GASnews
SUMMER 2020 VOLUME 33 ISSUE 3
Glass Expert Webinars®
INSIDE
Live Two-Hour, Interactive Web Workshops with Renowned Glass Artists Link to Class Recording Never Expires!
3 Letter from the President 5 Delicate Matter(s) 9 Make Something Better: GASnews Interview 13 Supporting the Work of the Glass Impact Coalition: The
Corning Museum of Glass' Archive-It Project
15 One Size Doesn't Fit All: Acknowledging Academia's Role
Susan Hirsch Into the Woods
16 GAS Opportunities
Scott Ouderkirk Marketing Art a New Way Lecture
17 Radical Departure—New Models for Gallery Practice
Tony Glander Making Glass Frit
Joe Porcelli Cutting Class
Dennis Brady
Dennis Brady Teaching Glass Art Lecture Dennis Brady Glass Weaving
Brittney Ouderkirk Selling on Etsy, Is It For You? Lecture Lisa Vogt
GAS news
Susan McGarry More Kaleidoscope Pattern Bar Designs
in a Changing World
Cover: altered self (who I am as a semi circle), 2019. glass: blown, cast and coldworked, cast wax, vitreographic print 40 in H x 24 in W x 12 in D. Photo Credit: Victoria Ahmadizadeh Melendez
New Fun with Flowers Lisa Vogt Fusing with Frit Susan Hirsch New Into the Woods A Four Layer Enamel Filled Fused Glass Forest Scene
in Perpetuating Homogeneity in the Glass Community
GASnews is published four times per year as a benefit to members.
Glass Art Society Board of Directors 2019-2020
Contributing Writers: Jennifer Hand, Joe Schill, David Schnuckel, Paige Morris, Victoria Ahmadizadeh Melendez
President: Natali Rodrigues Vice President: Nadania Idriss Vice President: Jessica Jane Julius Treasurer: Heather McElwee Secretary: Caitlin Vitalo
Editor: Michael Hernandez Graphic Design: Mae Quach Staff Brandi Clark, Executive Director Lauren Bayer, Communications Manager Kristen W. Ferguson, Development & Membership Manager Jenna Green, Operations & Program Manager Mae Quach, Communications Assistant Cathy Noble-Jackson, Part-time Bookkeeper
New Lustrous Lanterns Dennis Brady Combing Glass
New
Nathan Sandberg TBD Lisa Vogt Creative Slumping
Visit the Glass Expert Webinars® link under “What’s New” at www.GlassArtMagazine.com for more details and local times.
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Ben Cobb Matt Durran Glen Hardymon Mike Hernandez Eric Goldschmidt Karen Mahardy Lynn Read Debra Ruzinsky Mike Saroka Masahiro Nick Sasaki Demetra Theofanous Lisa Zerkowitz Paige Morris (Student Representative)
2208 NW Market St., #200, Seattle, WA 98107 USA Phone: 206.382.1305 Fax: 206.382.2630 E-mail: info@glassart.org
Web: www.glassart.org
©2020 The Glass Art Society, a non-profit organization. All rights reserved. Publication of articles in this newsletter prohibited without permission from the Glass Art Society Inc. The Glass Art Society reserves the right to deny applications for Tech Display, advertising participation, GAS membership or conference participation to anyone for any reason.
GASNEWS
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LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT My dear friends and colleagues; It has been a great honour to serve on the Glass Art Society’s Board of Directors for the last six years, and as the President for the past three. It is not something I would have imagined to do when I started blowing glass. During my time on the board, we have worked together on some significant changes within the organization - to both build on what has come before and give GAS the tools for success for the next 50 years. My main hope for GAS was to celebrate the global nature of glass, the breadth of making, our material itself, and to ensure that the processes within our organization conform to best practises, transparency, diversity, and openness. Do we have more to do? Of course. Will we misstep? Absolutely. But the lessons we learn from glass is to do, analyze what has happened, why it didn’t work, and readjust. Repeat when necessary. This letter is much different than the one I thought I would write as the outgoing President. So much has changed in our world. I hope you are safe and are weathering the storm of 2019- 2020 as best you can. I know I am being faced with changes and challenges that I could never have imagined even last year. I am, by nature, a private person and also a radical. I believe strongly in the universality of human rights. It is my belief that through acts of service and volunteering, we can change the circumstances and the world we live in. Some of you may think that this is naïve; I disagree. My belief is evidenced in positive changes that have happened over the last 40 years around the world. Despite the setbacks, we are further ahead in terms of civil rights, gender equality, and international cooperation. Are we “there” yet? No. There is still so much more to do. We are deeply enculturated into a political/ economic system built to subjugate large numbers in society. We have to fight to see each other as equals. This is profoundly challenging, but it is a fight that I see as necessary and valuable. I began advocating for social justice when I was 13. That dedication to decolonization, diversity, and equity shapes and drives everything I do, from my personal to my professional life. My dedication to this cause continues to be shaped by my experience as a middle-aged artist and an academic, Rubenesque, woman of colour in the world. I walk through daily life knowing I am judged for those things. I say this not looking for sympathy. It happens overtly and covertly—from being dismissed as unimportant to being denied service, being yelled at, etc. People do and say the darndest things to me when they feel entitled. This has helped build my resolve to lead a life of advocacy. Therefore, wherever I am, I attempt to build braver spaces. The GAS Board, Committees, and Staff have been working hard over the last four years to ensure our organization is one that embraces equity as a capstone value. You might be wondering why it is important for me to speak out about these issues of equity to you, my friends and colleagues. GAS has members interested in glass on every continent, whom we serve. How can we do that if we can’t see past our own prejudices and assumptions? We need to build tools that help us serve our members, in their diversity, in the best possible way. We have revised and updated the bylaws, established terms of reference for each committee, written and adopted a diversity policy, built a process for diversifying the board, empowered a Diversity Inclusion Equity and Accessibility committee, changed how we adjudicate, and we advocate for our members. Of our 18 Board members, 5 are international members, 4 are people of colour, and 10 are women. Our office staff consists of 5 women, and 2 are people of colour. GASNEWS
