Catherine Hough

The exploration of form and material has always been central to my work. The essential starting point of any piece is the creation of an asymmetrical free blown glass form which is then transformed through the use of cold working techniques such as carving, cutting and texturing with diamond and carborundum wheels, grinding and polishing, and sandblasting and brushing. My interest in these techniques arose from a desire to further develop the blown form rather than for surface decoration as they had traditionally been used.

 

My ideas and the way I use these techniques to interpret them have evolved during the many years I have been working with glass, but land and seascapes, birds, trees, and rock formations are a constant source of inspiration, as are the unique properties of glass such as transparency, opacity, and reflection which fascinatingly one can never accurately predict.

 

Apart from my glass making I have always enjoyed walking and photography, particularly of landscapes and birds. In recent years I have combined all these interests by the manipulation of images of nature onto glass. By the use of these images on single or multiple forms I continue explore the interaction of form, line and movement, and transparency, opacity and reflection that the unique qualities of glass endlessly facilitate. I also attempt to further exploit these possibilities by placing the main form on a reflective base with similarly coldworked textures and imagery.

 

  Glass  

25x9x12cm