Since that time, we have worked on a number of pieces – both blown and kiln-formed – which continue her conversations among objects and processes, repetition of forms and modular multiples, photographs and their subjects, rendered again as objects. Far from being a glass artist, Gay is equally facile in executing works using complex industrial processes as well as homespun crafty-crafts. I’m pleased to have had the continuing experience of helping her to realize her ideas, and this is exactly the kind of client and relationship I think sets my studio apart from so many other production-only studios.

Gay is mounting a solo show at Gallery Paule Anglim in San Francisco for the month of February. The opening reception is Thursday, Feb 5 from 5:30 – 7:30. Here is a bit of background lifted from the show’s press release:

For over twenty years Gay Outlaw has used the camera to examine the representation of three-dimensional objects in the 2-D photograph. Over time her studio practice grew to feature 3-D artworks using unconventional materials such as prepared food. Working with pattern, repetition and manipulating the illusion of sculptural space, she draws our attention to depth, shadow, weight and proportion. Gay’s work plays actual depth against the illusion of depth, and subverts expectations given to familiar shapes and materials. Combining glass, wood, bronze, cloth, papier-maché and cardboard, her new works are richly playful adventures.

Gay has shown her work nationally, including exhibitions at the Sculpture Center in New York, the University Art Museum, Cal State Long Beach, the Berkeley Art Museum and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Her works are in the collections of the SFMOMA, Berkeley Art Museum, the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, and the di Rosa Preserve in Napa.

See more of Gay’s work at her website.

The post Gay Outlaw first appeared on StudioBlog :: Jeff Benroth Glass.

new solid almond thing

It seems like some of the most interesting ideas for new product come from explorations of ideas that have no relation to commercial viability. To wit:

These almond-shaped solid glass elements, with their semi-sharp edge and hand-wrought variations, began as experiments for a possible installation in a gallery with exposed brick walls. In thinking about that texture and wanting to accentuate it, I thought it might be interesting to make some solid elements which would loosely magnify the surface behind them. So now the unfinished lenses are laying around the studio, and everyone who comes through is transfixed by them. They love the weight, love the optics, love the irregular forms – and everyone wants one. In fact, all but one of the samples I made for myself and the gallery (granted, the imperfect ones) are sold and gone.

This studio snapshot of the remaining piece is one of the larger ones we’ve made: it’s 15″ x 7.5″ x 4″, it weighs 18 lb and still wears the remains of its “sculpture punty” (that snotty bit on the back end that will eventually be ground and polished away). I am still exploring scale and thinking about price for these so I welcome your feedback.

The post New Lenses first appeared on StudioBlog :: Jeff Benroth Glass.