CHAPTER FIVEContemporary MakersThf.rk wkrk a kkw ISOI VI Kl) lS IWCI’SOI paperweight production during the 1920s and 1930s in both Europe and America. But it was not until after the Second World War that the paperweight renaissance truly began. The growing interest in antique weights, the rising value of such pieces in the marketplace, and the limited quantities available helped set the stage for the revival of paperweight making as an art form in the 1950s.One of the driving forces behind production of contemporary paperweights was Paul Jokelson, an importer and avid paperweight enthusiast. During the early 1950s, Jokelson approached two of the famous glass factories of the classic period—Baccarat and Saint Louis—and urged them to revive the art of paperweight making.Paperweights had not been produced in significant numbers for more than eight’ years, and glass artisans at the two factories were faced with the task of rediscovering the almost lost techniques. Once they succeeded, the grow ing interest in contemporary weights led to further experimentation and production.As soon as modern paperweights became commercially successful, more glass factories joined Baccarat and Saint Louis in producing them. Cris- tal d’Albret, Perthshire, Whitefriars, and othersbegan utilizing traditional techniques and classical motifs as well as exploring new possibilities in design and technology.This chapter is divided into three sections: Furnace Work Lampwork Cold Workwhich correlate to the three main ways in which paperweights are made. The major technical difference in these three situations is the origin of the glass.

• Halstead Wickes Combi 102 Manual Arts Online
• Halstead Wickes Combi 102 Manual Arts 1

Factories use furnaces or large vats to make their own glass, a pontil rod is used to collect the gather, and the molten glass is formed and shaped. A factor’ has the ability to produce more weights of one particular kind, and a factorv usually, although not always, utilizes a team approach to paperweight production.

Most studio artists use lampworking techniques to work with solid glass slugs that are purchased commercially. These slugs are melted down and manipulated into shape over a small gas burner or torch. In cold work, cold glass is manipulated through mechanical means, especially cutting, sandblasting, and polishing.New areas emerge as these factories and artists reach the edges of creativity and then expand beyond them. Still the essentials remain unchanged: the artist, the glass, and the fire.

Objects of beauty and mystery emerge from their skilled hands.Furnace WorkIn this section we begin with the major factories, followed by the individual artists who use this technique.BaccaratIn October 1951, a magnificent millefiori paperweight was found in the cornerstone of the old parish church at Baccarat, which had been severely damaged during World War II. The weight, which included an 1853 date cane, contained 233 millefiori canes. The piece was made by Baccarat’s master craftsman at that time, Martin Kayser. The dis-5.2 Antique Baccarat close packed tuillefiori (1848)covery of the “Church Weight,” as it has come to be called, helped rekindle interest in paperweight making at Baccarat.The first contemporary weight made by the factory was not, interestingly enough, a millefiori design. Because Baccarat had no records of the millefiori technique, it took several years of research and experimentation before its craftsmen finally succeeded in producing some millefiori pieces in 1957. By that time the company had already rediscovered, mastered, and begun production of anotherstyle of paperweight—the sulphide.Baccarat began making sulphide paperweights in 1953, again at the urging of collector and connoisseur Paul Jokelson.

The first attempt, which was a piece based on Dwight D. Eisenhower’s5.3 Baccarat Eisenhower sulphidecampaign medal, was unsuccessful. But the experiment proved to the craftsmen that encasing cameos in glass could be done.Later that year the factory produced its first successful contemporary sulphide to celebrate the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. This paperweight, which portrayed the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh in double profile, was extremely popular and led Baccarat to the production of a long series of sulphides.In 1968, Baccarat craftsman Jean Benoit began working on lampwork-style paperweights.

With the advice and help of American paperweight maker Francis Whittemore, Benoit soon mastered the technique, and in the early 1970s Baccarat added lampwork weights to its contemporary line. In 1974 Baccarat began producing a lampwork collection for each year, using one theme throughout. These weights present a variety of flowers, fruit, or animals on clear and colored grounds 5.8. 5.5 Outside the Baccarat factoryAll Baccarat contemporary weights hear an acid- etched seal that includes the words “Baccarat, France” and the outlined forms of a goblet, decanter, and tumbler. An interior date/signature cane and the number of the item are often included in special limited edition weights. Most Baccarat sulphide weights are inscribed on the edge of the bust with one or more of the following pieces of information: the artist’s name, the year the sculpture was created, and the name of the subject 5.7. 5.10 Inside the Baccarat factoryBaccarat Millefiori: By 1957 Baccarat had mastered the millefiori technique and was producing a few fine millefiori paperweights.

