Sleeping and Stretching

And neat socks, as always...

Canal Cityscape

Views from a canal walk in London are some of the best, surreal cityscapes you can find and they change at every turn: some sinister some heavenly. A walk from Little Venice to Kings Cross offers many stopping off points too.
More surrealism came later the same day as I returned to Brixton and rioting broke out on this traditional frontline, a scene that took me back 20 odd years. At the risk of sounding flippant it all made me wonder why rioters are so conventional; the same turf, the same missiles, the same looting (though much more this time) the same number of cars on fire climaxing in at least one sacrificial building with a shop at it's heart. Unimaginative people can be really dangerous.

Canework at Pilchuck

I'd never known how you make patterns like this with glass, so at Pilchuck Glass School (see some recent posts) I had everything to learn. This vase is by Scott Benefield who was teaching the MetaCane course concurrently with us at Pilchuck's Session 2 this summer. He'll be showing at Origin in London in September so do go and see his work there. As our course was based around recycling, I would gather bits of reject cane ends from Scott's studio.

This is a pick-up, you make an arrangement, warm it up in an oven called a garage and pick it up by rolling over with furnace glass.

Then it's hot worked as above. It seems agreed that The Maestro of glassblowing is Lino Tagliapietra. He's an artist in residence at Pilchuck right now in Session 5 - another reason I wish I was back there. I'm definitely a hot glass groupie now, I don't have the patience or time to learn this new art from scratch, it takes years to begin to master.
I love this short video of Lino, what he says about working with glass is so interesting and wise. He makes it look easy of course and you see him pulling the cane which is then cut into sticks. You can keep working layers by putting a cup shape inside another cup shape with for example stripes twisting in different directions.

When I arrived at Pilchuck - ignorant - I thought; why would you want to do a 3 week course just making little sticks?! Now I know better!

And I keep a dish of off-cuts etc. on my table now as I'll never tire of the beauty of these pieces and how they hold light.

It's Open....

Lost and Found is Becky Oldfield's recently opened Bermondsey shop. She's selling her own products: lampshades and quilts from original union jacks and more, (you can see examples on her website and my earlier post) along with lovely retro finds (did you notice I avoided the 'V' word that used to belong to wine there!) It's open on Saturdays from 11 - 5pm and well worth a visit. You'll spot some familiar chandeliers there too.
Find it at 77 Tower Bridge Road, London SE1 4TW

Cat Sniffs the Morning

I wanted to put up a sweet photo today as my last post looks different now in the light of all the urban damage we're seeing. It is simple, charming, amusing neglect that pre-dates this awful phase we find ourselves in.
There seem to be many great shop cats in Waterloo, this guy is from What the Butler Wore on Lower Marsh.

Banksy would approve.....

I really hope they don't fix these....

Flowers on Friday

Pike Place Market in Seattle is known for it's flowers. It was overwhelmingly luscious. The first time I went in early June it was full of lupins and iris.

I love how they look in the old paint buckets too.

 















When I returned in July it was full of sweet peas. Don't know if you can see that price but they were half the price of flowers in Britain.

Early morning coffee as the market sets up is a great Seattle thing to do.

Tinsel Town

No photograph of Los Angeles ever made me really want to go there, I went primarily to visit great friends, I was curious to see the city but didn't expect too much; I had a great time there, there's tons to see. I was lucky to be driven everywhere, though it's a trek and some congestion to get anywhere.  On my list amongst others were Watts Towers and Hollywood Forever....

Next to Paramount Studios and in view of the Hollywood sign is this cemetery with palm trees and mausoleums. Buried here, amongst others are Cecil B. DeMille, Rudolph Valentino, Jayne Mansfield, some Ramones, Tyrone Power both Douglas Fairbanks's etc.  And they show outdoor movies here sometimes!

The Griffith Observatory (in Rebel Without a Cause) is popular at sunset for a view of the Hollywood sign and the city. Here it is obscured by a mega limo!

And here's downtown viewed from the telescope sign.














WATTS TOWERS
Built over 34 years by Simon Rodia, an Italian immigrant who settled in Watts.

I'd always wanted to visit this. Built obsessively and single handedly by Simon Rodia, between 1921 and 1955 it has survived threats and became a cultural heritage site. He said "I wanted to do something big and I did". when he'd finished it, he deeded it to neighbour and left never to return.

He built tall and remarkably strong structures, cemented broken tiles, glass and crockery and impressed objects into cement.

Read all about it on the Watts Towers website.
And watch this lovely 1957 film, The Towers which has the voice of Sam Rodia and footage of him working.

It's Hot in the Hot Shop

This is the centre of the Pilchuck Glass School campus, the Hot Shop is really at the heart of it. It's this distinctive shaped building that is the logo for Pilchuck and instantly recognisable to anyone who knows it.

I knew nothing much about hot glass working but this place is like a magnet, you start watching people working and then you stay for ages to see how things turn out - alot is experimental which is one of Pilchuck's pioneering philosophies. I'm not sure what caused the steam above but it just added to the atmosphere.

I think there were at least 7 of these glory holes and work stations which makes it one of the best equipped communal glass studios around. This is my fellow instructor Nanda Soderberg with whom I'd been invited to teach an experimental chandelier making course; this entailed hot-working found glass objects and glass from the dump and incorporating them with metal or wooden structures made from things we found or bought in thrift stores.

This is Nanda making a Veronese shape vase from a wine bottle.

One of our students Jonah hot-worked alot of beer bottles and made a beautiful wall mounted light piece.

Back Home

This is where I've been. The pond in the idyllic Pilchuck Glass School campus, north of Seattle in a tree farm. We swam here on a hot day, at night there was always a loud frogs chorus here.

