Project Complete: Bird Flower Painting

I'm finally done with this project and I'm satisfied with how it turned out. The solder lines are much smoother than I'd feared. It generally has a professional look, at least to my non-professional eye. The most frustrating step was actually installing the wooden frame. I've learned something important about guide holes for screws... and how wide they should be.

Here is the project after I had finished foiling every piece with 7/32 or 3/16 inch strips of foil. I had to evenly wrap all the edges of glass so about 1 mm of foil overlapped off the edges onto both the front and back of the glass. When two foiled pieces are then placed alongside each other, this creates an "I"-shaped support for the lead solder.

[Click images to enlarge]

This is another close up of the bird section, all foiled this time:


And here is the finished piece. I'd like to get a better shot of it eventually, since this image doesn't show any of the subtleties of the glass whorls and distorts the lighting. The piece is a little more cartoony than I was going for. I think this effect comes mainly from the flat green of the leaves. I should have used an art-glass for the basic leaf color instead, to create a more organic effect.

Glass Endeavors Art Show

I'm hoping to have my Bird Flower project done for the Art Show at Glass Endeavors in a couple weeks. Stained glass enthusiasts from around the Twin Cities can submit projects, which are judged by an independent panel in several categories, including beginner, advanced, mosaic and fused glass. There are prizes, a reception, and other happy stuff.

I'm actually done foiling and soldering my Bird Flower project, and mainly need to patina it and get it into a wooden frame for extra reinforcement. Laziness has led me not to post about each step, but I'll do a final post when I'm done. It's exciting to be almost done.

Technically, I should be calling this project a "Flower Bird Painting" since that's the official translation of the style of Chinese art. See this page for a description of the classical style I'm referring to.

Project in Progress: (Even More) Bird Flower Painting

Quick update on the Bird Flower Project. I should have all the pieces foiled soon. It's taking a long time, like every step of this project. I'm excited to move on to less ambitious projects that I can complete faster.

Stained Glass and Modern Art

One thing I like about stained glass: It's hard to ruin a big piece with idiotic "artistic" aspirations.

People who know me very well are familiar with my abject disdain for "modern art." And I'm certainly not alone; this passionate disdain is shared by others. I accept that different people have different tastes, and some enjoy these modern visual oddities. I'd simply ask that they not call it "art." Call it anything else. ("Visually-assisted academic BS" perhaps? This website explores definitions of art much better than I.) For me personally, "art" should at a minimum incorporate one of two things, and ideally both:

1. Be remotely aesthetically pleasing. Not this. Sorry, no.
2. Require more skill to create than a layperson or animal can muster. For example, no. And no.

Granted, some modern art succeeds on both prongs but more often seems to fail on both. This piece by Mark Lawrence is pretty neat.


So, back to my original point. Stained glass is difficult to ruin with grandiose modernity. Even a "minimalist" piece will require a fair amount of effort and resources to make, and the more minimalist it gets, the more it resembles a normal window or an architectural highlight. The modern glass aesthetic also traces its path through people like Frank Lloyd Wright, who made some nifty designs. Furthermore, pieces that follow the modern canvas art traditions still look nice to me, since they inevitably incorporate color and seem more substantial, somehow, than splatters and rectangles on canvas.


In the end, larger stained glass pieces are functional; perhaps they are artistic craft rather than pure art. I tend to like what I see at craft fairs and that may be an insight into my taste and definition of art. Indeed, the Art vs. Craft debate an ongoing affair, so I'll sign out with this essay.

Perils of the Profession

This entry at Joe's Stained glass blog casts an interesting light on what it can mean to do stained glass for a living. It depends on what you want your business to focus on, of course. (And running your own business is an ordeal in itself.) Glass Endeavors seems to be thriving, but they focus on their store, studio space, repair service and classes in addition to doing the odd commission.

I think I'll stick to stained glass as a hobby for the foreseeable future...until I want to charge money for tacky glass memorials to Fluffy the cat.

Project in Progress: Leaded Glass Class

To take a small break from my Bird Flower project, I've started my second class at Glass Endeavors. This class will cover the leaded window technique, which is actually completely different from the copper-foil technique I've already learned.

With the copper foil technique, you simply wrap the edges of each piece with adhesive copper foil, lay out all the pieces, and solder them together. With leaded windows, you cut each strip of lead from a pre-extruded length, and assemble the window one piece at a time. Authentic horseshoe nails are used to hold the pieces together during assembly; small pieces of the lead came are set against the edges of glass and nails are used to press them in place.

See the picture below for an example of this technique in progress (source):



Also, here is the pattern I've chosen for my learning piece. It has a couple pieces that will be challenging to cut, but I like the overall look and want to try it out. For a larger image with much clearer lines, simply click the image below.

Project in Progress: (More) Bird Flower Painting

Finally, I have finished cutting and grinding the pieces! This was a pretty epic endeavor. Now I only need to foil, solder, patina and finish each piece. Plus add the frame and the rebar.

Here are all the pieces laid out. Each edge is spaced about 1 mm away from its neighbor. The window is 48'' x 22''.


I like how the foliage came out, and the glass I chose for the wood bark.


Here is the bird hanging out on its branch. Note that this is a sideways shot so it will be hanging upside down in the final pose.