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Recently, a spreadsheet came to my attention itemizing the ethnicity of Board and Staff of five different glass organizations, GAS being one of them. I am not sure to what end—I suspect it is to prove how white and exclusive each organization is. Neither the author of the article, nor its editor, have bothered to ask the GAS Board and Staff to self-identify, rather they have looked at our names and pictures and chosen a race for each of us. Identity is a many-layered thing with inherent complexities and histories. These layers are education, status, religion, values, culture, language, gender, colour, etc. The mix of these layers builds the person you are and that I am. It is in accepting our similarities and differences that we build understanding and strength in a multicultural world. I am a German Goan Canadian who was born in Africa. My first languages were Swahili, German, and English. Why is it important to tell you that? Because people always presume that I am from whatever community they disdain or are a part of. To judge me by my last name alone is an act of disenfranchisement. We need to fight for each other. We need to ensure we all have space to breathe, live, and make.
In solidarity,
Natali Rodrigues, Board President
“Freedom is never really won. You earn it and win it in every generation. That is what we have not taught young people, or older ones for that matter. You do not finally win a state of freedom that is protected forever. It doesn't work that way.” Coretta Scott King
RAD·I·CAL
ADVOCATING FOR THOROUGH OR COMPLETE POLITICAL OR SOCIAL CHANGE; REPRESENTING AND SUPPORTING A PROGRESSIVE SECTION OF SOCIETY 4
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DELICATE MATTER(S) by David Schnuckel It’s a difficult idea I’m still working out, but perhaps some of the most necessary advancements to the field of contemporary glass are developed by artists coming to the medium through less obvious points of entry. Artists who come to glass without formal training in it. Artists who hadn’t earned degrees in it. Artists who come to glass with an external expertise in other non-glass fields of interest and translate those knowns into a substance unknown. Artists who illustrate a virtuosity with glass as a matter of thinking with material as opposed to simply wanting to make eyecandy out of it. Enter Charisse Pearlina Weston, an artist and writer whose diverse creative practice approaches glass not as a thing to worship, but a podium of artmaking to mourn, commemorate, and speak of the complexities defining the Black lived experience. As an accomplished essayist and poet, Weston’s work integrates a material awareness and sensibility with glass that parallels the way she observes and engages words, culminating in objects and installations that are driven by (and curious of) the interconnectedness of contradiction. Language, linguistics, poetry, fiction, and the autobiographical account all come together - both literally and figuratively - in work that critically engages issues of racial strain and struggle as conceptually layered, ambiguously disclosed narratives. The visual language that she employs is one-part monument, one-part object collage; a spatial approach to an abstracted—yet story-laden—sculpture built on arrangements of seemingly disparate components. These symbolic ingredients are sometimes too vague to speak for themselves; but, when together, they form an emblematic voice that harmonizes around her conceptual center points in each work. Various inclusions of masonry, transparent papers and films, photography, text, and flat glass are all visual notes that lend to the flavor and aroma of a solemn, contemplative body of work as GASNEWS
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The immaterial imaginary of rhythm moistened black salt into translucence | 2016 | replacement frame glass, inkjet photographs, text on vellum, wood sculpture | dimensions variable. Photo Credit: Charisse Pearlina Weston
defined by tones of hardness and weight as it is by instances of breakage and soft malformation. Weston’s current integration of glass within her practice was initially unanticipated and unforeseen. The artist began engaging flat glass back in 2016 as a means to remedy a display problem for an early series of horizontally placed photographs culminating in the installation
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The immaterial imaginary of rhythm moistened black salt into translucence. “That piece made me realize the potential of a material like glass to both deepen and activate a number of other references,” Weston remembers. “I was already doing work around Black mourning and remembrance, but incorporating glass into that work—with its sharp edges and risk, its fragility and its malleability—made the violence that necessitates those activities
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black notes for the thing left there (or when darkness risks being the forever nocturnal source of light itself, notes two of nine) | 2018 | slumped replacement frame glass from collapse, tempered glass panels, text on transparencies, dark and lovely let's jam!conditioning and shine hair gel | dimensions variable. Photo Credit: Kayla Kee
legible.” In turn, it’s worth noting that Weston’s conceptual sensibilities here reflect a consideration of what her material needs are. Glass, in her case, is not the bug bite we normally speak about in our “why glass?” origin stories, but raw matter that inherently has a lot to add to the conversation her practice hinges on based on its physical and optical attributes. She adds, “What was beneficial as well was the fact that I was already deeply interested in the push and pull of transparency alongside language as a way to think through Black experience—so
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glass just made sense as a material to more thoughtfully incorporate into my work.” Weston’s affection for words and writing allows me to think on her relationship with glass a bit deeper. Parallels emerge between her curation of installation work largely featuring sheets of glass and her curation of words onto a sheet a paper; very different material substrates in sheet form that are both ripe for providing clarity (in one way or another) and yet equally wrought with paradox. Both are rigid, but both are malleable. Both are fragile and easily destroyed, yet equally capable GASNEWS