These pieces, which were marked #1 to #9, or dated 1957, were not distributed commercially. In 1958 the factory produced its first weights for sale; these weights contained the figure 8 for theyear of identification. Later that year weights with canes bearing the tw elve signs of the zodiac in black and white opaline were introduced. These zodiac canes are included in modern Baccarat close packed millefiori to help collectors distinguish them from antique pieces.To commemorate Baccarat’s bicentennial the factory created a limited edition of special millefiori weights that included a cane inscribed “Baccarat 1764-1964.” Twenty-six of these pieces were marked from A to Z, twenty filigree weights were marked from #1 to #20, and twenty couronne weights were marked from #21 to #40. These paperweights were primarily given to Baccarat employees and were not made available to the public.Over the years Baccarat designs have grow n to include a wide variety of patterned millefiori motifs, carpet grounds, filigrees or “semis dc perlcs,” and mushroom overlays.

Baccarat millefiori weights generally contain from 180 to 220 canes.In 1971 Baccarat revived the Gridel silhouette canes. These marvelous silhouettes based on the cut-outs of a child had been considered a trademark of the factory’s millefiori work during the nineteenth century (see the story’ of the Ciridel canes in Chapter Four). A series of eighteen weights was produced over a period of eight years.

Each of these contemporary Gridel weights has an enlarged central animal cane surrounded by a millefiori pattern including the other seventeen Gridel canes. The rooster and the squirrel, which were the first pieces produced in the series, w’ere issued in quantities of 1200. Each subsequent design was limited to not more than 350 pieces.Baccarat Sulphides: Since the first Baccarat sulphide was produced in 1953, many other sulphides have been made, often in honor of American presidents and other notable world figures. The majority of these pieces were produced in limited editions. To mark the completion of a particular limited edition and to ensure that no further pieces are made, the cameo mold is ground down to destroy its face. In the case of the coronation sulphide, this was done ceremonially, with officials of the company and a notary in attendance.Most of Baccarat’s early sulphides were designed by the French artist Gilbert Poillerat.

Poill- erat, well known as a sculptor, medal engraver, and designer of jewelry, worked with Baccarat to rediscover sulphide-making techniques. It was Poillerat who was responsible for producing many of Baccarat’s most famous sulphide cameos.Other sculptors who have produced sulphides for Baccarat include Albert David and Robert. 5.12 lodern Baccarat sulphidesCochet, both of whom worked as official sculptors lor the French Mint.

Dora Maar (sometimes spelled Mar), a protegee of Picasso, also designed two sulphides for Baccarat.Baccarat sulphides are usually produced in regular and overlay editions with a variety of ground colors and cutting designs. Baccarat’s regular sulphides are set in clear crystal and measure approximately 2 3/4″ in diameter by 1 1/2″ in height.

Color grounds include red, blue, green, purple, and golden yellow. Baccarat overlays (single, double, or flash) are approximately 3 1/4″ in diameter by 2″ in height. 5.13 Baccarat Eustace Tilley sulphideCorreia Art GlassFounded by Steven V.

Correia in 1974, Correia Art Glass in southern California is considered one of the finest art glass studios in operation today.Born in San Diego on February 14, 1949, Steven Valentine Correia has been active in art since grade school. He was encouraged by his teachers and was enrolled in a gifted students program while still in high school. He attended San Diego State College and the University of Hawaii, and received an MFA from Hawaii. Originally interested in sculpture and ceramics, his work with three-dimensional mediums led him to glass work. 5.15 Steven CorreiaCorreia was fascinated by the iridescent lustres of the famed Tiffany Studios. The original techniques of Louis Comfort Tiffany were lost until Correia was able to recreate them. In recognition of his achievement, the Metropolitan Museum requested that he make tiles to restore a damaged mural from Tiffany’s Long Island mansion.As the largest limited-production art glass studio in the country, Correia Art Glass has become famous for its art nouveau and art deco designs, iridescent color, anil exceptional quality.

Halstead Wickes Combi 102 Manual Arts Online

Pieces arc in the glass collections of the Metropolitan Museum, the Smithsonian Institute, and The Corning Museum, as well as in the White House.In the first years of production, Correia paperweights featured iridescent surface decorations. Later weights utilized lampwork designs, characterized by floral, animal, and aquatic scenes. 5.16 Correia molded snake weightthe influence of artist Chris Buzzini, who worked there from 1982 to 1986, paperweights were made in an unusual fashion.

Each weight had a frosted outer surface with one large facet cut to reveal the interior design. The facet was usually placed at an angle for easy viewing when placed on display.Correia Art Glass is now run by Correia family members.

Steven has moved on to producing large-scale laser performances, like the permanent light sculpture he created in front of a building in San Diego. He is also making glass sculptures using cold working techniques.