My fellow team members for our (awesome) course Hot and Ready Made in Session 2 of the Pilchuck summer school, more of this later.

I loved Seattle.

I don't think you could beat life on a houseboat there.

Next stop was Vancouver and a view from Granville Island.

A sunset strip of my next destination, Los Angeles, which I loved though I hadn't expected to.

I'd always wondered why Venice in LA is so called - but now I know after a walk round the canals and all the amazing homes there. Apparently this was a run down area not so long ago, hard to imagine that now.
There's a whistle stop tour for now, but there's more pics and info to come.
Welcome new followers, after neglecting blogging for 5 weeks or more I'm not sure how I got more visitors!

Pilchuck Glass School

Last year I was wondering what I could do to inject some freshness in to my work practice. I fancied an intensive drawing course or a residency and I wasn't sure where to start. Then by chance I got a fantastic invitation - I know other artists who do this stuff all the time but I haven't had many invitations and no grants or assistance - this invitation was from the creative director of Pilchuck Glass School, I had never heard of it and never considered working with hot glass. However after much dialogue and course writing with strangers over the internet I am Seattle bound! I soon learned that Pilchuck is a mecca for glass artists, so I'm really chuffed to be considered. This is a skills exchange gig so I'll be learning alot and maybe getting bitten by the hot glass bug whilst embarking on some experimental chandelier construction. Secretly I love to leap right out of my comfort zone, which this definitely will be. If I can work out blogging on the go I shall keep you posted.

Lost and Found Design

Look out for the opening of Lost and Found shop sometime next month.  Fellow upcycler Becky is currently preparing her retail space on Tower Bridge Road. Having taken on the space, she started stripping it back and found it was beautifully tiled, with borders and some honeycomb shaped tiles. I'd been looking forward to photographing my chandeliers with the tiled background, we hung 3 pieces.

You'll know Becky's work best from her bus blinds and reinvented Union Jacks, also featured in London Ateliers by Editions Paumes.

Where Becky led many have followed. Her shop will stock vintage furniture and work by other makers and as a work space too, will be opening just a few days a week.

Gil Scott Heron R.I.P.

How sad to learn of the death of one of my all time favourite singer and song writing artists at the age of 62, Gil Scott Heron. He was his own genre, a totally individual sound and it's hard to think of another artist who can move me like he does. Listen to 'Pieces of a Man' amongst so many other beautiful, painful, soulful, political, funky happy, sad songs. If you're not familiar with him have a listen on Spotify.  Some singers get hailed as great songwriters or even the greatest, I'm not keen on overblown claims because there are so many incomparable artists out there.... but as a prolific talent he probably tops my other faves, Stevie Wonder, Tom Waits... His work ages well too, listen to 'The Revolution will not be Televised', it sounds ferocious still today.

His death releases him from a very troubled life including addiction and jail, what a force his artistry was, I hope he went peacefully.

Getting to Grips with the Gear

I haven't found the transition from analogue photography to digital easy. I had a film camera I loved and lenses that I'd collected gradually as I could afford them and I knew just how I needed to overexpose for slides of my work.  However now that I finally have a digital SLR and two lenses, I'm getting to know them and thrilled with the results so far. I still have a black and white enlarger and I used to print alot and dodge and burn-in by hand etc. I struggled with the problem of dust settling in the film gelatine as it dried and pouring chemicals away, so I can't imagine going back to film, though it seems sad to make all that lovely old equipment redundant. Anyway downloading these pictures seems magic to me and they barely if at all need the hand of Photoshop as my little digital zoom pictures do.

I photographed these two related Jelly Bowl Lanterns before they left the studio, the discerning buyers of Anthropologie have been round and acquired them for some UK stores. There are two in London, my work will go to the Kings Road branch and to a new store opening soon on George Street in Edinburgh.
The Kings Rd shop has a gallery at the front, although this exhibition by Swarm featured on Pia Jane Bijkerk's blog has finished now - look out for Anthropologie's future exhibitions.

Package Deal

Can you see what this bag is woven from ?
Here's a closer view.

It's strips of Tetra Pak drinks cartons.
Have you ever tried to tear one? They're so strong. I bought this on a market stall in southern Portugal from some quite elderly weavers. I love the mixture of the silver interior and the outside's colours and text. I know we can recycle Tetra Paks now but they get soaked to seperate the paperboard, plastic and aluminium which seems long winded. I was trying to think what else you could use the washed carton material for: I have made wallet type things from it. It's such a strong material it would be good to re-use it without having to reform the components. Maybe you could fill them with sand to make bricks and then build a house?  seriously.... I'm meeting an architect friend later today so I shall run that one past her. Incidentally, Mr Tetra Pak inventor/producer is one of the richest people on the planet I believe.

Sound Effect

I was given a brief by a Japanese customer; to make a chandelier inspired by music by Harold Budd and Brian Eno - an album called 'The Pearl'. Have a listen, it's on spotify.

It's ambient music, very very clear, well worth a listen if you want to cleanse your head of clutter and thoughts of e-mails and bills etc. and focus on some serious creative efforts. Anyway I knew the client's wife liked green and turquoise but I saw no colour. The sound is like mountain air or water, full of oxygen - no colour! I also knew he'd seen my work in whites and clear and pearl and wanted something different. I panicked a bit at how I would find a solution. At the time I was taken with lilac glass, for years I never found beads in this colour then suddenly it appeared and it has a really crisp freshness. I put it with clear and opal and some rough crystal quartz chunks and happily it all seemed to come together, reflect the sound mood and most of all please my customers. To date it's the only musical commission I've had - I was thrilled to be given such a task.