of being dangerous and searing. Both live in the material identity of something like a contronym; shipped from their distributor as flat parallelograms that exist indeterminately as both a two-dimensional surface and a 3-dimensional object. The moments where commonality and contradiction crossover are frequent in Weston’s material handling and conceptual consideration, making for a body of work rich with layered coatings of intent. In fact, notions of “the layer” and “layering”—of things placed between things—is a method of organizing visual information within her practice worth unpacking, too. For instance, in black notes for the thing left there (or when darkness risks being the forever nocturnal source of light itself, notes two of nine), clear sheet glass panels whole, warped, and broken lay over one another with printed text on transparency film placed in various spaces between them. One way in which Weston is layering visual information is through this topographical approach to installation; a horizontal landscape of isolated moments of glass and textual fragmentation. In the metanarrative series, Weston uses a vertical method for layering visual information in an upward stacking of found masonry to support a series of warped, light tan sheet glass leaning on one another against the wall. In addition, there are moments when these glass sheets withhold imagery and/or text fired on, inscribed into, or trapped within its surface to further punctuate this method of organizing information. Structurally layering visual components up by way of stacking, she simultaneously layers graphic information through by way of transparency. Perhaps the most sophisticated instance of layering information in Weston’s practice exists in an appeal, but, in particular, very expressly, to (i sink), a sound-based installation where the idea of arranging things over things happens both visually and audibly. Laid out in four place settings on the floor, the glass components of this work bypass flatness and enter the realm of three-dimensional fleshiness, slumped so radically that they become inverted, ripple-
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walled containers; receptacles holding the phantom form of the upended flower pots and vessels used as Weston’s molding to slump the glass over. The layering here is both visually and conceptually rooted; one of absence and presence, a recording of things once there in the past and traces of the phantom image of those things now gone in the present. But there’s a sensorial layering happening in this piece, too; a blending of what is seen with what is heard. From within each of those inverted glass slumpings, a complex weaving of sounds extend from various angles of Black culture spanning across eras of American history. Openended sound textures and field recordings, excerpts of a vintage Pepsi Cola Company LP series from the early 60s called Adventures in Negro History, snippets of blues songs (sung by Weston), and readings of her own poems created from fragments of work by American abolitionists and writers David Walker and Frederick Douglass (spoken by Weston) play over, around, and within each other on continuous loop. This aspect of the piece illustrates how Weston’s creative touch bypasses the tangible as she even layers the atmosphere with information heard in addition to what’s seen. All of these observations are fascinating to connect within just these few referenced works. But the notion of layering reveals an even deeper connection with Weston’s research interests; evidence of art thinking about layering that is worth pairing up with an art making that implements it. If you dig into her website and spend the time this work demands to truly be seen, you will find stated points of reference to ideas, theories, and works published by poets, scholars, and writers of color that act as catalyst for the ideas and processes propelling the artwork that Weston generates. It is here that a term coined by the late Audre Lorde emerges in a statement written by Weston to a 2015 piece called Travelin’ Man; a literary blending and layering of personal memoir, history, and myth referred to as biomythography that tells stories that extend from both the individual and the collective simultaneously. GASNEWS
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felt in the heart as well as uttered in the mouth | 2019 | layered, slumped, and manually folded glass, photographic decals, high-fire enamel, and etched text derived from work by Frederick Douglas and David Walker | dimensions (without pedestal): 20x30”. Photo Credit: Paul Salveson
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An Appeal, but, in Particular, Very Expressly, To (i sink) | 2019 | four channel sound installation of slumped glass sound sculptures, lathe-cut vinyl records, record players | dimensions variable. Photo Credit: Paul Salveson
Could Weston’s tendency to similarly blend and layer information in her work be a visual manifestation of this literary tactic? As a comparable creative gesture of weaving material, object, image, and word within the spaces her installations inhabit, it seems so. To put the notion of layering aside, it should be mentioned that there are many formal aspects in Weston’s work that are as conceptually loaded as they are scholastically informed. And, quite frankly, this article is hardly capable of hitting the tip of the highly sophisticated iceberg that is her creative practice. Material choices and formal motifs consistently approached such as the fold, fragmentation, interiority, concealment, and repetition aren’t just areas of aesthetic dabbling, but creative decisions in her making informed by ideas put forward by scholars/writers such as Stuart Hall, Saidiya Hartman, and James A. Snead. What might seem like a body of work of makeshift arrangements and resolve is actually the result of dedicated research practices and careful planning, presented in a visual means that is serious and somber. Weston’s work and practice are both informed and intentional, even when her making relies on instances of improvisation, chance, or the incidental.
