UCG can offer support for funded arts projects with master glassmakers, designers and CAD CAM specialists, on hand to turn dreams into reality. We have over 30 years of experience working with top artists and designers, and even though we have our feet firmly on the ground, our heads and hearts are in the sky.
Sam Herman and Ian Hankey
Sam Herman was always at the forefront of the new. A visionary artist and the instigator of the UK studio glass movement, he was also extremely knowledgeable of technology in glassmaking. He collaborated with Ian over 2 years, looking at ways of incorporating computer aided design, 3D scanning and 3D printing into his work until he sadly passed away in 2020.
Sam taught Ian in the late 1980’s and was the reason he chose to work in glass. All the work we do supporting artists working in glass is dedicated to his memory.
Abigail Reynolds, Amy Whittingham and Ian Hankey August 2019
Abigail Reynolds, an artist based in St Just, Cornwall, contacted Ian looking for someone who could make glass from beach sand and seaweed on the far west Cornish coast. This was a fantastic project funded by the arts council.
Ian obliged and built a small ‘pop up’ furnace at the Kestle Barton site, and found a way to produce the most wonderful aqua glass, from which he made the cylinders and cast glass components she needed.
http://www.kestlebarton.co.uk/arts-and-events/abigail-reynolds-estover/
Emma Reynard and Ian Hankey 2021
Emma was recently awarded funding from Arts Council England to develop her creative practice.
Starting in September 2021, during the next 9 months she will be collaborating with Ian who will be interpreting her drawings in hot glass. We will create experimental new work from micro-organism observations of diatoms into floating, blown-glass sculptures.
This blog will document our progress.