Fusing,
a Fine Art for the Future
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Now is an
exciting time to be a fused glass artist. Glass has taken an amazing variety of forms
since ancient times, but never has it had the expressive potential available today. Recent
technological advances have made glass fusing viable for many artists and allowed fusing
to take advantage of the best of many different mediums. A renaissance of glass fusing as
a fine art is sure to follow.
Tiffany may have created fusing as we know it today. Manufacturing his own glass, he fused gold fish in bowls and waterfalls in hillsides, adding them to his stained-glass windows. What Tiffany did occasionally, new technologies allow us to do regularly. While Tiffany’s furnaces were large installations, today’s glass kiln, made of lightweight insulating materials, fits nicely in an artist’s studio. Tiffany began with trial and error, but digital controllers now remove the guess work from firing schedules and allow predictable results. The proliferation of pre-tested glasses has ended the time consuming testing for compatibility necessary in the past. All of which have made fusing an exciting new medium for many modern artists. The influx of artists involved in fusing has increased the pace at which the art form develops. As artists build on each other’s work and explore the possibilities of the medium, they are changing the way we think of glass. Now a fuser can work with the color intensity of a glassblower, the design and compositional elements of a painter and the three dimensional aspects of a sculptor. The only limits are those of ingenuity and imagination. Today glassblowing enjoys a resurgence as schools, shows and studios thrive. But though fusers and blowers use many of the same technologies, fusing has often been overlooked. While working molten glass offers a visceral and immediate experience foreign to fusing, it cannot be used for creating panels. Fusing offers a canvas on which the glass artist can create using the intense, saturated colors available to glassblowers. Fusing also offers a degree of planning and control uncommon among blowers and without the intrusive lead lines necessary in stained or leaded glass panels. Though the canvas of a fuser may be limited by the size of the kiln, limitations of design and composition are a thing of the past. Glass saws and drills provide a new freedom of design and detail. Powdered glass and stringers give the ability to shade, texture and line. Layering effects have increased the color palette exponentially. Now a glass artist is no more limited by his glass than a painter is by the color of his paints. With this freedom comes a concentration on more painterly concerns, such as composition, form and balance. The question is no longer, what can I do with this medium, but what artistic impulses and expressions need to be explored. Rarely have artists had the opportunity to paint their canvas and then shape it to their will. Modern glass artists can give their canvas three dimensions, shaping it over the form of their choice. And the canvas itself can take any shape the artist chooses adding to the three dimensional possibilities. As a sculptor, the glass artist can take advantage of a translucence unknown to stone, metal or clay. From the flat canvas of the painters to the color of the glassblowers and form of the sculptors, glass fusing gives shape and color to the imagination as no other medium can. As the possibilities become evident and the ranks of fusing artists swell, so will the interest of the galleries and museums. Those with Tiffany’s drive, talent and vision will surface at the top of their field. Soon fusing will take its proper place among the fine arts instead of being relegated to the craft and hobby industry. What an exciting time we will having watching this medium grow, mature and surprise us all. |