in which many of my sources of inspiration merge. The traditional heart-shaped ornament, which plays an important role in both Alpine culture and Venetian glass bead production, is highlighted by its colorlessness. The pattern allows a view right through the bead, as well as an internal view in a different color than the surface. The incidence of light, which is possible from all sides, makes the bead shine from within. Depending on the color chosen, it comes quite close to sunlight...
Having always being attracted by sculpture, I attended a course with Maestro Mauro Vianello in Venice. That was a further and significant step forward — sculpting allows absolute freedom and the possibility of expressing fantasy and imagination, experimenting, and refining new techniques. My idea, my artistic intent, is being able to abstract, conceptualize the subjects of my works.
This tutorial captures the elegance, wisdom, and peacefulness that a tree transmits through one made with soft glass, trying to crystallize these sensations, through an expressionist conception of shape and color...
I have since then been lucky enough to build up a little studio in my garage. I consider myself a glass hobbyist. There are so many glass artists who I hope to one day be close to as good as; while I am not there yet, I keep playing and having fun with the flame and glass and learning. That, in itself, makes me very happy. Most of what I make has been for fun and for myself, with the occasional Etsy listing because I’ve made more items than I know what to do with. Lately, I have been trying to sell more, doing makers’ markets and trying to get myself more out there. I always look forward to learning more glass skills and love to share the joy glass brings me with others.
This tutorial is about how to make a glass goddess (female body figure) pendant. This project is so much fun. Something I love about it is that every body is different, so every piece can be a little different from any others. Since it’s an organic figure, it also doesn’t have to be perfectly symmetrical. You don’t have to worry about perfection and can just have fun, and know that if your piece turns out perfectly imperfect, that is ... perfect...
Glass ... can be so diverse ... It can be brutal and tender, monumental and sophisticated. And what can be prettier than flowers? We celebrate love, new life, achievements, and memorable moments in life with flowers. I wish I could give flowers to every one of my customers for every occasion in their lives, because by observing nice things, we water the flowers growing within ourselves and the job of art is to create such feelings.
This is my technique for creating flower murrini and a spherical bead...
After a few years of enjoying — but not entirely loving — furnace working, I found out about the Corning Museum of Glass and their studio, where I signed up for an introduction to borosilicate glass class, and I’ve been having fun with it ever since.
I have always been captivated by ocean waves, and I view their constant state of flow and movement as a metaphor for life. Much like the sea, our lives will become stormy and turbulent at times, and giant waves may even knock us down for a while, but they eventually recede, which in turn gives way to calmer tides. This philosophy is what I intend to convey with these wave pendants. Much like real ocean waves, no two ever turn out the same. You don’t have to worry about being too technical; feel free to play around with color and style — I sure do! Thank you for taking the time to read my story and I hope you enjoy making these as much as I do...
I’ve made sparkle, patterned, and glow-in-the-dark bead caps recently. I rivet the caps in place by hand, without using any special coring tools, and I find the process very relaxing. I think most glass is so pretty that it speaks for itself. Touches of dichroic or glow glass can add extra interest and dimension to the beads.
One of my favorite styles of beads is a textured wave made with an Effetre color of choice, a silvered glass, and clear. It’s a simple bead to make and uses just a couple tools that many people would have lying around the house. Taking notes of the different color combinations helps so the prettiest outcomes can be somewhat duplicated. I experiment a lot, so opening the kiln after annealing is always a surprise. There can be some really gorgeous beads and some disgustingly ugly beads as well, but that’s the fun of it...
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June/July 2024 - Vol. 38, No. 1.
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In This Issue
How to Make Core Glass by Akiko Furuki
I live in Japan.
“Core glass” is the world’s oldest glassware-forming technique. It is an ancient technique that evolved during the ancient Mesopotamian and Egyptian dynasties. It is believed to be between approximately 3,500 and 1,500 years old.
By 2,000 years later (1st century BC), when the technique of blown glass was established, it was a forgotten technique in history—but the technique has been reconstructed by a very great contemporary artist, Mr. Iwao Matushima. I believe that he and this technique connect the ancients with us today...
I live in Nizhniy Novgorod, Russia. I started lampworking in 2013 after I’d left my office job as an English translator. As a child, I was always attracted to anything handmade and tried different hobbies and activities, but I always believed that I was too clumsy to make something beautiful with my hands and I envied people who could do that.
Then I came to know lampworking. That completely blew my mind and changed my life. Finally, I found a material suitable for my creativity! I was inspired, with thousands of ideas that I wanted to realize. Sometimes I couldn’t even sleep because of that.
I left my office job after a complete burnout and started making glass beads and jewelry. Of course, many people thought I was crazy to do that — but here I am today, 10 years later, still making glass beads. This tutorial is to share my passion for glass and show one of my designs...
I usually think up a design first and then try to find the right way to create it. Sometimes I realize I came up with something that just can’t be made, but usually I just keep trying until I make it. It fascinates me that unlike other material, glass allows you to work with layers to create a motif within. That’s what I focus on: layers, progression, building a theme step by step.
In my mind, this piece what an autumn storm looks like. The idea was born when I was listening to Vivaldi’s interpretation of a storm, which is actually the final movement, Presto (in G minor), of summer in “The Four Seasons.” However, I wanted to make a colorful bead, so I set the scene in the fall.
Note: In this Tutorial I use hard glass to explain...
In this article I want to share the elegance of copper electroforming. I will touch on the varied and numerous ways I use electroforming to create unique pieces of art and I will explain the process and science of electroforming to help you get started. If you are interested in exploring these techniques in more depth, I am offering a series of electroforming classes through Zurich Glass Schoo...
Landscape Bead by Blake Mazzei
I love making landscape beads that explore different ideas. It’s always an experiment.
I have developed these general rules for my work: I use the same number of opaque colored rods as transparent colored rods, working from the darkest colors to the lightest ones, making it as irregular as possible; I alternate opaque and transparent colors, while doubling the amount of transparent colors. Then I encase the bead with clear glass to give more depth.
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I was born in a small town in the south of Russia and never thought that one day, I would work with glass. I live in Moscow now. I graduated from the Moscow State University of Prints and am a graphic designer (book illustrator) by education.
It’s a bit of a funny story. I tried so hard to get there — I took exams three times and was finally successful only after three years of attempts, but in the last year of university, I figured out that I didn’t want to be a book illustrator. However, this experience showed me that I can be really stubborn in reaching my goals. The thing is to choose the right goal!
For a few years, I rented a studio with friends, but the year 2020 changed all that, of course. QR codes in Moscow allowed us to go outside only twice a week, which meant that I could not work in my rented workshop anymore, so I decided to move to my home studio. The pandemic made me want to fill my life with beauty and love even more than before.
I live in a small apartment and my studio is tiny but comfortable. It lets me work on the torch at any time...
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April/May, 2024 - Vol. 37, No. 6.
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