New Glass at Wheaton on NJN’s State of the Arts
Friday, June 19 at 8:30 pm; and Wednesday, June 24 at 11:30 pm

STATEWIDE –Follow State of the Arts to WheatonArts, where glass has been made for over a hundred years. But today, artists at WheatonArts are creating work unlike any imagined by the first glassblowers – contemporary art using glass in unexpected and often marvelous ways.  New Glass at Wheaton explores the world of the Creative Glass Center of America (CGCA) at Wheaton Arts and Cultural Center, also known as WheatonArts, in Millville, NJ, where fellowship artists live and work together as they pursue their creative visions. 

New Glass at Wheaton features three artists who work in different ways with glass, sometimes combining it with other materials (including performance). These three women were resident artists, or fellows, at the CGCA at WheatonArts from January through April 2008.   Charlotte Potter created tongue-in-cheek “antler art”during her residency, a response to the touristy western art of her then hometown, Jackson Hole, Wyoming.  In the process, she perfected her solid glass hot working technique.  Rika Hawes, a native of Canada now living in Philadelphia, chose to create large scale versions of her jagged, broken glass installation pieces.  She says that her earlier work began to seem like maquettes, or small scale models. Kim Harty, who arrived in Wheaton from Chicago, continued her exploration of conceptual themes and performance work.  One of her projects, “Synchro Blow” – a process where two glassblowers try to simultaneously create the same form – spurred the development of “Cirque de Verre,” a glass circus or performance/entertainment. Harty worked with Potter, Hawes, and several CGCA assistants to put on “Cirque de Verre,” which they performed at WheatonArts. The three fellowship artists have since continued to work together, including upcoming exhibitions and performances in Philadelphia and Bethlehem, PA.

State of the Arts producer Susan Wallner visits the fellows at the beginning and then again toward the end of their residency, to see the work they have made and find out how the experience compared to their expectations.  She also talks to the creative director of CGCA, Hank Murta Adams, an internationally renowned artist. He gives a tour of the facility, describing how they plan to grow in the future.  Adams reinforces the fact that, like any art colony, the most valuable aspect of the residency at Wheaton for the artists is the dedicated time to focus on their creative work. The executive director of WheatonArts, Susan Gogan, describes the unique qualities of WheatonArts and the fellows program, and what it has meant to the glass world, both in and out of New Jersey.

Also included is a visit to Glass Weekend, a biennial event at WheatonArts bringing together collectors, artists, and gallery dealers. The purpose of Glass Weekend is to raise money to help support the fellowship program (through a percentage of sales and admissions). During Glass Weekend ’07 former fellows and artistic collaborators Sabrina Knowles and Jenny Pohlman gave a hot shop demonstration.  Knowles and Pohlman are two time recipients of CGCA fellowships. The pair speaks of how their fellowships were critical to their artistic development; in fact, they describe their first fellowship in 1999 as a turning point in their careers.  New Glass at Wheaton views many of the gallery booths set up for Glass Weekend and talks to collectors and dealers, including Rick Snyderman, director of the Snyderman-Works Gallery in Philadelphia and a member of the advisory board of CGCA.

The Creative Glass Center of America at WheatonArts is a world-class contemporary glass art studio located in an historic glass community.   Wheaton Village was founded in 1970 as a recreation “glass town” by Frank Wheaton, at that time owner of Wheaton Industries, one of the largest privately owned glass companies in the world.  CGCA was formed in 1983 to support artists working in glass, at that time still a rarity.  Since 1983, up to 12 fellowships have been awarded each year to emerging and established artists to pursue their own work for periods of either 6 weeks or 3 months.  Over 300 artists from the United States and abroad have received fellowships to date. Each session, two to four artists live together in a house near WheatonArts, and are given their own studios at the glass facility.  CGCA fellows receive access to the facility’s hot glass shop, annealing, and cold-working resources – for an expensive medium, this amounts to a very generous and rare grant of time and money.  In addition, the fellows are supported by a community of staff artists and assistants willing to help them realize their creative visions.  In exchange, they help give demonstrations for the public and work to maintain the studio.    
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State of the Arts, the 29 time Emmy award-winning, half-hour arts magazine, airs every Friday at 8:30 pm, followed by an encore presentation each Wednesday at 11:30 pm.  All new State of the Arts programs are broadcast in high definition (HDTV) on NJN’s digital channel.

The current episode of State of the Arts can be viewed online at www.njn.net.  Photo images for this episode are also available. Individual stories are available to view following their broadcast by visiting the program online at State of the Arts. Selected State of the Arts stories can also be seen on YouTube (look for NJN’s Arts & Culture Channel). 

Funding for State of the Arts is provided by the New Jersey State Council on the Arts and the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation.  The series producer is Susan Wallner and the executive producer is Nila Aronow.

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