Cristal d’AlbretAs with Baccarat and Saint Louis, Paul Jokelson also encouraged Cristalleries et Verreries de Vi- anne of France to begin producing paperweights. The glass factory, which was founded in 1918 by Roger Witkind, began producingsulphideweights under the name “Cristalleries d’Albret” in 1967.George Simon, a well-known engraver for the French Mint, was the first artist to create sulphide cameos for the factory. His pieces include the first four sulphides produced at d’Albret: Christopher Columbus, Franklin Roosevelt, King Gustav VI of Sweden, and John F. And Jacqueline Kennedy.

This first Kennedy weight was only produced in asmall edition because the mold was broken during production.1 he engraver (iilbert Poillerat, who had worked extensively with sulphides at Baccarat, began making sulphides for d’Albret in 1968. Poillerat was responsible tor modeling most of the sulphides in the d’Albret series, including a second piece commemorating the Kennedy’s.D’Albret sulphides are produced in both regular and overlay editions. All weights of the same subject are finished with identical faceting designs and the same color or color combi nations. Weights are signed on the base with acid-etched letters arranged in a circle reading “cr. J Glass“J” GlassJohn Deacons, a skilled designer trained at the Edinburgh College of Art, formed “J” Glass in 1979 in Crielf, Scotland.

The company derived its name from the enigmatic “J” signature cane found in certain nineteenth-centurv Bohemian weights. Deacons chose this same mark to honor the unknown creator of those ingenious weights and to identify his own skillful creations. The company produced paperweights in the classic style until it ceased operation in 1983.“J” Glass paperweights include floral, insect, and reptile designs in lampwork as well as patterned millefiori motifs. Produced in limited editions of not more than 101 pieces, “J” Glass paperweights are signed with a blue “J” encircled by date numerals in red, green, and blue contained within a single cane.5.20 “7” Glass founder John Deacons. 5.22 The artists of Lundberg StudiosLundberg StudiosLocated in the small coastal town of Davenport, California, Lundberg Studios has been producing quality paperweights since 1972.

It first became known for its iridescent glass and art nouveau style. Later, its clear-encased weights with flower, bird, butterfly, and seascape motifs marked the emergence of a new form of paperweight.James Lundberg, founder of the studio, first studied glassworking at California State University at San Jose during the late 1960s. Classically trained in ceramics, Lundberg worked for a time with Dr. Herbert Sanders, researching the Arabian smoke lustres.A graduate tour took him to Germany, Italy, England, France, and Spain to continue studying glassmaking techniques. When he returned to the United States he joined with David Salazar and several other artists to create a small backyard glass studio in San Jose, California. At that time he became the first California glass artist to reproduce the colors and patterns of the highly acclaimed Tiffany Studios.In 1972, with the encouragement of paperweight dealer L. Selman, Lundberg began applying his iridescent glass techniques to paperweight design.

A year later he moved to Davenport, California, to set up a cooperative venture with Mark Cantor and others. The facility included four melting furnaces, five glory holes, and two torchworking areas for paperweights, as well as a complete grinding setup and lamp shop. Lundberg, who worked his way through college as a technician, developed and built much of the glass studio’s equipment.Lundberg Studios has consistently been staffed by glass artists working in the Renaissance studio tradition, with each contributing his or her unique skills to the glass process. Steven Lundberg originally trained as first apprentice to his brother James. Over the years he has worked in all aspects of glassmaking at the studio and is now a recognized glass master. David Salazar began as an apprentice in 1972. His torchwork helped to enlarge the paperweight-making focus of the studio.

During the next eight years he worked primarily as paperweight decorator and designer. In 1974 Chris Buzzini joined the cooperative to offer his specific decorative skills.

Daniel Salazar, who began as a pontil man for brother David and Buzzini in 1975, is now a master paperweight designer and decorator. In 1976 James Shaw joined the team primarily as cutter and polisher. George Shaw and Chris Bushman also lent their talents to the enterprise. 5.23 Lundberg Studios iridescent weight5.23 Lundberg Studios iridescent weightOut of the combined experience and expertise of all the artists, a new type of paperweight began to be produced at Lundberg Studios in about 1978. Called the California Paperweight Style (or torch- work), it represented a hybridization of two antique styles—the art nouveau Tiffany “ice pick” technique and the lampworking procedures of die French paperweight. It allowed for the direct application of complex three-dimensional imagery and enlarged the range of paperweights being offered by Lundberg.

By 1978 the studio was producing crystal encased weights in the new style on a regular basis. To quote Lundberg, “My work and that of my studio is an outgrowth of my love and fascination with glass. The formulations, the special tools, and equipment have all been labors of love. I always look into the material for my inspiration. I am a glass man.”Today Steven Lundberg, Daniel Salazar, and Samuel Sturgeon are the resident artists, but the influence of Lundberg Studios can be seen in the works of many of the prominent glass houses. Lundberg Studios continues to be a leader in the introduction of new designs and motifs. Currently5.25 Lundberg Studios crystal-encased vasesit offers a variety of fine glass objects including vases, lamps, tiles, and jewelry’ in addition to its full line of paperweights.

