Discovering the freedom and fun of art without rules
Letting go of perfectionism through adventures in glass
When I stepped into my first glass torchwork class at Metropolis, one of MIT’s makerspaces, I expected to learn a new type of art. I did not expect my experiences with glass to change the way I organize my life.
In my first class, my attempts to create a marble resulted in an unintentional and relatively lopsided mushroom. Even after weeks of practice, my rabbit ended up as a creature that looked more like a melted gummy bear than a bunny. Months later, I had yet to make a round marble.
In the past, my inability to make a marble would have been frustrating. I would have spent months trying, and even if I eventually succeeded, I probably wouldn’t have been that excited with the results.
After a few weeks, I let go of trying to make a marble. Inspired by a video that popped up on my YouTube recommended list, I decided to try something different, a glass octopus. It didn’t make much sense to jump to something harder, but I figured at least I would have some fun trying to make it. I needed to let go of the perfectionism and go back to my original goal with glass torchwork: to find a fun and relaxing artistic hobby. Making the perfect sphere would have to wait.
My first two octopus attempts did not even make it into the kiln. They shattered as I was trying to sculpt them. I went back to the internet where I learned that you have to keep the glass hot, particularly when there are significant changes in the size of the glass pieces (the body of the octopus is much larger than the tentacles, so the tentacles cool more quickly and will shatter if they are not kept warm enough). I learned how to flame anneal, the process of heating the body and the tentacles to just warm enough that they equalize in temperature without melting into a gooey mess. I’ve made that mistake a few times too.
I eventually succeeded in sculpting an octopus. In the process, I became more comfortable with being close to the flame, understanding how to heat the glass to the fine line between pliable and too soft to work with, and how to recover from mistakes. As my skills improved, so did the variety of things I could make. I made colorful turtles, rabbits, intentional mushrooms, and more.
I was recently working on making a glass elephant, by far the most challenging sculpture I had attempted. After forming the body, legs, tail, ears, and trunk, I had nearly finished the sculpture. All I needed to do was remove the support glass from the back of the elephant. But then I made a mistake – I heated the cold seal. The support had fused to the elephant sculpture, making it impossible to release. I tried in vain to melt the glass support rod without destroying the thinner details surrounding it, but even with a targeted flame, the finer details on the rest of the elephant melted before the support even became pliable. In a final attempt to save the sculpture, I held it with metal tweezers, trying my best to keep the elephant out of the flame, and gently pulled the rod free. I heard the faint grinding noise of stressed glass, and knew it was too late. In my attempt to preserve the details, I had let the rest of the glass elephant get too cold. Hours of work lost to a simple mistake.
As I walked to my next meeting, I was surprised to find that I wasn’t frustrated. Instead I felt calm and content. I love glasswork – the intensity, the heat, the absolute focus required to maintain the temperature of the glass across the sculpture. It’s the most relaxed I feel on campus, mostly because there isn’t space in my brain to think about anything else. I care far more about the experience of working with glass than I do about the end result.
This approach to glasswork began to spill over into other aspects of my life. I began to categorize activities into two buckets: things I want to excel in and things I do for the simple joy of experiencing them. This dichotomy brought new balance to my life. When I once would have seen things like glass as a distraction from my work, I started to see them as an investment in my day to day life. I was surprised to find that this balance not only made me happier, but also more productive at my research. Knowing I needed to leave the lab by 6pm to get to the studio meant that there was no time to stare blankly at code for an hour while trying to think of the most elegant possible solution. Much like with glasswork, I needed to just make a move and trust in my own ability to adjust and correct mistakes along the way. Sure, sometimes it doesn’t work, but I have learned more from diving in and trying than I ever would have by looking for the perfect approach.
Someday I will probably make a round glass marble, but I am happy with the imperfect menagerie of glass animals that live on my desk. I keep them all, from the accidental gummy bear to the semi-cracked elephant, as a reminder that sometimes the experience is more important than the outcome.
If you would like to try making marbles, turtles, or something else out of glass, you should sign up for the free 2 hour beginner training “Glass Flamework – Marbles” at Metropolis which will give you all the tools you need to get started!
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