My first inspiration to want to cast glass sculptures came from my love of Rene Lalique's early first glass casting around 1895. His incredible works in jewelry became know as 'Fantastique' which describes the imagery from so many "Art Nouveau" glass artists. This is the most difficult material I have encountered as the magic happens in the melt stage inside the plaster mold. I am a self-taught glass caster through trial and error. When I first started there was only one book by very inexperienced people and of course no Youtube.
Thankfully Gaffer Glass in New Zealand developed lead crystal casting glass which is possibly among the best products in the world to use.
This piece was installed in 2018 at my 40th retrospective in Bridgetown, I built it for the kids at Christmas time for a treat. The work is available for lease or for sale. It comprises approx 70 kg. of lead crystal and is currently 1 meter in diameter and approximately 80 plus cm in height.
My passion for glass casting is driven not only for a love of the material but the way colours mix. Like soft watercolour paintings, the pastel hues create an exciting mix that is always a surprise and almost impossible to completely control and unique within every piece.
Attempting to earn a living from cast lead crystal was unfortunately not to be. I believe that the Australian contemporary glass galleries could not cope with wildlife being part of the work as this was not considered (Contemporary design). As Australia is such a young culture this stands to reason, the style was French or European from 1900 and onwards. My failure was not trying to get the work out of Australia to the correct market in Europe.
The internet was just developing when I was working with glass so selling via the net was rare and difficult. The isolation of living in West Australia takes its toll on most artists here, even today. I am simply proud of what I achieved. I discovered that there were only about 10 people in the world casting high-realism wildlife in glass crystal at the time.
