I fell in love with tile and stone when we were building a house. I went to the stone yards and was mesmerized by the veins, patterns, and the flow of colors. I know this came from my childhood home where we always had a big sewing room full of fabric. My mother went to the French Fabric Academy in New York to learn pattern making and custom tailoring. We loved making our own clothes.
This is the same way I fell in love with stained glass mosaics. I have endless sheets of glass with textures, veins of color and light, and patterns galore.
It took me along time to really learn to cut and shape the glass to make it flow. My early work was a bit clumsy with large grout lines and rough shapes. I credit artists like Yulia Hanansen, Kory Dollor, Katherine England, and many other mosaic artists for thier classes (online and off).
I call it art of a thousand cuts because I work with tiny flowing pieces and then fill in gaps with little shards the size of a sliver. It is painstaking hard work and takes a long time. A piece that is 12x2 can take me 3 months!
Then there is the subject of grout. Grout can make or break your piece, and you have to learn to consider it as you go along.
I never use one solid color over my piece. I have a variety of grout tints that I mix just as you would paint. Each section is grouted to the color of the glass seamlessly. Grout is tricky and dries lighter, so sometimes I will use acrylics to paint the grouts lines.
I am literally obsessed with mosaics.
I love teaching workshops as well! A studio full of students learning the tools and skills and chatting away with music in the background. Taking them from not knowing what a nipper is to completeing a beautiful piece in two days is very satisfying.
Now back to work for my 1001 cut!
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