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We’re at a strange place. One where a global pandemic is still running rampant in this nation amidst a backdrop of political unrest and continued racial injustice. If there’s anything to be certain of at this moment, it is that it’s a highly uncertain time. And the deep history of racial fracture within this country (even hard-wired into its inception) is still revealing itself as a persistent threat to Black lives and livelihood in ways both blatantly obvious and systemically nuanced. The world has always been said to be fast-changing; a rapid pace of continual transformation that has produced as many moments of human triumph as it has human trauma. In turn, Weston’s practice takes on a world of racial civility shattered to pieces and translates those fragmented truths in gestures of remembrance involving glass; a material of inherent risk that speaks of vulnerability, mishandling, and jeopardy in ways too relevant to go unnoticed.
Studio Magazine illuminates craft, making, and design in North America.
To see and know more about Charisse Pearlina Weston, go here. David Schnuckel is an artist and educator, currently Assistant Professor within the Glass program at Rochester Institute of Technology in Rochester, New York. GASNEWS
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MAKE SOMETHING BETTER:
GASNEWS INTERVIEW WITH VICTORIA AHMADIZADEH MELENDEZ
searing circuit 2019 12 mm glass tubing filled with argon gas, mercury 30 in H x 30 in W x 3 in D Photo Credit: Artist
GASnews: Your approach to glass embraces technical skills while tapping into the broad metaphoric capacity of the material. What does glass, as a material and medium for expression, uniquely provide for you as an artist? Victoria Ahmadizadeh Melendez: I really do feel that glass has been the most enthralling medium I have ever worked in. I love its transition from movement to stasis, and its unending potential to transform. For me, glass at its best is always something that threatens to evolve once you look away from it. My current work has a lot to do with desire and interpersonal relationships, and what those relationships have to teach you about yourself. It seems suiting then that the material itself allures me, that I should be required to have a lifelong dialogue with it in order to maintain my relationship with it. I view glass as a high-brow material, something that is somehow inherently regal and flashy in its transparency and gem-like qualities. I have never come from money and I admit it’s fun for me to make objects GASNEWS
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that look and feel rich. I’ve never shied away from throwing in other materials, in part because I think about it in the same terms of high-and-low brow combinations in fashion—things are more exciting when anything goes. You mention technique here and I think it’s worth noting that it’s a medium that keeps me on my toes, as both a viewer and a maker. In my earlier years of working with the material, there were definitely things that I thought I would simply never be able to do; actions I would see others perform that I assumed belonged to them. It’s been a fantastic source of personal power to prove myself wrong, to continually unlock these doors and “level up” to the next stage of capability. My development as a glassmaker has paralleled my growth as a person, as I am continually able to shatter my perceptions of myself. You have to try new things in order to adapt and grow. You have to invest in yourself to be there for others. The culture of glassmaking reinforces all of these ideas for me.
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GN: Balancing between finesse and funk, your work points to that embrace of both high- and low-brow materials and processes. Are there material qualities, found or fabricated, that you gravitate toward or are most salient to your aesthetic? VAM: A couple of years ago, while we were doing a residency, my friend H Schenck told me in conversation that my work comes across as slick, shiny, punchy and cut-throat to him. I loved that! I was pretty proud to receive that description of my work; it’s something that I try to keep living up to. That string of words implies having a lot of impact, and I think a lot about how to continue making objects that are able to embody those adjectives. I like for things to be pretty striking, in terms of the color combinations I choose, unexpected textures coming together, and incorporating found elements that seem both random yet highly specific. The part of the definition of cut-throat I think about most is the part that says “fierce and intense.” I’ve really enjoyed working with
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selective memory (the most unkind morsels of the self removed) 2018 Artists’ denim jacket, blown glass shards, mixed media jacket: women’s size medium, installation dimensions variable Photo Credit: Artist
neon recently; I don’t think it can really get any more striking and intense than that. GN: Themes in your work often address personal and cultural identity through intimate visual narratives with dynamic aesthetic qualities. What messages and/ or experiences are you most interested in shaping for your audience? VAM: My work often begins and ends with writing poetry and prose. It’s a way for me to immediately get out my thoughts and feelings without being limited by the rules and regulations of more analytical or structured modes of expression. Then from there, I have someplace to go. My writing deals with hefty themes like love, death, and exposing the physical realm or corporeality as deeply limiting. But I find myself also touching upon the mundane aspects of life in a city, like being really broke or experiencing the simplistic rush of a successful bike ride. I’m a huge music fan and I love albums that take you through it all—the high highs and low lows. I think that when I put on an exhibition, I try to create
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that sort of an experience for people—a multi-faceted narrative we can go through together as maker and viewer. GN: The themes, both personal and universal, relating to your experiences are expressed through titles and expressive handling of material qualities that are often nuanced or nebulous (ineffable). Is it important that an audience decipher your intentions? VAM: So the thing is, I love ambiguity. I think that mystery is what makes life worth living, and I think my art is pretty useless unless I’m making the viewer connect a few dots around the room. However, it’s been a learning experience for me to figure out where I cross the line. Is it a luscious, provoking ambiguity that perfectly hints at a beautiful, subtle meaning? Or… is it just confusing? This summer I took a creative writing class with Minneapolis-based writer Abbey Mei Otis. She talked a lot about world building and ambiguity in short story writing. More than once she said, “Do you want to be good at tricks? Or do you want to be good GASNEWS
at stories?” If your goal is to communicate with others, maybe it’s best to let them in a little bit on what’s going on, rather than just tricking them. A lot of what I do nowadays is creating that “ineffable” mood for people to feel rather than making a hard factual statement. At the same time, I try to be generous to those willing to piece some things together. The titles of my objects are usually pulled from a larger text, which often appears someplace else in the exhibition. It could be on the wall, it could be in a zine I made, but it’s up to the viewer to read the titles, read the writing, and plug some things together. I’ve also recited poetry at show openings, hoping that the audience will use my words to anchor their understanding of my objects. In a similar sense, my artist talk has become more important now than ever, as I use it as a platform to show certain images while I recite specific lines. I would love to make an artist book that shows images alongside accompanying text, I think that would be pretty effective at sculpting a really specific experience and understanding for people.
