Glass Gardens

I work in small glass beads but have always been fascinated by cast glass.  Twice I have taken classes with Loren Stump.  It is inevitable we will make a paperweight near the end of that class,  They turn out very well and it's great to try something new.  It's definitely not my thing - paperweights, that is -but a class with Loren Stump is an event.  I learned things I use even now, fifteen plus years later.  If I could afford it  I'd take a third one.

"The Lightness of Being" by Howard Ben Tre'

What I always find remarkable about the glass artists who work sculpture size is the planning it must take to pull that off.  To think that some of the pieces they make must cool in a kiln for several months - - - well, that is just mind blowing.  It would kill me to wait that long to see how my piece turned out.  I'm more of an instantaneous gratification kind of person with glass.  I don't even want to put my beads in the kiln to cool.  I want to see the color and if I got the composition correct. So, my overnight cool keeps me on pins and needles.

In the Dennos Museum they had one exhibit hall dedicated to an installation by Howard Ben Tre'.  It was beautiful.  The tall sculptures looked like trees, sundials, people standing tall in the wind.  Spectacular pieces!!!  DH and I sat in the gallery for awhile admiring them and resting my cranky left knee while we contemplated which one would look good in our yard.  Then I had to laugh - uh, they are impervious to weather but what about dog urine?  Okay, skip the dreaming about a sculpture garden.