Today "Glass Network", the quarterly magazine of The Contemporary Glass Society arrived - here is my page. The questions I wrote about in this piece may be familiar to people who work to commission, or to those who have read my posts from Kelmscott Manor when the questions most frequently asked by visitors were spinning in my head.
Patchwork Windows /
Cirencester Parish Church
I think I've found my favourite patchwork window ever, particularly the top left hand face that I spotted across the complicated interior of Cirencester Parish Church. It made me realise that it's the juxtaposition of images as much as the pattern making that is so appealing about these windows. My previous favourite was the one in Hereford Cathedral (below), where a hand skilled in design put together the section about Joseph's dream.
Pages from the Hereford Cathedral stained glass brochure (click to enlarge)
I've also admired windows put together by artists, like the one at Ripon Cathedral (below), featuring Kempe figures surrounded by beautiful Bridget Jones patterns in blue and sharp yellow. It has a huge impact from a distance and the modern glass is just as lovely as the old.
Pages from the Ripon Cathedral stained glass brochure (click to enlarge)
Although I occasionally make sheets of patterned glass to cut up for patchwork windows as if it were fabric, I really consider this to be cheating. My glass scrap boxes are full of pieces made as samples or ones that broke during manufacture. The birds below were fired in my first ever kiln for my first public commission. I don't know why they kept breaking - the result was a whole extra window.
My bird window, 1986
Teaching Stained Glass /
Twentieth Century glass and stained glass lantern in The Oak Hall, West Dean House.
I always say that the inspiration for my own glass came from looking at examples of old stained glass. I worked out why certain techniques and design features were used and this enabled me to invent my own way of doing things using modern methods and contemporary imagery. When I teach short courses at West Dean College, as I did last week, I try and get my students to take the same approach using as examples the stained glass in West Dean House.
Windows representing the four seasons above the entrance doors, West Dean House.
Above the front door you find these beautiful women representing the four seasons. Their provenance is unknown to me; I concentrate on the pattern making in the background, the detailed clothing and the border. Rob Veck's panel below uses the same paints, iron oxide and silver stain, with a face and some patterns borrowed from another Pre-Raphaelite and her gown.
Detail from autumn window, West Dean. Rob's panel in progress at West Dean College.
The stained and enamelled fragments that patch windows and lanterns in The Oak Hall (top), are a great example of my favourite type of reassembled stained glass. I was very happy to have a fellow patchwork enthusiast, Jane Brocket, on my course for whom a different way of working with glass seemed to make sense. Below left is Jane’s work in progress, where pieces that she has sandblasted, painted and fired are combined with scraps from the off cuts box. I was reminded of panels made at the Bauhaus by Josef Albers, nothing pointlessly complicated here.
Jane's panel in progress at West Dean College. Glass, lead and wire panels by Josef Albers, 1921.
Intricate Designs /
Inside the Quiet Room, Churchill Hospital, Oxford.
Our refurbishment of The Quiet Space/Multi Faith Room in Churchill Hospital is almost finished. It used to be a white walled storage space and now, after much consultation, I have designed glass and acrylic panels, wallpaper, lino floor, and bought some new furniture. Often, during the development stage, my designs are more intricate than everyone else thinks they should be - despite much loved examples of really complicated patterns used to decorate buildings throughout the ages.
Details from the Vyner Memorial window, Morris & Co. 1872. On the right rare (for stained glass) initials of EBJ, designer and CFM, glass painter. Christ Church, Oxford
Medieval grisaille glass: left from Exeter Cathedral, right from Christ Church, Oxford c.1350
These medieval grisaille windows are my favourite examples for showing the techniques of painting and staining on different types of coloured glass and the combination of geometry and plant life that I use in my own work. I was shown around by great guides at Christ Church; Jo Cottrel who also volunteers at Kelmscott Manor and Edward Evans who has written the Pitkin Guide to the windows and therefore knows the history of every single window in the cathedral.
Patterns in a Dorset Church /
I was slightly worried about the way that I had shoved my three Kelmscott designs together in The New Brewery Arts Exhibition (see my last post), but after my visit to The Parish Church of St Peter & St Paul in Cattistock, Dorset I realise that I could have gone further with my display. The baptistry under the tower was designed by Gilbert Scott and decorated in 1901 probably by W.O. & C. Powell. It's a small space filled with patterns, texts and images with no spare space between them. I was particularly taken with one design, used in two different colourways, my drawings of this repeat pattern are shown below right.
Interior of the baptistry at Cattistock Parish Church
I was really there to visit this small, rich Morris window from 1882. The colours are strong and the design is clear, facing the porch this window is immediately more eye-catching than any of the others although they are all filled with interesting stained glass of different types. The detail that I picked out here is the depiction of the wooden surface of the angel's zither - ways of showing wood grain on glass is something that I've played around with too.
My glass painting "Slice through Yew Tree" 2007 (click to enlarge)