About the Artist
I was raised in the country, in (more-or-less) a cabin in the woods. We were far from any larger cities, at least a full thirty to forty minutes worth of a drive. So, while I did have friends, I spent a lot of time around nature and floating about in my own mind in the dreams of the fantasy books that I read.
I had always found beauty in nature. I mean, there was a forest right outside my window, so how could I not? And I wandered through those woods often, finding gorgeous curiosities and watching birds and creatures as they went about their own lives. But, I was still a homebody and still loved spending most of my time curled up with a book. Thus, the majority of my sketches and art revolved around fantasy.
It wasn't until my Marine Biology class in High School that I was introduced to a vastly different part of nature that I had never experienced. The Ocean and Coral Reefs. I didn't realize how absolutely mind-blowing it all was until our class went snorkeling around the coral reefs in the ocean around Key Largo, Florida. The beauty of the corals and the creatures was beyond anything I had imagined seeing in person.
So, when I started college at Bowling Green State University, I actually went in for Marine Biology. I fully expected that I would go on to be a Marine Biologist working in the field. However, the call of the art world was still stronger and I switched my major to Art (my mom had asked me what took so long!). It wasn't difficult for me to pick a focus, either, considering glass was such a fascinating medium.
The funny thing about my time earning my bachelors degree in Glass Blowing, though, was that I was definitely not the best at it. The large scale work of using a long, heavy, steel rod and large clumsy tools had not been easy for me, in spite of my passion for it. And I struggled with it, even when our class had the opportunity to go to Murano, in Venice, Italy, and study at the Abetti Zanetti School of Glass. When they were teaching us to use the even softer glass that Venetians use, I actually struggled even harder! I didn't have the skill for it. At least, not that side of hot sculpting.
But, one day, we were introduced to another facet of glass: flame working. We were set behind a torch and handed thin rods of glass and small tools and given tutorials and allowed to test things out with it. Oh, I was terrible at it! The glass melted so much easier and was so sensitive! I definitely caught some of the ire of my classmates because my glass kept popping in the flames and sending hot shards everywhere! But, the tiny detail you could get fascinated me more than any other kind of sculpting I had been introduced to.
Thus started the journey of teaching myself how to work hot glass in front of a torch. There were no classes back in Bowling Green, at the time, for it. So, I had to purchase my own cheap starting torch and a small propane tank and used glass strands I pulled on my own from the furnaces. I spent a lot of time sitting on the cement floor of the hot shop with that small tank squeezed between my legs to keep it steady so the torch wouldn't accidentally fall over and set something or myself on fire. The majority of that time was spent just playing and experimenting. Seeing what I could do. And I found I had, once I understood how it worked much better, that I was actually good at picking up the skills. It was something I was much more capable of and did really well at!
So, that was the beginning of my adventures with flame working. And I haven't stopped. My greatest inspiration at the beginning, and a person I still follow, was and is Wesley Flemming. His works with insects and arachnids blew my mind. Especially all the spiders. So, as any new and practicing artist to a medium does, I started trying to emulate his works by researching how to make spiders and started trying it on my own. They were huge and clonky at first, but as I practiced, they became smaller and more fine. My smallest spider I've made to date fits on a quarter.
But, spiders were not my only buggoes that I've made. I've make scorpions, centipedes, mantis, ants, and a variety of beetles and more. Then, I began working toward an old love of mine: the ocean. Thus, began a series where I created brightly colored fish, coral, octopi, jelly fish, and waves. So, I might not have become a marine biologist, but I could still express my love for the environment beneath the waves.
From there, though, I then went even further back in my life. Strange how, at some point, we begin looking back. Back to our first loves in life. Mine had been the trees of the forests I grew up around. Large, sturdy, alive in a way people can't even begin to understand. There is something fascinating and awe-inspiring about trees. About how old some of them are. Some can grow to be hundreds of years old! What have these ancient trees seen? What memories do they hold within them? If they could speak, what would they tell us? They are silent guardians of memories.