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Far Left: falling to shatter 2016 blown glass mirrored and treated with shatter resistant coating, glass reflector beads, embossed label, sharpie on gold and silver mylar glass object: 16 in Dr, installation dimensions variable Photo Credit: Terry Brown Left: a brazen love knot 2019 cast glass, blown glass, brass shavings, resin, paper 18 in H x 24 in W x 24 in D Photo Credit: Artist
GN: How has your experience as a woman of color impacted your voice as an artist and educator? VAM: My experience has formed my identity, and my identity is my voice; it is inherently present in everything that I say, do and make. It is a lens through which I offer my every explanation, it is the hand I use to reach out to try to help others. GN: There is a connection that I think is particularly worth noting - your personal discovery, growth, and empowerment through your development and mastery of glass and the use of your experience to reach out to others. What core beliefs or practices as a maker do you find most important to you as a teacher? VAM: When I’m teaching hot glass specifically, I find myself really emphasizing that everyone consciously works toward releasing feelings of fear and intimidation. I try to remember how scared I was to take my first gather, and the false notions I had of what I could be capable of. I use those experiences to help others understand GASNEWS
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that there is nothing holding them back from making what they want besides time, patience and practice. I took a workshop with Jen Elek and was really inspired by her teaching approach. She literally teaches people to say 'please and thank you' to one another in the shop. If you’re upset in the studio, hard on yourself and everyone else around you, what will that really accomplish? It’s easy to forget to be kind when objects become the focus over people. It’s not a human being’s default, though – it takes time and effort to remember to take everything about that intense atmosphere in stride. On a more conceptual note, I try to remind my students that they can always make something different from what they’ve ever made before. I remind myself of this constantly. Just because you’ve had success making one thing doesn’t mean you’re chained to it forever! Many of my favorite artists have made work across several mediums and have a definite evolution of their approach over time, and I think that’s healthy. Another great reminder is simply to “make what you like.” This is harder than it sounds. It’s a taboo in critique VOLUME 33, ISSUE 3
to say that you “like” something, but at the same time, I try to be honest with myself – if I walked in the gallery and saw this piece I'm making, would I really be into it? Maybe there’s a theme you want to work with, and based on what others have done you think it should take on certain aesthetic qualities. But are you really, truly passionate about those qualities? Say what you want to say, and make it come from your voice and your interests. When you’re investing all of your time and money into it, it’s the least you could do. GN: What does the word radical mean to you in respect to the field of glass art? VAM: These days it is a radical act to be any kind of artist at all. It’s going to take a lot of perseverance, focus and risk-taking for us to continue working with glass amongst our current global challenges. You could say the same for any mode of expression, really, because expression is being persecuted right now. Recently, I’ve felt like a weed trying to grow through a crack in the sidewalk. Maybe less important than the material itself in this discussion is the
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Left: altered self (who I am as a semi circle), 2019. glass: blown, cast and coldworked, cast wax, vitreographic print 40 in H x 24 in W x 12 in D. Photo Credit: artist
GN: Those are beautifully drawn metaphors to the material. What area of our field do you see the greatest potential to transform stagnation into movement? VAM: I really love the initiatives I’ve been seeing recently from organizations like Crafting the Future to raise money in order to include a more diverse population of makers in our field. I think that if we are able to not only draw in, but also retain more diverse people in Glass, we’ll get some fresh energy just in terms of different viewpoints and
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ideas being expressed. It’s upsetting to think that some voices may never be heard just because those people can’t afford to “pay to play.” Not everyone can do an internship for free to get ahead, or can pay to have their artwork shipped abroad for a big exhibition. Those issues are worrisome to me, in part, because they have been obstacles in my life as an artist. I hope that we can generate more flow and movement in the glass community by creating more practical paths for people like this to travel along, in a way that is responsible and sustainable for them. Victoria Ahmadizadeh Melendez lives in Philadelphia, PA, and is faculty in Glass at Tyler School of Art and Architecture. She enjoys working in her studio, writing poetry on the bus, taking care of plants, listening to new music and learning about neon.
GASNEWS
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ethos of transformation that I mentioned earlier. A continued commitment to fluidity, an impulse to force stagnancy to give way into movement, an ongoing melting and deconstruction that eventually finds its way to fresh creation and rebirth. There is something better, and it is radical to set out to find what that something better is.
On the cover of the September/October 2020 issue of Glass Art®, RGB Murrine Button by Jodie McDougall.
