Thursday Salute to Originals: Glass Currents
Artist Shayna Leib creates flowing glass sculptures inspired by the sea and the wind.
The motion of the wind, water, and natural fluid forces are captured by still, intricate glass forms in Shayna Leib’s latest collection of molten glass sculptures. Thousands of hand-made tubes of glass curve and extrude from canvases and sculptures, mimicking the way sea anemones bend and flow in a current.
Each sculptural piece is created through a process called cane pulling — the stretching and coloring of transparent glass to create complex opaque rods. After sorting through tens of thousands of glass pieces, Leib arranges them into forms to illustrate motion.
“I am intrigued by multitudes of tiny little parts- blades of grass all bending in the wind to the same rhythm,” said Leib explained on her website. “As you pan out you have waves of form. Zoom in and you see each individual blade of grass moving to the flow of the wind.”
Much like blades of grass, the tiny glass tubes seem to bend together softly and uniformly under a larger force.
This Thursday, we’re saluting Shayna Leib and her glass sculptures that transform a hard and rigid material into soft and fluid masterpieces. You can view more of the artist’s work on Instagram. To learn more about the cane pulling process, visit shaynaleib.com.
Sources: Shayna Leib, This is Colossal