Let’s say you’re interested in fusing or
kilnwork. Imagine if you could take a course that presented an overview of various techniques and processes, which enabled you to realize your goals in kilnformed glass. It wouldn’t matter if you were a beginning student or advanced. You would learn to make and use pattern bars. You would experiment with airbrushing. You would also get to work with micas, precious metal
lusters, photo resist, Paradise paints, metal foils, even Potassa
Sulfrata! You would prepare stainless steel molds for slumping, create bas
relief's, and sandblast iridized glass to create design images. Daily slide shows of historical and contemporary work would inspire and guide you.
This might seem taunting and cruel if not for the fact that Brock Craig and Avery Anderson have developed such a course, and are now teaching sold-out workshops nationwide.
Craig and Anderson have a combination of over 36 years experience in glass art, specifically kilnformed work. They met on Brad Walker’s
www.warmglass.com, hit it off and Craig invited Anderson to co-teach a workshop at Red Deer College in Alberta, last June.
“Our classes sold out in three hours, and we added a third 1-week course,” says Craig. “That course sold out also, and we had a waiting list of 48 students. The college wanted us to do a fourth course, but at this time Avery and I hadn’t even met, so we settled for the three weeks. The courses went very well, and with word of mouth and some more self aggrandizement on the Warm Glass website, we have been very busy teaching since.”
Due to the success and fun they had at Red Deer, Craig and Anderson formed a partnership with the concept of teaching ambitious and comprehensive 5-day workshops.
The techniques taught depend on the host studio’s available equipment. Craig and Anderson bring some equipment with them: photo resist materials, a developer, washout hose, airbrushes, compressors, etc. Aside from fusing kilns, the major equipment necessary for the studio to provide is a sandblaster, preferably a pressure pot system, a small room that can be darkened and a washout sink for photo resist.
In addition to their comprehensive fused glass class, they also offer Advanced Production Techniques, a course intended for students who are familiar with fusing and wish to expand their design and fabrication processes. Considerable time is spent sketching ideas and drawing patterns for the course project. Students develop good design skills utilizing processes that result in two finished pieces: a silkscreen image on glass and a sandblasted iridized glass work.
“It is our feeling that our diverse backgrounds and the way we approach fusing in different fashions provides a well-rounded overview of what can be accomplished with fused glass,” says Anderson. “This enables the students to leave our class with both knowledge and enthusiasm for when they return to their own studios.”
Brock Craig Vancouver, British Columbia
Brock Craig is engaged in a personal odyssey through the medium of glass art. A former member of Mensa and the Canadian Army, “two somewhat disparate organizations,” Craig says, he has also been a sales manager, tennis court painter and cab driver. The artist has been a student at the Pilchuck Glass School many times, and in 1994 was an artist’s assistant for Eve
Laramee.
“I started in stained glass, and at a Pilchuck Open House in 1983, met Richard
LaLonde,” says Craig. “Fusing immediately attracted me, and in the next year I took classes with Rick, Ruth
Brock-mann, and Gil Reynolds. In 1986 I spent over three months at Camp Colton, being a cook, bottle washer, plumber, construction worker, airport limousine driver and general factotum. I also got to do a little teaching, and enjoyed it very much.
“With fusing I could envision something, cut it, lay it out, fire it, and have something the next day. I liked the immediacy of it, and I seemed to have an aptitude for it. A lot of it came intuitively, and I had the luxury of having three very good teachers in my first year.”
Craig has been instrumental in the growth of the British Columbia Glass Arts Association, having been a charter lifetime member, serving on the Board from 1989 to 1995 and serving as President in 1992 - 1993. During his tenure, he organized the
BCGAA/Pilchuck Scholarship, enabling a deserving, juried BCGAA member to attend the school on a full scholarship. He also inaugurated the Projected Image Lecture Series, a course of artist’s talks given by Pilchuck instructors in conjunction with Simon Fraser University. Dr. Edward Gibson, Evelyn Burch and he initiated what would eventually become the
S.F.U. Biennial Exhibition, a recording exhibition of the BCGAA held at the Simon Fraser Gallery.
His current work is primarily kiln worked, including fused and slumped bowls, sushi trays and platters, torsos, and painted and fired panels. He is also designing a series of lighting fixtures using plate glass, cast glass, halogen and fluorescent light sources and extensive metal fabrication.
“Though I’ve been working with the black and clear
Bullseye, my signature work, for over a decade, I’m constantly exploring new techniques and formats. Whatever goes in a kiln is fine with me,” says Craig.
