Art Forum Symposium

Social get together and refreshments: 5:00 - 5:30 pm
Symposium: 5:30 - 8:15 pm

The Glass Workshop, School of Art, Australian National University is very excited to have many international friends visiting our city this February, in anticipation of the 2015 Ausglass Conference in Adelaide "States of illumination", and in conjunction with the "Honouring Cultures" program hosted by the Canberra Glassworks.

To celebrate the local and international community we are so proud to be a part of, we will host an evening symposium on Tuesday the 10th of February.  Artist talks and a panel discussion will engage the attendees in conversations on individual artistic practices and the topic of collaboration.

Please find details of the program below, including times for social interaction before the symposium, and a potluck dinner after.

We hope you can join us for the evening!

This event is supported by the Canberra Glassworks and the Embassy of the United States of America.

Programme

Additional events

Preston Singletary is the International Artist in Residence at the Canberra Glassworks, from 5-13 February. He will be working and collaborating with renowned Seattle based Artist Dante Marioni. Details of events related to their visit are available through the Canberra Glassworks. Singletary's residency is proudly supported by the Embassy of the United State of America.

Speaker Biographies

Jeff Ballard

Born in Illinois in 1977, Jeff Ballard earned a BFA in Glass in 2000.  Upon graduation he became Production Manager and Head Designer at various South Western studios in the United States.  On the job training was supplemented heavily with master classes and Teaching Assistant positions at national and international prestigious venues.  Since 2010, Ballard has undertaken many international opportunities as a gaffer, an artist in residence and a teacher. He is on the board of Berlin Glas e.V. Finding inspiration from his immediate surroundings, each new location provides Jeff with the found objects that are the catalyst for new ideas. His fascination with the unconscious realm of sleep has become the focus of his most recent series of work.

Nadania Idriss

Nadania Idriss is the founder and executive director of Berlin Glass e.V. Born is Berkeley California, she has a specialisation in Middle Eastern Art and is a Phd Candidate in Art History at Freie Universität Berlin.  Idriss worked for UNESCO in Paris for 7 Years before discovering glass in the mid 2000’s at Pilchuck Glass School. In 2009 she founded the first glass studio in Berlin to offer hot glass for artists and the general public. The rapid rise and success of Berlin Glass e.V. has seen this organisation become a key international centre for glass within just a few years. Berlin Glass e.V has collaborated with many international artists including Contemporary Artists Mona Hatoum and Ayşe Erkmen. Berlin Glas e.V. and the ANU Glass Workshop have collaborated on a bi-lateral exchange since 2013.  The Berlin Glas e.V. team will be demonstrating at the Ausglass conference in Adelaide

Magdalene Keaney

Magdalene Keaney, a curator and writer, is the Artistic Director at the Canberra Glassworks. Formerly a curator at the Australian National Portrait Gallery, she completed an MA at the Courtauld Institute, University of London; held a research fellowship at the Victoria & Albert Museum and subsequently spent six years with the National Portrait Gallery, London. She was appointed as the inaugural Director of the Fashion Space Gallery, London College of Fashion and has published widely and produced exhibitions internationally as a curator of photography. She has a strong interest in design practice. She is currently completing a PhD at the Centre for Art History and Art Theory, ANU.

Dante Marioni

A leader in the field since the late 1980's, Dante Marioni grew up surrounded by artists. Born in Mill Valley, California in 1964, he studied glassblowing in the mid 1980's with some of the most revered glassmakers in the world, and has continued to reinvent his highly distinctive work over several incredibly successful decades. His passion for his Craft, and his highly sophisticated understanding of the history of the medium has inspired generations of Glass Blowers and art supporters. Often drawing from forms and techniques of the past, Marioni's work blends glass blowing virtuosity with a unique affinity for balance, form and composition. It can be found in major collections and museums throughout the world, including the Corning Museum of Glass, the Chrysler Museum, the New Zealand National Museum of Art, the Smithsonian Institute and the Yokohama Museum of Art. Dante Marioni has taught, demonstrated and lectured all over the globe.

Jenni Kemarre Martiniello

Jenni Kemarre Martiniello came to glass as a mid-career sculpture, textiles and photomedia artist of Arrente (Central Desert), Chinese and Anglo-Celtic descent. She says: "I am Kemarre skin, and my totem is the Mulga, or King Brown Snake. In 2008 I did a beginning glass residency at Canberra Glassworks…. My transition into glass has been inspired by the medium itself as a vehicle to express my personal responses, as a contemporary urban Aboriginal woman, to my Grandmother’s and father’s traditional country, the land itself and the survival of cultural practices, often through the mirror of my photography and textiles. My passion for hot blown glass and kiln formed works inspired by traditional woven eel traps, fish traps and baskets began during my Thomas Foundation Artist in Residency at Canberra Glassworks in March/April 2011, and continues in 2012 with the support of artsACT and the ATSIA Board of the Australia Council for the Arts."

Lani McGregor

Lani McGregor is a co-owner of Bullseye Glass Company and the Director of Bullseye Projects. Bullseye Glass Co is a leading manufacturer of glass for studio based pratice and has a long history of supporting and collaborating with artists all over the world. It has been a long time supporter of the Glass Workshop at ANU. Prior to joining Bullseye in 1984, McGregor operated a glass studio in Albuquerque, New Mexico, that specialized in kilnformed and flat architectural glass. In 1990 she established Bullseye's Research & Education Department and developed its initial teaching programs. Today, with partner Dan Schwoerer, she shares a home that doubles as a private museum and laboratory for the study of architectural kiln-glass. In 2005 the couple shared the GAS Lifetime Membership Award. McGregor has served on various non-profit glass, art, and craft boards, and most recently joined the board of trustees of the Portland Art Museum.

Preston Singletary

Preston Singletary learned the art of glass blowing by working with artists in the Seattle area including Benjamin Moore and Dante Marioni. As a student and assistant, he initially focused on mastering the techniques of the European tradition. His work took him to Kosta Boda (Sweden) where he studied Scandinavian design, but also saw him learning directly from Venetian glass Masters Lino Tagliapietra, Checco Ongaro, and Pino Signoretto. In 2010, he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Arts degree from the University of Puget Sound.
The art of Preston Singletary has become synonymous with the relationship between European glass blowing traditions and Northwest Native art. Singletary’s artworks are included in museum collections such as The British Museum, The Seattle Art Museum (Seattle WA), the Corning Museum of Glass (Corning, NY), the Mint Museum of Art and Design (Charlotte, NC), the Heard Museum (Phoenix, AZ), and the Smithsonian Institution (Washington, DC). Singletary maintains an active schedule by teaching and lecturing internationally.

Li Wen

Born in July 1968 in Chong Qing city, Li wen determined to become an artist at the age of fifteen. He began his studies at the Technical College of the Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts before entering the China Academy of Art (Zhejiang Academy of Art) in the Oil Painting Department. He was soon offered a full scholarship to study at the Moscow Stroganof Academy, where he discovered many materials and processes. It is his interest in stained glass and mosaic that would influence his later works. He went to Prague in 2004 as a visiting scholar to study at the Academy of Architecture and Design under the supervision of Professor Kopecky. This experience was a crucial turning point in his career and his introduction in the glass art field. Early on Li Wen taught at the China Academy of Art in the Oil Painting Department, where he set up the mural painting department. Later he started setting up a glass studio in a new campus of the China Academy, at the College of Public Art. By 2006, the glass studio was fully endorsed by the academy and welcomed its first group of Bachelor students. In the last decade, Li wen has endeavoured to share his passion for glass art in China, promoting glass art in the society and thriving for studio glass to become China's top platform for glass art.