Saturday 16 June 2012

Seattle and New York, New York!

So this next update is me having even more fun in America with my fabulous friends, this includes seeing the new Chihuly Exhibition in Seattle, some fun places to eat and a lot from various locations around New York. Just a snippet of what I saw and did......Enjoy.

Leaving Pilchuck....Sob.



Cool Bathroom at Seattle Glassblowing Studio.


Seattle Space Needle


Chihuly, this guy seems to know what he's doing....




Chihuly's collection of classic radio's


Piano Accordion's 






And this is the gift shop.....these are all books about Chihuly.....All of them.




Awesome planters, I love it....


Well it is Seattle, the weather's got to come rolling on in....


This puts me out of a job.....Kind of like it though


With the beautiful Hannah Carlyle Jeweler extraordinaire at MOMA in NYC 


Mark Rothko.....I don't know what else to say except WOW.


Jackson Pollock, again with the WOW


If you ever happen to be in NYC find this place, best sandwich I ever had, ever.




Yankees.....cool


Magnolia Bakery...yummy cupcakes


Another Hot Dog


Biggest Tree cross section I have ever seen @ the Natural History Museum


Last night in America got to hang out with some more old Jam Crew Mr John Hallett.



GIANT PIZZA. GIANT DELICIOUS PIZZA.


That is All.

Pilchuck: Glass, Glitter and a lot of Slugs




Time to update, the last three weeks have been a crazy whirlwind of Glass making, excellent friends, a lot of hot dogs and lets not forget the slugs......


The excellent Pilchuck Glass School where I spent two weeks as part of a multiples and mixed media class with the awesome Lance Freidman as teacher, Karen Donnellan and Jonathan Chapman as TA's, I have to say I had no idea what to expect (apart from knowing the class would be about multiples, mixed media and connections) and that was a good thing, the first project included eggs...



Now let me explain, the initial project was about finding a way to think outside the box when it comes to connecting identical objects leaving the objects (eggs) visible and an integral part of the design, but also being able to carry and transport them easily. Using elastic bands this is what I came up with, I am not going to go into to much detail with the projects but hopefully a bit later on I will be able to add some images of the work I made during the class.

I was incredibly fortunate to be re-united with some very good friends and JamFactory 2008/9 team Amanda Dziedzic and Mariella McKinley, I worked with these guys for two years straight! Having left Australia in February I haven't seen them for a few months, so this was an amazing coincidence that we were all selected for classes in the first session at Pilchuck Glass School this year! Amanda and Mars were both selected for Karen and Jasen Willenbrink-Johnsen's class which looked astounding as you can see from the owl that Karen chose to make in a demo (pictured below). Picture above courtesy of Amanda Dziedzic.


And Now for the Glitter......



Yes as with many summer school programs there are the essential parties that one simply must attend! This one involved a lot of glitter and very odd costumes.....also beer and dancing, fun was had by all.
And my first Hot Dog.....


Now to the serious bit, making the glass, below are some of the expertly crafted tools used to produce some beautiful, inventive contemporary glass..... and yes that is a carrot.





The above pictures show the 'Magic cup competition' which is basically 'who can make a cup using the most absurd tool imaginable', you only get one and you don't get to pick it yourself, mine was the cinder block and this was my cup, I was pretty pleased with myself.



NOW for the serious glass....Amanda Dziedzic making a beautiful and awesome Japanese inspired radish and lovely life like Fruit made by Mariella McKinley. These gals made some amazing work in there hot sculpting class and I heard they learnt quite a lot as well.

Below I have added a few images of the work that was produced during the class I was taking, my desk shot is the first one. The class wasn't about producing finished pieces it was more idea's based and everyone managed to produce some incredible work in a really short amount of time.





Beautiful Sunset, our view from the Lodge


Well I think that's it for Pilchuck


Now on to Seattle and New York....