Topic: Ian Macdonald, glass artist.

[chopin-liszt]

I have been promising to show some of Ian's work, but my promises spread over time and different forums from "British" and Irish to "things for holding bits of paper down".
So I thought it best to give him his own thread here.
I'll start with a couple of small but very heavy bowls, with bubbles and swathes of colours in unusual shapes. The second, tall bowl also has silver leaf inclusions.

[chopin-liszt]

A couple more of the small tall bowl, to show the shape, and two of a teal vase with a central dividing part inside that looks like a whale's fluke - I have not a clue how he did that.

[chopin-liszt]

Followed by a lovely large black vase, with dichroic features, which is clear when you look through it from the inside out.
The black colour has been achived using oxidation, it's got a pale rosy beige colour inside, with a mirrory surface. You cannot see in to it at all, but you can easily see out of it.

(I've got another large, bag shaped vase, in beautifully shaded cobalt blue, with dichroic coloured features too, but i couldn't reach it to get it for photography.)

Then we start getting to my favourite things.
Large spun platters, with coloured enamels, silver foil and copper wheels inside, which Ian gets on the end of his pontil rod and spins it around with that gut-churning confidence so much talked about, to get them into their final shapes.

[chopin-liszt]

Last pic (for now. I will have to get the cobalt vase sorted)
My favourite centrifugally spun platter.

[keith]

Would you mind if I added the piece he made at the Red House Cone, it's not signed but we did watch him make the vase during a display 

[chopin-liszt]

Not at all, please do!
And anybody else who might have some of Ian's work, please, add images!

[keith]

Thanks Sue, we were impressed at his skill in handling hot glass and talking to the group at the same time 

[chopin-liszt]

That IS lovely. I really like the intimate way the "shawl" is wrapped around the neck, and the way the pattern and the elegant shape of the whole thing work together...

It's much more than a surface decorated vase, it is a complete work of art.
My one bugbear about Ian's work is that each piece needs its own "stand alone" space.
It doesn't really lend itself into becoming a collection and it gets a bit lost here.
I don't have enough spare large spaces to put his work into.

Thanks, Keith.

[keith]

Going next week, maybe he'll be there, I hope 

[Anne E.B.]

Just bought this unusual piece dated 2003 (not sure whether to call it a bowl or a vase?) and thanks to Sue, have been able to identify it as having been made by Ian MacDonald .  The same design as previously shown but in amethyst.  I've included an image of the signature (black & white).