This is what started the beginning of my Memory Trees and eventually lead to my Memory Tree Memorials.
I had always found beauty in nature. I mean, there was a forest right outside my window, so how could I not? And I wandered through those woods often, finding gorgeous curiosities and watching birds and creatures as they went about their own lives. But, I was still a homebody and still loved spending most of my time curled up with a book. Thus, the majority of my sketches and art revolved around fantasy.
It wasn't until my Marine Biology class in High School that I was introduced to a vastly different part of nature that I had never experienced. The Ocean and Coral Reefs. I didn't realize how absolutely mind-blowing it all was until our class went snorkeling around the coral reefs in the ocean around Key Largo, Florida. The beauty of the corals and the creatures was beyond anything I had imagined seeing in person.
So, when I started college at Bowling Green State University, I actually went in for Marine Biology. I fully expected that I would go on to be a Marine Biologist working in the field. However, the call of the art world was still stronger and I switched my major to Art (my mom had asked me what took so long!). It wasn't difficult for me to pick a focus, either, considering glass was such a fascinating medium.
The funny thing about my time earning my bachelors degree in Glass Blowing, though, was that I was definitely not the best at it. The large scale work of using a long, heavy, steel rod and large clumsy tools had not been easy for me, in spite of my passion for it. And I struggled with it, even when our class had the opportunity to go to Murano, in Venice, Italy, and study at the Abetti Zanetti School of Glass. When they were teaching us to use the even softer glass that Venetians use, I actually struggled even harder! I didn't have the skill for it. At least, not that side of hot sculpting.
But, one day, we were introduced to another facet of glass: flame working. We were set behind a torch and handed thin rods of glass and small tools and given tutorials and allowed to test things out with it. Oh, I was terrible at it! The glass melted so much easier and was so sensitive! I definitely caught some of the ire of my classmates because my glass kept popping in the flames and sending hot shards everywhere! But, the tiny detail you could get fascinated me more than any other kind of sculpting I had been introduced to.
Thus started the journey of teaching myself how to work hot glass in front of a torch. There were no classes back in Bowling Green, at the time, for it. So, I had to purchase my own cheap starting torch and a small propane tank and used glass strands I pulled on my own from the furnaces. I spent a lot of time sitting on the cement floor of the hot shop with that small tank squeezed between my legs to keep it steady so the torch wouldn't accidentally fall over and set something or myself on fire. The majority of that time was spent just playing and experimenting. Seeing what I could do. And I found I had, once I understood how it worked much better, that I was actually good at picking up the skills. It was something I was much more capable of and did really well at!
So, that was the beginning of my adventures with flame working. And I haven't stopped. My greatest inspiration at the beginning, and a person I still follow, was and is Wesley Flemming. His works with insects and arachnids blew my mind. Especially all the spiders. So, as any new and practicing artist to a medium does, I started trying to emulate his works by researching how to make spiders and started trying it on my own. They were huge and clonky at first, but as I practiced, they became smaller and more fine. My smallest spider I've made to date fits on a quarter.
But, spiders were not my only buggoes that I've made. I've make scorpions, centipedes, mantis, ants, and a variety of beetles and more. Then, I began working toward an old love of mine: the ocean. Thus, began a series where I created brightly colored fish, coral, octopi, jelly fish, and waves. So, I might not have become a marine biologist, but I could still express my love for the environment beneath the waves.
From there, though, I then went even further back in my life. Strange how, at some point, we begin looking back. Back to our first loves in life. Mine had been the trees of the forests I grew up around. Large, sturdy, alive in a way people can't even begin to understand. There is something fascinating and awe-inspiring about trees. About how old some of them are. Some can grow to be hundreds of years old! What have these ancient trees seen? What memories do they hold within them? If they could speak, what would they tell us? They are silent guardians of memories.
This is what started the beginning of my Memory Trees and eventually lead to my Memory Tree Memorials.
