When I met with the powers that be at Studio Channel Islands Art Gallery about the two person show in August, I learned that I had to come up with a title. So, "Greenland Diary" it is. I am planning for all the works to be inspired the diary my dad kept during his Navy voyage to Greenland in 1951.
One of the diary entries started, "Fog and ice, fog and ice." That inspired this piece.
Top section: I had found a large sheet of a Bullseye special production glass while perusing the cache at Pacific Art Glass. It was black and grey in an irregular pattern. Of course, I saw icebergs, fog, the ocean, everything my dad had written about.
Bullseye calls these special sheets "Saturday glass" --they are created by the Portland production team as an experiment. I decided I would experiment with their experiment.
Before firing in the kiln, the glass looked rather dull, and it was hard to even see the pattern without looking at it from an angle. Some areas had an iridescent coating -- which made me think twice about buying it, as this finish can come off as a bit glitzy if not Las Vegas declasse.
Bottom section: I wanted to use a gray opalescent base, as that color flowed well with the specialty glass. I thought about doing a separate firing with a design in glass powder which would complement the design in the top section. That felt a bit tortured/contrived.
The lines in the top section are both jagged and soft. I auditioned the glass that had severe angles created by the bas relief stringers on top of it, and it seemed to harmonize. It is a clear glass, which allows the base gray to show through. It also has the iridized coating. In my mind, any Las Vegas glitz reading was cancelled by the overall darkness of the piece.
Let's hope others agree. I'm kind of in love with this diptych.
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