Many of these pieces are included in major museum collections—The Corning Museum of Glass, the Art Institute of Chicago, and the Smithsonian Institution.Each Lundberg piece is signed with the studio name, artist’s name, date, and number.5.24 Paperv eights front Lundberg StudiosOrient & FlumeGlass artists Douglas Boyd and David Hopper studied at California State University in San Jose during the late 1960s, where they took part in some of the earliest college classes offered in glass- blowing on the West Coast. After graduating with Master’s degrees in glass, Boyd and Hopper traveled extensively throughout Europe studying glass and glassmaking techniques.In 1972 the two artists established Orient & Flume as a small glassblowing operation in Chico, California. In an interview published in American Art Glass Quarterly, Winter 1983, Douglas Boyd discussed the studio’s name:The first house where we blew glass in Chico was located between Orient and Flume Streets. We liked the sound of a combination of the two names and chose it for the personal meaning to us. However, the word orient also means a pearl of great beauty, value, luster—anything valuable and beautiful. Flame is derived from a French word that means to flow. Our glass designs are flowing and fluid.

So the words orient anti flume, in effect, define the glass.Orient & F lume has grown from a two-person operation to a glassworks with a staff of twenty people. It can be described as both a studio and a factory in that it has the required furnaces and can dependably produce glass in quantity. The facility runs eight colors regularly and has the capacity for.

5.26 The artists of Orient & Flume5.27 Orient & Flame mallard arighttwenty. Still, it is small enough to allow each artist the chance to work and create as an individual.Orient & Flume’s glassworkers successfullv synthesize glass styles and techniques from many different time periods and parts of the world with their own contemporary artistic interpretations. The company developed its reputation producing brilliant iridescent glass paperweights and other objects with art nouveau motifs and elaborate surface decoration. Early paperweights were made using the torchwork, or hot glass decorating technique, in which molten threads or dots were applied to the surface of a piece and then manipulated into a pattern. Its product line later evolved to include lampwork decorations.

Coming from Lundberg Studios, artist Chris Buzzini brought with him new techniques in this area when he joined Orient & Flume. The result of this blending of styles and techniques is a rich and innovative approach to paperweight design.

Some limited edition pieces, for example, have been crystal- encased weights w ith fumed iridescent grounds of various colors that used millefiori and torchworked glass for details.Orient & Flume produces its own glass and creates its own colors. The sand, which comes from pure deposits in Oklahoma and Texas, and the other ingredients, some of which come from Russia, South Africa, and Israel, are melted every night for use the following day. A studio approach is used for most pieces, in that a piece is created from start toORIENT & FLUMEfinish by one person. I Iowever, the shop structure is used in iridescent pieces, so that the gathering, decorating, finishing, and fuming are each done by the person most skilled in that area.Orient & Flume glass is represented in the permanent collections of The Corning Museum of Glass and the Chrysler Museum in Williamsburg, Virginia. Pieces may be seen in England, Scotland, France, Germany, Japan, Italy, Africa, and South America. The company was also honored with a commission from the Metropolitan Museum of Art to produce a series of tiles for the restoration of the home of Louis Comfort Tiffany.Orient & Flume paperweights are signed, dated, and numbered on the base. 5.29 Orient & FI tune iridescent flower zvei5.30 Perthshire founder Stuart DrysdalePerthshire PaperweightsPerthshire Paperweights is one of the few factory- size operations in the world devoted exclusively to making paperweights and paperweight-related objects.

Founded in 1968 by Stuart Drysdale, a country lawyer and businessman, the factory is located in Crieff, a small farming community in central Scotland.Drysdale first became familiar with paperweight manufacture while managing two other glass factories in Scotland—Vasart Glass and Strathearn Glass. Both factories produced small numbers of paperweights but the pieces were extremely simple and crude in craftsmanship and design. In 1967,while working at Strathearn, Drysdale was introduced to the history and sophisticated techniques of antique French paperweights through an American magazine article. Lie was intrigued with the possibility of creating paperweights equal to those made during the classic period.In 1968 Drysdale and the master glassblowers of Strathearn left that company and formed Perthshire Paperweights. For the first two years the operation was located in an old schoolhouse that had been converted into a makeshift factory. In 1971 Perthshire moved into a newly constructed, modern factory on the outskirts of Crieff.About three-quarters of a ton of glass is produced each week at Perthshire. The primary ingredient of Perthshire’s glass is white sand from northwest Scotland.The Perthshire factory employs about thirty craftspeople who work together designing.

