After learning how to make vitrigraph murrini rods, I’m awed by the variety of patterns that emerge in the cut pieces. Even though making them and creating an art piece with them is a lot of work, I am driven to make more. I love the way they turn out – very cellular and interesting with lots of different patterns in one pull. I have been keeping lists of the 30 layers of starting material glass that go into each crucible as well as the rod number or position as each color emerges in the center of the rods. It helps in planning future pulls. I found that I need about 18 (of 30 total) layers of white and/or clear to make interesting pieces. Here is a sculpture I just finished using the fused glass murrini from one pull and a piece of solid walnut that I refinished after help cutting it by my carpenter son in-law.

Urban Sprawl

Now that spring is really here and life gets in the way of art glass, my new kiln is ready to fire. My plan is to use it for thicker sculptures that take a long time to anneal. In the mean time I have been creating some flatter pieces such as the one below made with glass powder wafers. I love the texture achieved when I fused my diatom wafers to the background glass. I call this piece “Bones.” I mounted the glass on an aluminum frame, and it is 20″ x 16″ x 1″.

Bones