Kilnart Glass Studio
Medium: Glass & Metal
Location: Powell River, BC
Member Since: 2004
ABOUT
Jo Ludwig started his craft career 25 years ago working in glass, but more recently, he started working in metal also. When working in glass, Jo makes small, colourful, glittering bowls that fit into the palm of your hand. He calls these beautiful, eye-popping creations “ToBs”. “ToB” (which rhymes with “Bob”) is short for “Thing of Beauty”. When making his ToBs, Jo uses a technique known as kiln-forming. This technique employs a kiln to first fuse together, and later form, layers of glass in a kiln. Between each firing, a lot of cold working (grinding, sand blasting and polishing) is required, making the production of each ToB a time consuming process. Finally, Jo signs and numbers each ToB. When working in metal, Jo uses a lot of found objects to make his Steampunk birds that articulate, can raise and lower their wings, and are banded around one foot, displaying the bird's number and Jo's signature. Most birds have a figure, or a little chair visible through one of its eyes to provide a sense of scale and wonder, but also to heighten the mechanical aspect of Steampunk. The finished bird is polished to a high sparkle and glitter.
ARTIST STATEMENT
Like most everybody, I love colourful and shiny things. Glass is colourful and shiny, so I make small, glittering dichroic glass bowls. But I also like mechanical things, and so I also make articulated, highly polished metal Steampunk bird sculptures with dichroic glass eyes and sometimes dichroic glass wings.