Craig’s torsos require his extensive knowledge of a wide variety of techniques. The first step in the creation of these torsos is to cut a piece of ¼” glass to the desired shape. After the blank has been tidied up, using a water fed belt sander, it is cleaned and placed on a ceramic fibre mold (taken from a cardboard brassiere stand) in a kiln and brought slowly up to approximately 1150 degrees F, at which point the glass softens enough to slump and conform to the mold. After being annealed, the torso is cooled to room temperature and removed from the kiln and mold.
It is then sandblasted using various liquid resists, including spray adhesive, rubber cement and contact cement until the distressed appearance is achieved. The torso is then sprayed with molten copper using a machine called a Thermal Arc Sprayer. This machine is similar to a wire fed TIG welder, but uses compressed air to blow molten metal out of a nozzle and onto any substrate. After the torso has been metal coated, it can then be patinated using various patinas, or electroplated with silver or gold and then
patinated.
In addition to his one-of-a-kind work, Craig creates a line of sushi platters and trays. Blanks of the required size are cut out of Bullseye iridized glass, the bottom disc being black and the top disc clear, with the iridized surfaces together in the middle. Imagery is sandblasted into the iridized surfaces of both blanks. The sandblasting is very light, just enough to remove the micron-thin layer of Stannous Fluoride that produces the iridescent surface, deposited on the surface of the glass during its production. When the blanks of glass are sandblasted, additional surface treatments are utilized, which may involve further sandblasting using various liquid resists or etching of the surfaces using a Dremel tool with abrasive heads. The two blanks are then decorated with various metal foils, which may include gold, silver, copper, aluminum, and variegated red, a kind of iridescent brass. The bottom black piece is placed on a kiln shelf, and the clear piece is layered over it, separated by small glass beads spaced around the outer edge of the black disc. The two discs are fused together in a kiln at approximately 1400 degrees F.
After annealing, the fused glass blank is inspected. The edges are belt sanded to eliminate any irregularities. At this stage an additional firing may be employed for surface adornment such as glass threads, glass beads or more metal foils, or the bottom of the bowl may be sandblasted.
When the blank is ready, it is placed on a mold of the desired shape and heated until it becomes pliable and slumps, slowly conforming to the mold. After annealing, the rim is ground, and hot worked feet are applied.
“I’ve taken an ordinary, everyday object and glorified it,” says Craig. “Three times I’ve been approached by American or Japanese businessmen to make a carload of sushi’s. I used to be a contractor, and I’m doing this because I didn’t like that. I declined. What I’d like to eventually do is make even more high-end pieces than I do now, little masterpieces.”
Craig’s work is in collections in Canada, the U.S., Germany, Japan and Australia. His work is available in many galleries in Canada including Starfish Glassworks, Victoria, B.C., and New-Small -Sterling Glass on Granville Island, Vancouver B.C., and several in the United States. In 1996 he won the Award of Merit at the
S.F.U. Biennial Exhibition and is now in the permanent collection of the Simon Fraser Gallery, and won the Award of Distinction at Glass Art VIII, held in September 1996 at the Vancouver Public Library. He has taught numerous fusing workshops in Massachusetts, Oregon, New Zealand, Australia, and B.C., and was the fusing instructor for the Vancouver Academy of Art from 1998-2000.
2002 Teaching Schedule
“Interest in fusing and kilnwork is exploding,” says Craig. “Several glass schools have just opened, including Eugene Glass School, Vitrum Studio in Maryland, and Pittsburgh Glass Center. In North America, glassblowers have driven the glass movement. But in other parts of the world that’s not the case. In countries like Australia, New Zealand, and England, kilnworking is driving the movement. And things are changing now in the U.S. as well. More has happened in the last two years than the rest of the time put together. In part, Brad Walker and his Warm Glass site are responsible for that. There’s now a forum where people can answer and ask questions. People know about Avery and I through that board.”
Their teaching schedule is still being planned and confirmed, but Craig and Anderson will teach at Northwest Art Glass, Seattle, WA, in May; Vitrum Studio, Beltsville, MD, in June; Firehouse No. 12, Vancouver, WA, July; Talisman Glass Studio, Chicago, IL, August; Eugene Glass School, Eugene, OR, August;
Bullseye, Portland, OR, in the summer; Creative Glass, in Switzerland, September; Urban Glass, New York, January 2003; and they’re talking to studios in Pittsburgh, Arizona, Florida and Denver as well as England, Malaysia, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia. “It has snowballed,” says Anderson. “Brock and I were surprised to find that there are so many fused glass students out there who want this type of intensive instruction. The students we’re getting are serious. They want to progress, and five days of nothing but glass fusing is a great way to do that.” For more information and course schedule
www.averyanderson.com, or
www.warmglass.com
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