5.33 Perthshire craftsman and finished articlesproducing paperweights. Millefiori and lampwork designs are created by the glassworkers themselves and experimentation is encouraged.Stuart Drysdale said of Perthshire’s operation: “If we’ve got one secret at all to our success today, it is that rarely can a person come along and say, ‘That’s mine—I made it.’ Other hands have been involved. In other words, we are really doing what the traditional famous factories in glass and china did—developing a team and a factory name.”Perthshire Portrait Canes: In 1972 Perthshire began including portrait canes in many of its regular and special edition paperweights.

Portrait canes may resemble silhouette canes, but they are made in an entirely different way. A number of very thin glass rods are arranged like a mosaic in a mold, heated together, and then stretched.

Perthshire’s first portrait canes were solid, single color, black or white designs. In 1974 the factory produced its first color portrait canes.Perthshire portrait canes include: SailboatScottie dogPelicanFlowersButterflyThisdePolar bearAngelCatChristmas treeRobinSleighOwlReindeerDonkeySanta ClausOstrichChurchCandleCrownSwanPenguinAirplanePelicanRoosterDuckSquirrelJumping rabbitNursery rhymecharactersEditions, Signing, and Dating: Perthshire regularly issues three types ol paperweights: the special yearly collection; regular limited issues; and decorative weights. In addition, Perthshire’s craftspeople occasionally make one-of-a-kind pieces and some paperweight-related objects.Perthshire’s special yearly collection is made up of new designs created for a specific year, produced as limited editions, and never repeated. These pieces include a cane containing the “P” initial or a “P” cane with the year of issue. In some instances the initials of one of the craftsmen is etched with a diamond stylus on the base of the piece.

Perthshire’s regular limited issues are weights produced in small quantities for a specific number of years. Some of these pieces are signed alphabetically, with the letter “A” representing 1969, “B” 1970, and so on. 5.36 Perthshire Special Yearly CollectionPerthshire’s decorative weights, which director Stuart Drysdale calls his “bread-and-butter weights,” help finance the production of the limited edition pieces. Though not regarded as collectors’ items, they are considered to he the finest weights of their type on the market. They generally display concentric rings of millefiori canes that are often divided by a wheel and spoke arrangement of thin spiral canes.Saint LouisIn the early 1950s, at the special request of Paul Jokelson, Saint Louis began experimenting with paperweight making after a lapse of over eighty- five years. Paul Gossmann, a talented young glass- maker at Saint Louis, was given the job of rediscovering the lost techniques.

In The Ait of the Paperweight—Saint Louis, Gossmann described his early experiments:Finally, in 1951, the shop supervisor nominated me for a thrilling assignment: try to remake, identi- ca lly, nineteenth-century’ paperweights. I was eighteen years old when a long period of research and testing began for me.

With the aid ot Louis Lutz, the first rods were produced, and after a few weeks, the first paperweight reflected the light of day. However, the quality level was low. After a few months, progress was made in quality, and production was just about to begin. Then I made my first lampwork flowers, dahlias. Two years later it was overlays, and then the Queen Elizabeth of England sulphide.

I knew many secrets remained, especially the one concerning the upright bouquet. Not until I saw anold bouquet broken in two, was I able to recover the lost secret.Gossmann spoke also of the personal satisfaction involved: “I rediscover each year the pleasure of inventing for the new collector.

When a paperweight is a success, I feel an intimate joy, a feeling of creation.”The process of producing sulphides also remained a mystery to Saint Louis glassworkers until a nineteenth-century piece was broken open and examined. After analyzing the chemical composition of the enclosed cameo a test weight was produced. This test piece, which displayed a cameo of the Duchess of Berry, was made in 1952.In 1953 Saint Louis issued its first twentieth- century’ paperweight. This limited edition sulphide was made to commemorate the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. 5.48 Outside the Lottott studioCharles and David LottonA fascination with iridescent glass led Charles Lotton to build a small workshop with a furnace and an annealing oven, providing him with space to experiment with glass and glassblowing.

In 1973 he began working full time to produce paperweights and vases in the art nouveau style. Many of the designs he used were from the Egyptian, Oriental, Islamic, and Grecian periods. One of his greatest accomplishments was the discovery of the formula for mandarin red glass. 5.50 David Lotton5.50 David LottonPaperweights made by Charles Lotton are not finished on the bottom and show a rough pontil scar near the script signature.From the age of ten, David Lotton helped his father, Charles, in his art glass studio in Illinois.

While working as his father’s assistant, he began experimenting with making paperweights on his own. By 1975, when he was fifteen, he was producing his own weights.David Lotton’s weights are primarily iridescent surface-design weights with floral motifs. All his pieces earn- his signature and the date etched on the base. 5.51 William Manson “Arctic Encounter” weightWilliam MansonAt the age of fifteen, William Manson joined Caithness Glass in Scotland, where he was given the opportunity to be an apprentice to master glassblower Paul Ysart.

