Thursday, February 24, 2011

Progress on the Samoan Window


These are the centre three sections assembled in position.

Last night I attended the opening of a solo exhibition at Lo Fi gallery by Californian artist ABOVE, his first time in Sydney and in fact his first gallery exhibition. I was already familiar with this street artist's work and got quite excited when I spotted some of his arrows about in Hibernian House. ABOVE works all over the world; it was wonderful to see his work in person.














The exhibition was prompoted by the recent death of the artist's brother and so was titled appropriately "Here today; Gone tomorrow". All the personalities featured in the larger collages are artists who had been cut down in the prime of their careers.

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

The Congregational Church of Samoa in Sydney













While the Arab World disposes of its dictators and despots and Christchurch crumbles, a new work is being built in the studio of Hamilton Design Glass. The pictures above show the left hand 3x panels and the right hand 3x. There is also a central panel, 7x in all, making up a gable window symbolically illustrating The Resurrection. This will be the first stained glass window for the Church which is located at Lugarno.

The design is loosley based on a triple lancet window I made in 1998 for All Saints Anglican Church in Tumut

My heart goes out to those affected by the Christchurch earthquake. So sad to see the Cathedral so badly damaged, but as the Minister said last night, it's only a building..

Saturday, February 12, 2011

Geometry


Geometry is a stunning exhibition at Sabbia Gallery which opened during the Ausglass Conference and has just one week left to run: try to get there! Sabbia invited 25x top notch studio glass artists from Australia and New Zealand to create a piece around the idea of Geometry and the resulting exhibition contains some extraordinarily beautiful works.

The headline piece shown above is the largest work I've ever seen of Cobi Cockburn's, one which takes her oeuvre to another plane altogether. Also demonstrating a 'great leap forward' (to my mind) are the pieces by Brenden Scott French. His work upstairs in the glass cabinet is gorgeous but difficult to photograph in-situ; but I have to say I'm particularly drawn to this rather impressionistic landscape which is hiding behind the gallery's administration desk.






Galia Amsel is a New Zealand glass artist whose name is not at all familiar to me though I have seen and admired her work at the Glass Artists Gallery in Glebe. I find this new piece produced for Geometry especially beautiful and beguiling. It is titled Spirit and in the words of the artist conveys a quietly conquering spirit rising above a dark and complex space.