The following is a copy of Arizona Glass Alliance's contribution to the Spring Newsletter of the Art Alliance for Contemporary Glass.
Arizona Glass Alliance had a fun filled winter season. In early December we enjoyed a terrific presentation by the very interesting Ghanain artist Anthony Amoako Attah, who uses native tapestry patterns to create wonderful glass ‘fabric” sculptures that are both beautiful and meaningful. Anthony’s work is amazing—it really looks like fabric. Later in December we hosted a presentation by the young glass artist Kate Clements. Kate does very large, wall size installations of wonderful outdoor floral scenes that transport the viewer to another, magical place. We all enjoyed the journey and got to know Kate and her work.
In January Patrice Martin made the trip from Tennessee to visit with our group and share some of his life experiences with us. Patrick, who is the head of the glass program at Centre College, is the consummate educator/sculptor, and his work is often filled with his comments on society and the environment, making him a very interesting speaker.
February was a very special month for Arizona Glass Alliance. We started the month with a presentation by the up and coming young glass artist Eriko Kobayashi, whose work has been included in New Glass Review for the last two issues. Eriko does super realistic glass “food”, including such delectable items as S’Mores and gummy bears, and several of her creations got eagerly “eaten” by some of our members. Later in February about 40 of us had great fun at our annual social event. This year it was a pre-Valentines Day bar-b-que, complete with ribs, chicken, brisket and all the trimmings. Many of our members came in their best Western boots, hats and jeans, and a very good time was had by all, including a hot game of “left, right, center”.
March will be busy with presentations by Minhi England and Sarah Vaughn. Minhi does a wide variety of work, and was recently recognized in an exhibition in Pittsburgh, while Sarah is the director of the glass program at Penland.
In April we’ll be taking our annual trip to an interesting glass oriented destination, this year St. Petersburg/Sarasota where we’ll visit with glass artists, see interesting museums and galleries, tour private collections, savor great dinners and most of all each other’s company. Our season will finish in late April with a presentation by the star of the documentary Holy Frit, Tim Carey. Holy Frit is about the creation of massive stained glass windows for a major church and Tim’s leading role in the successful effort.
We’ll go quiet for the summer and resume our activities in the fall, probably October. If you’re in the Phoenix area please contact us—we’d love to invite you to be a guest at one of our events.