For the creative professional working in hot, warm, and cold glass
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SUPPORTING THE WORK OF THE GLASS IMPACT COALITION: THE CORNING MUSEUM OF GLASS’ ARCHIVEIT PROJECT by Joe Schill The year 2020 has been unpredictable. First, the COVID-19 pandemic hit in March. Then, protests and acts of civil unrest erupted across the nation in response to police violence and the widespread social, political, and economic inequality that has continued to plague our country. Soon after, Nate Watson, Executive Director of Public Glass, wrote a letter for GASnews (Spring 2020, vol. 32, no. 2) that denounced the glass arts community’s complacency regarding racial diversity and equity. In his letter, Watson asked readers to support the work of the Glass Impact coalition, a group of non-profits that promotes racial equality within the context of glass and offers a platform to shed light on what Black and Brown artists are doing in the world of glass— artists like Jason Minami and Ya’zmine Graham of GlassRoots in Newark, New Jersey. GlassRoots, along with seven other community-focused glass organizations, has made a commitment to introduce glass and glassmaking to communities that otherwise might not have access to programming related to glass. Members of the Rakow Research Library were aware of the disparities in access and diversity, particularly within the glassmaking community. However, learning about the Glass Impact coalition was new information. We decided that the work of Glass Impact needed to be included in our web archiving program, a program that ensures the content of captured websites is preserved even if the websites change or vanish. The Rakow’s web archiving collection will preserve the efforts of this important coalition. Glass Impact is a nationwide effort. Members include the following: Firebird Community Arts in Chicago; Foci—Minnesota Center for Glass Art in Minneapolis; GlassRoots in Newark; Hilltop GASNEWS
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Screenshot of CMoG’s Archive-It website. (https://archive-it.org/collections/14447)
Staff of GlassRoots. Photo courtesy of Shine Portrait Studio. (https://www.glassroots.org/staff.html)
Artists in Tacoma, Washington; North Carolina Glass Center in Asheville; Public Glass in San Francisco; STARworks Glass in Star, North Carolina; and, UrbanGlass in Brooklyn. Glass Impact “represent[s] all of the leading organizations working to bring the art of glassmaking into communities of color, to veterans, and to those who would normally not have access to this VV OO LU LU MM E E2 53 ,3 ,I SI SS U SU E E4 3
medium for expression because of its cost-prohibitive nature (https://www. givetoglass.org/).” These studios connect POC with the world of glass, an endeavor that Corning Museum of Glass wholeheartedly supports. To that end, a permanent record of their efforts is critical. The Rakow Library uses Archive-It, created by the Internet Archive,
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Interns and the STARworks Glass team work with Ché Rhodes for a Firefest glassblowing demonstration. Photo courtesy of STARworks Glass. (https://www.starworksnc.org/)
as its web archiving tool to ensure that websites will be available now and in the future. One of the key features of ArchiveIt is that websites are “crawled” and preserved as they were originally meant to be viewed. CMoG’s Glass Impact Member Websites Collection is open to the public and can be found at https://archive-it.org/ collections/14447. Web archiving is a fairly new practice, so it’s entirely possible that you might be wondering how it works and why it’s important. Websites change over time as content becomes out-of-date or new information is added. Another increasingly common problem is “link rot,” which occurs when a web page is relocated, taken down, or reorganized (e.g., hyperlinks that return a 404 error). These issues present obstacles to those searching for information on the web today, and it’s a problem that will only increase over time. So just as libraries and archives preserve books, journals, and special collections, they now preserve websites as well. Using Archive-It, the Rakow organizes groups of websites into collections. This makes it possible for someone interested in community-focused glass studios, for example, to find them all in one place. The significance of web archiving is that
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Instructor helps student in the studio. Photo courtesy of UrbanGlass (https://urbanglass.org/)
it protects contemporary websites and ensures that researchers in the future will be able to find the information they seek about the past. We hope that this effort to preserve the voices of Glass Impact members is a step in the right direction by taking a more proactive role in supporting Black and Brown artists and organizations that promote diversity and equity in the glass arts. We want to recognize and highlight the work they are doing to create new opportunities for POC, veterans, and youth from challenging backgrounds. And while we understand that this may be a small step, we hope it will lead to closer ties and increased cooperation between Glass Impact and the Rakow Research Library. This may be our first step, but it will not be our last; we are already planning to add a web collection that focuses on glassmaking in Africa in the near future.
