GSoI: Looking back on 'Orientate' 2013

the auction exhibition in CIT Crawford College foyer
(photo Michael Holly, 2013) 

   

Dear reader, On Saturday the 2^nd of November 2013 the recently re-formed Glass Society of Ireland held its first international symposium; ‘Orientate’ in CIT Crawford College of Art and Design, Cork. Early that morning our favourite GSoI members (I joke, we have no favourites – we just hope even more of you can make it next year) sacrificed their Saturday lie-in to join us for a day of stimulating talks and presentations from a variety of glass practitioners, craft writers and curators.

The choice to include such a range of professional fields amongst our speakers was deliberate. We are acutely aware that the future of glass as an art material relies upon much more than a talented artists working alone in a studio. Everyone is connected by a vital network of dependency – the artists, the writer, the curator, the buyer. The symposium ‘Orientate’ was aptly titled; this conference aimed to uncover how contextualising the material has underpinned glass as an occupation - exploring how we orientate ourselves around the material.

Mimmo Paladino: El Rabdomante, Glasstress 2013

Our first speaker that morning was our keynote speaker Dr Francesca Giubilei. We asked Francesca to give the keynote address as she is Project Manager and Curators Assistant for the pioneering Glasstress exhibition. Glasstress, a satellite exhibition of the world renowned Venice Biennale, seeks to open up the use of glass as a material by giving artists access to the incredible skills and expertise of Murano’s glass-masters to produce work.

 

With her charming Italian accent, Francesca talked us through the origins of Glasstress, a project she described as ‘a bridge between the old idea of glass and the future.’ Projects like Glasstress are breaking down the perception of glass as a disciplined craft material and injecting it into the ‘anything’s possible’ world of contemporary fine art. Francesca’s lecture really set the tone about the pivotal point that glass is at today. The Glasstress exhibition 2013 was on show in Venice until the 24^th of November and will travel to the London College of Fashion next year.  

Helen Story: The Dress of Glass and Flame, Glasstress 2013 

After Dr Giubilei’s lecture the audience had the opportunity to ask questions and converse. An interesting discussion arose from the audience about the importance of ‘intellectual property’ when a glass-master is involved in the production of an artwork. Do projects like Glasstress undermine the technical skills and achievements of the glass-masters? Many of the makers present in the audience felt slightly uncomfortable with the idea that this style of a conceptually led project might be the way forward for glass. While everyone seemed to agree that the collaborations and exchange of knowledge occurring in Venice are exciting there also seemed to be a consensus that ‘we must not just train thinkers’ and that technical skills must not lose their value. 

The next speaker of the morning was our only Irish national: Dr Eleanor Flegg. Eleanor is a writer and lecturer. Craft is her main inspiration although as she informed us, she does not consider herself ‘a champion to the cause of craft’ she writes about it because she finds it interesting. Eleanor’s talk was a personal favourite: though it had very little to do with glass, it had everything to do with the potential of writing to explore all kinds of art/objects.  She talked about the different types of writing that may be used in the context of writing about craft – how it is often indulgent writing, focusing on promoting the artist/gallery/material or bland information based around dates locations and statistics about the piece or person in question. Critical writing is less common but is something that perhaps should be considered more since, Eleanor pointed out, “the reason that I write at all is to find out what I think.” Our thoughts and opinions are rarely straightforward; the reflective process of writing can help us assess them more clearly. She referred to writing as “a making process – it’s just not three dimensional”. Eleanor is interested in finding new ways of writing about craft and she is currently writing a speculative fiction novel based on her experience of a ceramic artist’s work (the name eludes me, I apologise). She delighted us by reading an extract from it during her talk – it was the most unusual way of engaging with an object I've encountered and strangely captivating. 

A central point of Eleanor’s talk left lingering in my mind was the idea that we should be ‘pushing boundaries without being certain of the results’. She is pushing boundaries in her atypical craft writing practice just as exhibitions like Glasstress push boundaries and break material tradition. If the audience – who were largely makers and students - were to take just one thing away from her talk I hope it’s an appreciation of the power of writing as a tool towards understanding our own opinion and perhaps our own practice in a way that is just that little bit more considered and - no pun intended, crafted.

Jerome Harrington, 'Glass in the Expanded Field' - Diagram.

The third speaker of the morning was Jerome Harrington. Jerome is a UK artist with a background in glass making whose current work takes an ‘expanded’ view of working with glass. He is not so much interested in working with the material itself as investigating how it is culturally perceived and utilized.  Jerome broke his talk into 3 loose sections, based around the questions ‘why glass?’, ‘what is glass?’ and ‘what does glass mean?’. One of Jerome’s most interesting projects the audience found was his 2011 study of Glass in the Expanded Field. Based on Rosalind Krauss’s exploration of the expanded field of sculpture in the 1960s, Glass in the Expanded Field is a study of how glass makers identify themselves and their peers within the discipline: subjects orientated themselves on a diagram in proximity to either ‘prioritising of craft skill’ or ‘prioritising of concept’. The results of the study show a wide range of stances by makers as to where they position themselves in relation to the studio glass movement, to craft practice and to fine art.

 

Emer Lynch and our panel of speakers
(photo Michael Holly 2013)

The morning session concluded with a panel discussion featuring the three speakers and led by GSoI Vice-Chairperson Emer Lynch, a curator whose own practice has developed from her educational background in glass at the National College of Art and Design. Emer invited the audience to engage with the speakers and ask questions on issues raised in their lectures. The main subject that was discussed was the difference between glass art and glass craft, and if indeed there was a difference at all. The apparent consensus within the audience was that the labels are generally nothing more than ‘marketing categories’ and that in general the discussion is one that makers can become fixated with but the general public don’t particularly care about the distinction. Everyone in the audience seemed interested in the debate and I imagine that if time allowed we might have continued to pick the speakers brains all afternoon but time waits for no one and it was off to a delicious lunch of home-made curry, courtesy of the college canteen. Yum!

To be continued! 

 Written by Meadhbh McIlgorm 
GSoI Media and Communications Officer