A new piece is in the works – “Botanical Specimen From An Angular World”. 

Imagine a plant with both curved and angular vines, square and triangle leaves, and angular fruits. 

I will enter this piece in the Tacoma Museum of Glass upcoming “Red Hot 2010″ event.  ”Red Hot 2010″ is Tacoma Museum’s fundraising auction, and this year they are hosting a new competition.  Artists will submit entries for consideration for the live auction and the competition.  Red Hot Artist Grand Prize is $10,000 and a week in the Museum of Glass hotshop.  New/Emerging Artist Award is $5,000 and a week in the hotshop.  And the People’s Choice Artist Award is $2,500.

Stay tuned for images of my piece.

After nearly a year, I have suspended my miniature auction due to lack of bids.  I’m considering adding a For Sale section to my website to list experimental pieces that won’t go to galleries.  For now though, these fun little pieces will remain with me.

I’ve completed a new piece in my toys series – a funny little futuristic car.  My brother Bob and I played cars often as children.  We had a variety of cars from Matchboxes to the big, hardy Tonka dumptruck.  We built big and small cities of roads and hills and bridges in the dirt and drove our cars around, talking the whole time – “… and then this guy drives up and dumps off a load of special rocks brought back from the moon … and these guys are using the moon rocks to build a bomb proof shelter for the President … ”

This car has one wheel in front and two in back, and a seat and steering wheel inside. 

Although rather lumpy and somewhat square-ish, the wheels on this little car turn, so you can drive it around and make up your own stories.  The little car is available in my miniatures auction. 

Oftentimes ideas come to me not when I am working in my studio, but in completely unrelated circumstances.  Recently while attending a business education course, I had the random idea of making toys in glass.  I’m always thankful and excited when a fun idea comes to me and I can’t wait to get to my studio and try it out.

Sitting in my business conference, I made a list of toys I want to make.  This had me reminiscing about my childhood.  When I was growing up with my older brother, Bob, we had toys that fostered creativity and imagination – Tinker Toys, Lincoln Logs, blocks, cars, a wagon, tricycles, and later bicycles.  We had a huge back yard with a large bare area in which we could dig, build, or whatever we dreamed up.

Just last night my mom and I were chuckling over our memories of the time Bob and I set out to dig to China.  Mom says we worked on that “tunnel” for the whole summer.  It grew to be a pretty big hole.  At some point though, we realized China would be too far for the two of us to dig to, so we transformed our hole into a submarine.  We installed benches across so we could sit and “drive” the submarine, and all manner of “switches, buttons and levers” into the submarine walls.  That submarine was good for days into weeks of undersea travels!

The first toy I decided to try making in glass was a wagon.  This piece was very fun to make, especially figuring out how to enable the wheels to turn.  On a wagon, that turned out to be easy – the wheels are on an axle that spins through loops mounted to the bottom of the wagon. I posted the wagon to my auction.

My second toy was a swing set, complete with glass chains, which will be my next auction.

My third toy is in the works in my studio – a tricycle.  That has been much more difficult to figure out.  Enabling the front wheel, pedals, and handlebars to actually work has been quite tricky.  I’ve been working on it for days and it’s still not done!  When the tricycle is complete, I’ll post images.

Other toys I have in mind include a model airplane, pouch with marbles, teddy bear, car, and a rubber duck.  If you have ideas for toys you would like to see me make, please send a comment.

In the meantime, enjoy the wagon and swing set!

Like many artists experience, there are times when I am just not satisfied with my ideas and my work.  Usually during these times, just pushing out a piece feels fake, like a lie.  I was in that sort of funk with the auction pieces.  I just didn’t have a fun idea for a miniature botanical that I wanted to try. 

Then I had an epiphany:  I am the one who invented that I make botanical art, and that means I can change my declaration – I can make whatever I want! 

My epiphany coincided with our youngest son Reilly’s final research project for his Science and Language Arts classes.  He researched windmills, and in particular, how many windmills are required to power an average 2,000 square foot home.  I had nudged him in the direction of this project out of my interest in installing windmills in our back yard.  Our yard looks out over a small valley and we get a lot of wind up the hill.  I thought perhaps we could learn about windmills for our own home while doing Reilly’s project.   

Reading and browsing through the library books about wind power, I found myself attracted to the different types of windmills.  There were the old farm style windmills with the big wheels circled with paddles to catch the wind.  At the other end of the style spectrum were the modern wind farm models with three very long, sleek blades. 

Happily, my work with Reilly sparked my interest in a new direction, and my first glass windmill was the result!  Of course after this first one, I had to make a botanical model. 

The first of my little windmills is the “Red Tip Windmill” that is now listed in my miniature auction.  The “Plum Foot Windmill” will go up next week. 

By the way, if you haven’t found it, there is a listing of all my miniature auctions.  Choose the Auction tab along the top of the page.  On the next page there is a Past Auctions tab.  Choose that and you will see images of all my miniature auctions to date.  Enjoy!

… And, although I had fun making these and am quite pleased with inventing how to enable the blades to turn, these are mere trifles compared to other artists who make kinetic sculptures.  If you like this sort of work, I recommend the art of Bandhu Scott Dunham, who makes working steam engines and marble machines, among other amazing works.   http://www.salusaglassworks.com/gallery/gallery_kinetic.html

Finally, stay tuned for my auctions, as I will continue to explore the windmills.