School in Sheffield

This is the model for the gate for a school in Sheffield that we have now had approved - it swivvels on a central access so it can lock. We are looking forward to making the real thing and seeingit in situ by the end of the year.

Birmingham Children's Hospital

It's OK now to revela the detail of the new commissionthat Matt and I have won at the Birmingham Children's Hospital and the National Memorial Arboretum in Alrewas - in honour of children who die in hospitals. I led our first Consultation group this week and learned a great deal about what the staff and bereaved parents might like. For example, although everyone loved this moth wing - as well as the metaphor of all too short a span of life - it seems that in some cultures you musn't depict faces or eyes; moth and butterfly wings don't all have eyes on them but many do. Does this disqualify artistic inspiration from this source? Still thinking about it.

Oxford Arts Week

This is what my display looks like at 100A Cowley Road, with a large framed art print at the back and several others in the browser (one sold at the private view along with a few sparkle plates). A high class collection of work and I was pleased to be a part of it. On show for 10 days.

Public Art Project

We have won the 'tender' for a major project comprising two internal spaces and one external one (one proposal drawing shown here). Very exciting indeed. Unfortunately I'm not allowed to say where or what it is at this stage, though I expect I will be able to at some point. Very thrilling anyway.

May

It's another of those 'What happened to April' moments. Nothing logged, but I showed at the artsdepot 'Small is Beautiful' exhibition during May and have 5 prints at the Braintree Community Hospital where they will be on show for the next 6 months. Also shortlisted for another public art project and a show at Vessel Gallery (haven't heard about either yet). However, during May I have joined fellow East Finchley artists in the No Space Needed exhibition and will be exhibiting at 100A Cowley Road Workshops as part of Oxford Arts week from 21-30 May.

Phoenix Exhibition

How right my last post was: I have already sold the most expensive item in the exhibition - which is interesting as my prices were way higher than anyone else's. It all goes to show that you need to get your work seen and that exhibitions are a good way to do this. It's also pleasing that the Phoenix will get some commission out of it and I'm glad to do something small to support the cinema.

Lights Up

I've got two things in this exhibition - low key, but it's good to be seen rather than keep stuff at home. A lot of people pass through The Phoenix.

New Gallery in Cardiff

This, and two other pieces, are about to go on show at the Oriel Albany Gallery - a new one for me. I've got nothing at home now, which is the way it should be.

Miratis

Launched today is a new website http://www.miratis.com/ where I am one of 10 launch artists showing the 'finest creations from today’s most talented and talked-about designer-makers' (their words). It's good to have stuff out there on view - and this picture they took showing my work is particularly vibrant.

Next exhibition

I am in this exhibition, starting today and ending on Valentines Day. My offerings are second from the left, second row.

Valentine dishes

A set of pâte de verre valentine dishes for the Heavenly Sent exhibition at The Glass Art Gallery which I am about to deliver. Wastage of 4 (maybe 5) which aren't good enough. Hours spent - and with the gallery mark-up, 20% VAT, general recession, and no private view this time, it hardly seems worth doing. That seems rather a down-beat posting for the first of 2011, but we are all feeling the pinch now. Maybe the thing to do is to make what one wants to make and garner it up for better times ahead.

Art prints

We have just launched our website to sell fine art prints online. It's at www.artglass.print.com
where the first range of limited editions can be seen. We have just a few Artists' Proofs available on enquiry.

Christmas sparkle

Almost all my sparkle plates have gone now. I've just a few left (which I might give away myself) so in the end it was worth making a batch of affordable present-type stock. I did well financially - better than posher exhibitions in fact.

Christmas Fair

Alternative title to this post is 'Where did November go?'. I've been a tardy blogger this year. Not good. Here's a (rather grainy) picture of the lensy sparkle plates I am making at the moment for the Christmas Fair at the ArtWorkers' Guild on 5 December. They'll look nice with delicate biscuits - though I don't recommend heavy handling. Inexpensive for an austerity Christmas.

Shortlisted for ...

We were shortlisted for the Award for Best Use of Visual Art in Health Care - not just my work, but all the hospital art - shame we didn't win. Still, down to the last 4 is not so bad and a good lunch at the old Whitbread stables was had by all. I tried to replicate these icecream baskets later - but they went soggy.

Wallace Day

An interesting seminar day run by the Society for the History of Glass in which I learned of two 1st C AD glassmakers who were women - one who did (?blew) window glass. Another talk concentrated on Roman riddles of a similar period, including this one:

A new commission

Not glass, and not made by me but by Matthew Lane Sanderson. He and I have won a public art pitch to make two pairs of gates for a school in Sheffield. It'll be steel and glass, and is a project I am very excited to be involved in. And the hospital has been shortlisted for an art in hospitals award. Some much-needed positives, at last.

Biennale

Last weekend was the International Festival of Glass and Biennale. I wasn't in the main show but had a double piece (which I forgot to photograph) at the Dial Glassworks gallery. All very jolly meeting up with glass people, but I felt somehow out of it and went home early.

And where did August go?

Coughton Court

One of the windows at a charming Elizabethan manor house near Stratford-upon-Avon where we had just been to see Julius Caesar. Pretty - this sort of thing and a lost art in many ways. Our companions at the play admired my glass jewellery, that I was wearing, and ordered 2 necklaces and 2 pairs of earrings just like that. Shows it pays to advertise your own goods. I was boldly wearing all white that evening.

Leerdam - the Stourbridge of Holland

On our way to Amsterdam, we stopped at the Glass Museum in Leerdam. Though limited in its collection, compared to Broadfield House, the town itself as the Glass Quarter of Holland had so much to teach Stourbridge in terms of creating tourist attractions. I didn't see as much as I wanted, but you could tell from the way it was arranged, street names, restaurant signs, proliferation of galleries, and so on that it was a vibrant town with some manufacture still thriving. Shame the Brits can't recreate that. Pix show some modern whacky wineglasses in nude forms and last century - normally I capture the makers' names but it was hot, the others a bit bored and S wielding the camera.