Oliver goes glass working

I travelled to Sunderland on a rainy bonfire night to spend a day making glass marbles at the National Glass Centre. After arriving late due to my poor time management, we met the artist-teacher Zoe Garner (https://www.zoegarner.co.uk/home). We were taken backstage into the workshop and after a health and safety brief, we were let loose on the glass and blowtorches. We were each charged with making three different types of marble. Zoe expertly showed the group the different techniques and methods we would need to create the marbles. It all looked simple and easy to do. This was certainly not the case.

Working with glass is hard, and I struggled most of the time. Making perfect spheres was extremely hard and the constant management of the behaviours of the material over a 1200 °C blow torch required extreme amounts of concentration. It certainly is not something that can be learnt from a text or book. Even being shown by Zoe – an expert – still didn’t result in me successfully replicating her methods. However, by the end, I did learn some techniques, becoming more confident in making something that resembled a sphere, using moulds and tools, and working with the malleability of glass at extreme temperatures. I learnt that dexterity and feel are essential skills to glass working as I was often applying too much force to the marbles, causing them to be misshapen or creased. I further learnt how the ability to replicate something doesn’t equate to expertise. By the end of the session, I was able to react and correct issues as they occurred, but I was unable to understand how to avoid those issues or why they were occurring.

I ended the long day having produced three different marbles. I was exhausted from the heat exposure and constant concentration but thoroughly satisfied and happy with the day’s activities. Overall, it was a successful day that made me think about my thesis and the glass workers I study in a new manner.