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Joe Schill is an archivist at the Rakow Research Library, Corning Museum of Glass
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GASNEWS
SUMMER 2020
VOLUME 33, ISSUE 3
ONE SIZE DOESN’T FIT ALL: ACKNOWLEDGING ACADEMIA’S ROLE IN PERPETUATING HOMOGENEITY IN THE GLASS COMMUNITY by Paige Lizbeth Morris From student demographics to tenured faculty, policy to pedagogy, academia continues to maintain the status quo. The eurocentric canon benefits a homogenous group of primarily white, cisgender, heterosexual, and able-bodied participants. Academic institutions loudly purport the successful inclusion of all people and bodies through their marketing materials, yet the hypocrisy of these statements is revealed in the curriculum, which predominantly consists of white and male authors, artists, and scholars. Diversity, Inclusion, and Equity policies at every university boldly state that you are welcome here—but who exactly is included in the emphatic you? The glass community desperately needs to confront the overwhelming lack of diversity in our field. As the student representative of the Glass Art Society and a recent graduate myself, I must acknowledge and address the collective concerns of our student members at the university level. As we work to redirect education through the parameters of a global pandemic, I believe that inequities which were always present within the school system will become more glaringly obvious. In the United States, our classrooms, whether digital or physical, will be occupied with far more trauma than we have previously experienced as students will be pairing the stress of COVID-19 with ongoing civil unrest. How can we recognize these inequalities if they do not directly affect us due to our own privileges? And how can we be proactive in our own classrooms to ensure a culturally responsive pedagogy that offers each individual student the education they deserve? In response to the pandemic, GAS began hosting virtual Student Meet Ups. It was initially considered as a space to foster GASNEWS
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Screenshot from May GAS Student Meet Up, courtesy of Jenna Green
community amongst the students who were feeling extremely displaced by the abrupt end to in-person classes. A mere hour long conversation revealed the stark financial inequalities among various glass programs. While some students were receiving athome-studio-packages filled with tools and materials, other students talked about the lack of funds in their programs, stating that they can’t afford special programming or visiting artists. While these discrepancies are not new, they manifest even more trepidation when you begin to pair them with underrepresented students experiencing a lack of support in the studio. Many students’ unequal experiences are quickly dismissed by those who hold administrative power. I have witnessed individuals who tried to report discrimination or unequal treatment be dismissed, gaslit, referred to an employee in the Diversity and Inclusivity office, and reprimanded in various ways including unjustified academic probation. VV OO LU LU MM E E2 53 ,3 ,I SI SS U SU E E4 3
What purpose do the (in)actions of the individuals in positions of academic power serve? Why do those individuals respond with resistance when demands for fundamental change are brought to their attention? The dismissive conduct of the institution, whether an individual university or the institution of academia at large, is alarming and troublesome. It directly affects our classrooms, controlling who is present in regards to race, ethnicity, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, national origin, religion, age, disability, familial status, pregnancy, military or vetran status, criminal conviction, class, and any other characteristic outside of the already established uniformity of academia. Systemic oppression permeates the halls of every institution and in academia it affects the pedagogy and the syllabus, the assignments and the lessons, who is leading the discussions, and who is allowed to (or invited to) participate.
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My recognition of this reality led me to consider the possibility of the Student Meet Ups as a supplemental alternative to academia- one where the participants take part in determining the direction of the programming. Glass has been woven into academia since Harvey Littleton opened the studio doors at University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1962. While our community has grown exponentially since then, glass still retains a fairly homogeneous complexion. Tearing down the walls of institutional racism and heterosexuality are not an easy feat when the ideology permeates every corner of our society. Yet those of us taking part in academia have the opportunity to unlearn the status quo and redirect the conversation. We must consider the ways in which we have perpetuated a system that benefits the few and how that has affected our own community. Our (in)ability and (un) willingness to create culturally responsive pedagogy and programming is a part of a social phenomenon that needs to be addressed by each and every individual in academia. It needs to go beyond the performative nature of the Diversity and Inclusion statement and the little black
box on social media; otherwise, academia will continue to perpetuate narratives of sameness through complacency, failing to proactively create space for the inclusivity that is so heavily proclaimed in their brochures. We can no longer afford to allow academia leniency when it holds so much of the structural power of our society and our glass community. While logistics shift how education is accessed during the pandemic, the creative minds of our university glass programs can use this moment to reconsider the ways in which glass is accessible or inaccessible to politicized bodies within our society. Who has this access? What do they look like? Why? And how can we sustainably offer a seat at the gaffer bench to those who have been systematically excluded? We can continue to circulate these questions amongst our community or we can begin to do the work by addressing the institution of academia’s roots in a racist system. Paige Lizbeth Morris is the GAS Student Representative. She is an artist, writer, and fabricator currently living in Richmond, VA.
GAS OPPORTUNITIES To access the Glass Art Society’s up-to-date opportunities, just click on the links below.