Ten years later, Ysart left the company and Manson took over the designing of limited edition paperweights for Caithness.In 1979 Manson opened his own glassworks just outside of Glasgow. Two years later he closed the works and went back to work for Caithness. His pieces include lampwork flowers surrounded by garlands of millefiori canes, salamanders set on rocky grounds, fish, swans, and several other motifs.Manson weights are signed with a signature/ date cane and numbered on the base. Each design is limited to 150 pieces.Michael O’KeefeWorking in two converted storefronts in Seattle’s south end, artist Michael O’Keefe is creating some of the most unusual and beautiful contemporary paperweights. Reminiscent of Dominick Labino’s early work, his elegant weights display soft-hued forms and shapes caught in delicately colored crystal.

His fascination is with the transparency of glass. Working with the space inside the surface, the paperweight becomes the form, the area to explore and work within.Initially a student of photography, O’Keefe began taking glass classes whi le studying at the Center for Creative Studies in Detroit. After receiving his BFA in photography in 1976, he worked for two years at the Poultry Glassworks in downtown Detroit. Poultry’ Glassworks deals exclusively with the technique of silver veiling, and all of O’Keefe’s paperweights utilize this relatively new process.The silver veiling process involves melting silver and glass together. The variables of the furnace atmosphere bring the silver to the surface of the glass. Critical timing at each stage of heating, reducing, and cooling determines how the silver will fall. Different elements in the formula also cause the silver to react in different ways.

When the glass is pulled and twisted, the silver causes it to change color—from brown to yellow and from yellow to blue. Unlike many studio artists, O’Keefe makes his own glass, so that he can get the perfect glass for his purposes. Thus his unusually subtle and delicate colors are the result of the specific ingredients used in his batch, or glass mixture. 5.55 O’Keefe inspecting a weightWhile in the Navy, O’Keefe spent three years in Japan, where he gained an appreciation of and love forjapanese design. His current work subtly reflects that aesthetic: external simplicity with internal complexity and depth. The inner forms are soft and suggest continuous movement; the outer shapes elegantly frame this movement.

Fire polishing and careful grindingcomplete the impression of fluidity, eternally caught and held.O’Keefe’s weights are signed and dated on the bottom with a diamond stylus.Parabelle GlassIn 1983, with the help of his wife Doris, Gary Scrutton began making paperweights in a small studio in hack of their home in Portland, Oregon. Using the name Parabelle Glass, the Scruttons are the only studio artists in this country concentrating exclusively on the production of millefiori weights.Gary first began working in glass in the 1940s. His Portland-based glass business produced stained glass for churches and restaurants throughout the United States. In 1981 Gary began developing a glass studio at home, and in 1983 he sold his stained glass business to his two sons. Then he began making millefiori paperweights, which, he says, hold so much more mystery for him.With only the most general information available, Gary spent the first year in his new studio unraveling the mystery—experimenting with the making of glass and the development of techniques. Unlike the big factories, he had no archives, no resources, no history to help him. He worked diligently to overcome the host of problems involving equipment, design, and the making of colors and canes.

5.56 Gary and Doris Scruttondent in their close packed millefiori, garlands, and basket motifs. Of special note is the unique pansy cane, a Parabelle exclusive. Gary has also designed eight silhouette canes, including a squirrel, elephant, rabbit, dove, butterfly, and rooster.Parabelle weights are signed “PG” in a cane within the design.Doris Scrutton primarily creates the paperweight designs, but she is also the walker in stretching the millefiori canes. In the traditional manner, pontil rods are attached to each end of a thick heated cane. She then walks—or runs—stretching the glass rod from forty to one hundred feet, depending on the temperature of the glass and the diameter desired.

5.58 Gary Scnitton blocking it weight5.59 Outside the Parabelle Glass studioIn contrast to many studio artists Gary makes all his own colors, purchasing his raw materials from a local supplier. In this way he can have everything in his control. Lie has also developed a highly sophisticated glass studio with computers regulating the temperatures of the furnace and the glass formulas. The main furnace holds two hooded pots, very similar to what the French use, and two smaller pots for colors. I Ie melts about 160 pounds of crystal each week.The Scruttons have been greatly influenced by French weights, particularly Clichy, in terms of paperweight style, color, and design. Their contemporary use of classical motifs is especially evi-David SalazarDavid Salazar is an artist of unbounded creativity and enthusiasm.

Few other furnace artists can consistently offer such a wide range of styles, colors, sizes, and design motifs. Salazar calls himself a “one-man factory.” As this factory he melts his own glass, makes his own colored glass, pulls his own rods and millefiori, and makes designs that continue to expand the possibilities of creative glass paperweights.David Salazar was first introduced to glass in 1972 while studying at California State University at Sanjose. He chanced to meetMarkCantor, who was then sharing a studio with James Lundberg. Salazar was fascinated by the hot glass process and was offered a job as apprentice to Cantor. At the same time he met Lawrence Selman, who expressed a desire for the two artists to develop a line of paperweights.

