DIRECTOR’S LETTER
EDITOR’S LETTER There is a fog that we became accustomed to living in. We could still see, but our vision has been adjusted to exist in a place where we understand our lives, our neighbors, and our communities in very different ways. Our adaptive facilities have given way to new strengths, new ideas, and new insights. In our facet of the glass creative community, we have learned to make, communicate, recollect, embrace and empower through solitary and collective adaptation. Throughout this issue of GASnews, writers bring to light an array of insights and experiences on the theme of Adaptation. María Eugenia Diaz de Vivar presents a range of artists whose exquisite and unique approaches transform the mundane glass of mass-produced bottles into innovative designs in jewelry, Kayla Cantu provides an intimate interview with LGBTQ and BIPOC emerging glass artists navigating the struggles of community- and selfacceptance on their journey to grow and thrive, and David Schnuckel delves into the growing facet of new media as a tool for intersectional investigations with the material and metaphors of glass. Our challenges to make, connect, and learn in solitary and communal ways has brought us to reconsider and even redefine our standards and expectations. I believe that GAS and the glass community has emerged with a strength that will continue to fuel creativity and innovation in exciting and unexpected ways. Lastly, I give my heartfelt and sincere gratitude to our late friend and mentor Benjamin Moore. He was a visionary and a leader who dedicated his life to his art and community in profound ways that paved the path for many of us to be better makers, thinkers, and citizens of the glass world.
Artists have long been known for their adaptability, but our world is now changing so quickly that adaptation seems like it has become part of our daily routines.The need to adapt provides us with an opportunity to reassess the world around us and decide how we want to approach it moving forward. It allows room for people, organizations, and societies to grow. It makes us stronger and promotes innovation. VIRTUAL 2021 was the culmination of months of adapting at the Glass Art Society - adapting our programs, adapting the way we bring people together, adapting our expectations, and adapting the way we gauge success. Adapting is often viewed simply as a way of handling unexpected situations, but what can be learned from how you handle those situations can shift your entire perspective. Adapting to the “virtual” reality we’ve been living in for the past year and a half has helped open our eyes to new, different, and better ways that we can serve our community and bring people together. There is nothing we enjoy more than gathering together at the conference each year to celebrate what you are doing in your practice, provide new opportunities for you to connect and work together, and make future plans. Although things didn’t look the way they normally do, all of those things happened this year, and some of those future plans that were made include carrying virtual opportunities over into our in-person conferences allowing even more people to participate and benefit from the conference experience. We have spent a lot of time looking at what we do, why we do it, and how we do it. We are excited to incorporate the lessons we’ve learned into our new strategic plan and our upcoming 50th Anniversary Conference in Tacoma, WA. In our plans, we are creating space for some of the new ideas that came out of having to adapt to a virtual world, and this year, we will be accepting virtual lectures and panels (delivered live) and providing virtual content for those that can’t make it to the conference in person. While there is no getting around the devastation created by the pandemic, we believe the way people have adapted will make our community better and accessible to more people. I don’t think I’m alone when I say we are really looking forward to that!
Michael Hernandez GASnews Editor
Brandi P. Clark Executive Director
GASNEWS
SUMMER 2021
VOLUME 35, ISSUE
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