CALLS FOR ENTRY JOB POSTINGS CLASSES + WORKSHOPS EVENTS EXHIBITIONS 2019 St. Petersburg GAS Conference Student Exhibition, Photo Credit: Heather Baigelman
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GASNEWS
SUMMER 2020
VOLUME 33, ISSUE 3
RADICAL DEPARTURE – NEW MODELS FOR GALLERY PRACTICE IN A CHANGING WORLD by Jennifer Hand Part One in a Two-Part Series Foreword: In the midst of this global time of upheaval, cultural shifts engendered both by COVID and the latest wave of the Black Lives Matter movement have the potential to reshape the current gallery structure, leaving in its stead a more equitable system of representation. This series will examine ways that visionary gallerists are shifting the paradigm towards allyship and relevance, and how socially conscious galleries with a history of representing controversial artists have found success. Part One: Radical Beauty – Joyce Scott and Goya Gallery, a Study in Authenticity Joyce Scott doesn’t think of herself as a radical. She identifies as a storyteller, a performer, a progressive – and above all else, an artist who reflects the tone of her time. Nevertheless, Scott’s beadworked masterpieces speak for themselves, threaded as they are with narratives of racism, bigotry, classism and violence against women—weighty subjects rendered in a whimsical material. In the context of a medium characterized for decades as long on sparkle and short on concept, Scott’s works have been consistently provocative. She has built a career on making politically charged work since the 1970s, and for the last twenty years has been represented by Goya Gallery in her hometown of Baltimore. A collaborative partnership like theirs that allows for the development of trust can be the difference between success and obscurity for an emerging maker. Such opportunities are exceedingly rare even for the most privileged artists, and have been historically all-but-nonexistent for artists of color. Anyone familiar with Scott’s captivating personality and staggering work ethic will know that her footsteps are not ones easily followed, but it is sound GASNEWS
SUMMER 2020
strategy to study that success story for guidance in our changing world. Goya is a gallery that is “focused on exquisitely crafted, powerful works that investigate the human condition with a ... potent, honest and inclusive microscope,“ in the words of executive director Amy Raehse. Like Scott, Raehse shies away from the designation of radical, positing instead that it is our time that is radical, and the artists she represents are just “the first to arrive with an adequate mirror.” The language that both Scott and Raehse use to describe their ethos is remarkably similar—coming back again and again to themes of close looking, of getting people to stop and examine themselves, and the idea of authenticity. Those buzzwords are everywhere these days on social media, as arts institutions are being called out with unprecedented regularity and severity for their complicity in our societal inequities. Museums, galleries and craft schools are scrambling to form diversity committees and five-year equity plans in the midst
of the dire financial landscape of the pandemic. The acquisition of political art will undoubtedly see a corresponding spike in popularity, but sustaining that trajectory over the long term will require more than surface efforts. Galleries with an existing foundation of forward thinking are well placed to lead. Transparency is another theme in both vocabularies that has layers of meaning for these times. In the countless interviews Scott has given detailing her biography and process, she speaks of the inherent beauty of glass and how it transformed her background in fibers. She manipulates these material properties to her advantage in her mixed media sculptures and installations, playing with light the way that our culture seems to want to play with history and truth. Analogously, Goya is committed to a culture of transparency in line with its membership in ethical art institutions, as well as contributions of community opportunity building and philanthropy.
Scott in her studio. Image courtesy of the MacArthur Foundation. Photo Credit: MacArthur Foundation.
VOLUME 33, ISSUE 3
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With the exception of her jewelry work and pieces for specific themed holiday shows, Scott doesn’t censor the scale or content of her work for gallery versus museum settings. In fact, she attributes her success to the fact that she doesn’t put boundaries on herself when creating. “A major strength of my work is that I try not to corral myself with what I think people are going to like.” She acknowledges that her rapport with her gallery is a major part of what gives her that freedom, but also credits herself in having cultivated that relationship wisely. “If you choose a gallery that is totally in support—in league—with you, they’re going to want to do what is best for you, because then you will create your best.” Scott firmly believes that the right gallery can sell pretty much any sincere offering from a serious artist. Every market is different, of course, and regions vary in the type, quality and quantity of work that will be able to sell. But a combination of sophisticated collectors who are aware of the trends in the field and the ability of a skilled gallerist to find the niche interest buyer perfectly suited to a work means that artists can make political, conceptual, thematically difficult work and still find a way to make a living. There is, of course, no magical formula to guarantee finding a connection with a gallery like Goya. Scott recalls facing hardships based on both her race and her gender as she was starting her career, but persisted by making work that broke down those barriers on its own merit. Perhaps that same tenacity informs Scott’s hopeful attitude toward the direction in which the art world is moving. Technology, for instance, has made it much easier to see how galleries are choosing to represent both your work and that of peers. She has also observed that young artists are far more sophisticated than in earlier days; well-traveled and versed in professional development, they are less likely to be taken advantage of and keen to engineer new solutions. Scott points out that the contributions of young Black artists are being valued and spotlighted by the art world at the moment—both because they are making some of the best artwork on
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Left: Scott’s “Head Shot” (©2008 Joyce Scott) makes a visceral impression with woven beads, glass and bullets. Photo courtesy of the Chrysler Museum of Art, where this piece will be on view as part of its upcoming permanent collection exhibition, “Come Together, Right Now: The Art of Gathering.”
the market, and because of the popularity of BLM and performative wokeness. The idea of black artwork being fetishized is not a new concern for Scott, but she is quick to quip that regardless of the intentions of the collectors of Black artwork, the money lands the same way in the bank account of the artist. Though her art tackles the toughest of topics, Scott’s sense of humor and warmth glimmer through in her sculpture as well as her outlook. She sees several parallels to the profound changes of the 60s and 70s in the times we are living through. Before the 80s when global society fell under the spell of unbridled capitalism, people were challenging institutions and making artwork that questioned the state of the world. Having now lived during two periods of social upheaval, Scott maintains that Black people have done the work to reveal the systemic rot in our societies, and now it is up to white people to fix the GASNEWS
systems of inequity that remain. “The whole world is being rocked, because no one is comfortable while this pandemic is going on,” she states. To paraphrase Scott, who has delighted in disorienting viewers with dazzling discomfort over a lifetime of exquisite artmaking: there has never been a better time to shake up the way we make a living making art. In the next issue, we will examine how galleries are adapting to stay relevant in our changing landscape. Whether bringing art to the streets to overcome social distancing restraints, or reimagining the economic equity of representation, creative minds are carving a new path forward. Jennifer Hand, who formerly wrote for this publication under the name Jennifer Detlefsen, is a Norfolk, Virginia based artist, mother, writer, curator and veteran.
SUMMER 2020
VOLUME 33, ISSUE 3