His interest was in design, and the medium of glass offered the perfect format for his creative skills and artistic vision.Salazar worked for ten years at Lundberg Studios, becoming its chief paperweight designer and decorator; at times working with Chris Buzzini andjames Shaw; and introducinghis brother Daniel to the world of paperweights. He has also workedwith Correia Art Glass and with Zephyr Studios. In 1985 he built his own studio in Santa Cruz, California. There, with two furnaces, three color pots, two glory holes, and a state-of-the-art air/gas mixer, he is recreating in paperweights the beauty and variety of the world he sees. Undersea life, the night sky, the moon and the waves, surface design florals, romantic hearts, and swirls are all within his wide range of expression.

5.64 Paperweights by Paul Ysart Paul YsartBorn in Barcelona in 1904, Paul Ysart is considered one of the most important contributors to paperweight making in the twentieth century. A paperweight artist since the 1930s, Ysart was one of the first contemporary craftsmen to rediscover and refine techniques used in making weights.Both Ysart’s father, Salvador, and his grandfather were glassblowers in Spain. Just prior to World War I, Salvador moved his family to France, where he worked as a master glassblower in Lyon, Marseilles, and Paris. In 1915 the family moved to Scotland, where Salvador worked at the Edinburgh and Leith Flint Glass Works. It was there, at theage of thirteen, that Paul, Salvador’s oldest son, began training as his father’s servitor. In 1922, Salvador was offered a position at John Moncrieff Limited Glass Works in Perth, Scotland, a firm specializing in laboratory glassware and apparatus.

Salvador brought along Paul and his three other sons, Vincent, Augustine, and Antoine, as apprentice glassblowers. While at Moncrieff, the Ysarts created the “Monart” line of colored glassware, which was manufactured from 1925 to 1960 and was widely exported to the United States.During his early years at Moncrieff, Paul, with the help of his family, began experimenting with paperweight making. Some of the early weights. 5.65 Paul Ysurtmade by Paul and his family were marketed by Moncrieff and today occasionally turn up bearing a Moncrieff label. By 1938 Paul was creating quality 7 paperweights, which were finding their way into important collections.

Two examples of his early work, both featuring butterfly motifs, were illustrated in Evangeline Bergstrom’s 1940 classic, Old Glass Paperweights.In 1948, Salvador and his sons V incent and Augustine started their own business called Ysart Brothers Glass at the Shore, Perth. Paul continued on at Moncrieff, where he created some of the finest paperweights made since the nineteenth century. In 1963 he took a job as training officer with Caithness Glass in northern Scotland.

On his own time he continued to make paperweights, and he created over twenty different designs before he left Caithness in 1970.In 1971 Ysart started the Paul Ysart Glass Company in Wick. Here he could specialize in paperweights and other glass objects produced in very 7 limited editions. Since his retirement in 1979. 5.66 Paul Ysart srwimmiug fish weightYsart has continued to make a few weights.Over his fifty 7 years of paperweight making, Ysart has produced a range of millefiori and lampwork designs set on clear, colored, and lace grounds. ne ofhis most popular lampwork motifs is a hovering butterfly, shown on a number of different grounds. Other subjects include clematis- type flowers, lacy or decorated snakes, dragonflies, ducks, and swimming fish.Most of the paperweights made by Paul Ysart contain a small “PY” signature cane either in the design or on the base of the piece.LampworkRenewed interest in paperweights by the great glass factories in Europe and America served to inspire a number of individual artists.

They were encouraged by the growing market, but even more by the challenges to duplicate and expand on designs and techniques of the past. Together with the contemporary glass factories, these artists are responsible for the current renaissance in paperweight making.In the late 1940s a lampworking technique was developed to produce Krench-stvle paperweights without using a furnace.

The major distinction is the origin of the glass. Factories make their own glass in large vats or furnaces, whereas lampwork artists begin with solid slugs of glass that are made commercially. The slugs are melted down and manipulated into shape using small gas burners or torches.This section includes most of the artists using the lampworking technique. Many ol these artists gained their skill and expertise in glass working as scientific and industrial glassblowers in factories producing decorative glass. Some worked as novelty glass makers. From a design perspective, many of these contemporary studio artists are expanding on the more traditional styles and motifs. They are creating their own unique designs rather than working within the style of the traditional French weights of the classic period.Some of the master artists represented here are entering into entirely new areas of creative expression.

Paul Stankard has brought out the cloistered botanical. Delmo Tarsitano has introduced a nonmagnifying rectangular form to replace the traditional dome. Lundberg Studios is producing crystal-encased paperweights anil vases in their ow n California Paperweight Style.New areas emerge as these artists reach the edges of creativity and then expand beyond them. The listing is not exhaustive; hut the artists included here are the ones you would most likely encounter as you pursue the paperweight in its finest forms.

Lyotte faceted pansy and ladybug weight5.70 Rick Ayotte Christinas weightsAyotte has been keenly interested in birds since he was in high school. During that time he charted migratory bird groups and studied their food and eating habits. He also began carving life-size birds from wood.Ayotte studied at Lowell Technological Institute and later worked as a scientific glassblower in Nashua. In 1970 he started his own business, Ayotte’s Artistry’ in Glass, which specialized in solid crystal, weave, and hollow glassware gifts. In 1976 he was asked to create two life-size lilacs for the White House Christmas tree. The project proved to he quite an undertaking, with each lilac containing over 200 separate flowers. 5.72 Rick Ayotte fruit and flower weightWhile working as a scientific glassblower, Ayotte became acquainted with Paul Stankard, who worked at the same company.

Halstead Wickes Combi 102 Manual Arts 1

It was Stankard who first encouraged Ayotte to try’ his hand at paperweight making. Stankard had noted the lack of bird subjects and asked Ayotte if he would be interested in filling the gap. In 1978 the first Ayotte weights appeared on the market.

For Ayotte, paperweights offer a creative challenge as well as an opportunity’ to combine skill and expertise in glass with a long-time interest in ornithology.In his earlier weights, Ay’otte’s birds were set in simple surroundings and encased in clear crystal. His later work grew to include intricate foliage, berries, flower blossoms, butterflies, nests, and the use of color grounds. Most of Ayotte’s pieces depict birds in their natural habitats. Ilis use of lampwork flowers and vegetation is extensive.Ayotte has also developed a compound layering technique, which involves creating two separate encased layers within a weight.

This has given him the ability to achieve an unusual sense of depth and realism in his work.In speaking of his work, Ayotte say’s, “When you look at a paperweight, you should get something— y’ou try’ to get a feeling. It’s more than making it real and color-coordinated. You have to get a feeling in a little sea of color.”Ayotte produces paperweights in editions of from twenty-five to seventy’-five pieces. He signs his work with an engraved “Ayotte” plus edition number and size on the base.Bob Ban fordBob Banford’s classic-style paperweights have been greatly influenced by French paperweight design. His pieces feature a wide range of finely crafted lampwork subjects including single flowers, intricate upright and flat bouquets, bumblebees, dragonflies, and salamanders.Bob’s fascination with glassmaking is very’ much in keeping with the long-time interest his family’ has had in the profession. Bob’s grandfather knew Emil Larson, an American glass craftsman well known for his crimped rose paperweights.

Bob’s father worked as an antique glass dealer for many years and often did business with paperweight makers Fete Lewis and John Choko from Millville. Also, the Banford family has its roots in the Vine- land, Xew Jersey area, a region rich in glassmaking history and tradition.After high school Bob worked as a scientific glassblower for a year and a half.

I le began demonstrating novelty glasswork and in his spare time experimenting with paperweight making.In 1971 Bob and his father Ray Banford, who had also become interested in the craft, began seriously producing paperweights. Since that time Bob and Ray have worked together in a small studio behind their family home in Hammonton, New Jersey. They share ideas and techniques, butwork as independent craftsmen and have each developed distinct and individual styles. 5.73 Boh BanfordAfter Charles Kaziun, the Banfords were the next to develop the making of overlay paperweights with a torch.

It is a more difficult process, more precise, with a much higher failure rate than overlays made out of a tank. They have also produced distinguished basket and gingham cutting designs. Most of their intricate cutting is done by Ed Poore, considered one of the best paperweight cutters in America.Bob’s paperweights are in a number of private and public collections including the Smithsonian Institution, The Corning Museum of Glass, Wheaton Village, the Chicago Art Institute, and the Bergstrom-Mahler Museum. Each of his weights contains a signature cane made up of a red “B” in a white ground surrounded by a blue rim.5.74 Bob Banford salamander weight5.76 Ray Hanford Ray BanfordRay Banford became intrigued by the idea of making paperweights after visiting the workshop of Adolph Macho, an elderly Czechoslovakian glass craftsman who worked in Vineland, New Jersey. Watching Macho create a paperweight, he became fascinated with the process.

A visit to The Corning Museum also served as inspiration. Thus, in 1971, Ray and his son, Boh, began making paperweights.Ray’s paperweights include bouquets of lampwork irises, lilies-of-the valley, and morning glories, as well as paperweight-style buttons and pendants.Occasionally Rat – and Boh Banford have produced “combination weights,” in which lampwork elements made by each craftsman are encased within a single weight. These rare pieces include signature canes by both artists.