Wearable Art and Fine Crafts

Robert Rickard, best known at Gallery Five for his popular line of metal art clocks, also launched his Rickard Studio last year to reflect his broader scope of work – from his clocks to sculptures, furniture, wall pieces, and more.  His new collection of sculpture, forged in stainless steel, and designed for indoor or outdoor use, is being embraced by master planners, architects, and developers as well as collectors.

Artist’s Statement
Robert Rickard’s contemporary home in the mountains above Taos, New Mexico can be characterized by infinite peace and silence. Except, of course, when he is in his spacious studio next door; then the sounds of tools working steel and aluminum reverberate across the valley.

Rickard’s work is incredibly vivid and yet very natural. The colors are reminiscent of the sunsets over the Rio Grande Gorge, which he sees from his studio. It is in that bright, airy studio that Rickard creates memorable pieces which harness the myriad properties of metals: their rigidity, their pliability, and their essential chemical make-up.

His is a scientific approach. After using a hand-held plasma cutter to carve his designs into the base metal, each sculpture is then coated with other metals; typically copper, bronze, and iron. Each of these metals reacts differently to the chemical patinas and dye oxides with which the pieces are finished, creating a rich palette of hues.

Rickard is an honored Niche Awards Finalist and is a juried participant in several exclusive shows. “I have been deeply humbled and grateful for the way that I have been welcomed into galleries and collectors homes,” says Rickard.

Handblown glass Megaplanet 3.5" diameter with a small flattened bottom

Josh Simpson contemporary glass sculptures are in galleries and museum throughout the U.S. and worldwide.

Gallery Five has a small collection of small hand blown glass planets and other spherical glass art sculptures, paperweights, and perfume bottles.   Pictured here is an an imaginary planet with filigrana cane and precious metals, an original Josh Simpson design.

Artist Statement

Evolution is an apt word to describe the trajectory of my work — it is an organic process that happens over time and is full of trial and error. Thirty years into my career as a glass artist, I can look back and see the branching in the evolutionary family trees of my work. In the moment, when I am in my studio, I don’t think about where I’ve come from, I merely ask the next question of myself and the glass and move toward its answer.

Thirty years ago, I started out focusing on making goblets because to me they represented the ultimate challenge for a glass artist. I spent seventeen years seeking the perfect goblet. But that wasn’t all I did during that time. With the goblets and then planets, vases, and iridescent glass, as with all my work, I have always learned by experimenting and doing. I usually work at something until I’m satisfied I’ve got it right. I always seem to have more ideas than I’ll ever have time to make.

Inspiration

The last thing I do before I go to bed is walk out to my studio to check the furnaces. Seeing an aurora borealis, or watching a thunderstorm develop down the valley, or just looking up at the sky on a perfect summer night inspires me to translate some of the wonder of the universe into my glass. That wonder comes out in my work, not in any purposeful way but slowly. My work evolves in such incremental steps that I often don’t recognize the natural influences until someone points them out to me.

Along with the natural world, my motivation comes directly from the material itself. Glass is an alchemic blend of sand and metallic oxides combined with extraordinary, blinding heat. The result is a material that flows and drips like honey. When it’s hot, glass is alive. It moves gracefully and inexorably in response to gravity and centrifugal force. It possesses an inner light and transcendent radiant heat that makes it simultaneously one of the most frustrating - and one of the most rewarding – materials to work with. I attempt to coax it; all it wants to do is drip on the floor. Most of my work reflects a compromise between me and the glass; the finished piece is the moment in time when we agree.

Josh Simpson contemporary glass

copper face double circle wall clock

Girardini Design metal art collection at Gallery Five includes clocks, lamps, vases, fruit baskets, and more.

Julie and Ken Girardini are a husband and wife design team who have been working with metal for the past eighteen years. They have participated in some of the finest juried craft shows over those years.

They are self taught in all aspects of metal work, and explore daily with different finishing techniques, e.g., grinding, polishing, and patination of metals to achieve a light reflective and alluring surface. Ken welds using a TIG welder in addition to a plasma cutter to cut the steel. They have fabricated a number of cutting jigs to efficiently use this machine, and also utilize a variety of saws, sanders and grinders.

flying dragon wall clock

The Girardinis strongly feel that objects which people interact with daily need to be well designed and functional in addition to being beautiful.

Gallery Five is where you can find limited edition, handcrafted in the USA, unique gifts: ceramics, glass, fiber, metal and wood – and wearable art: clothes, accessories and jewelry.

Month of June – Dads and Grads SALE 15% OFF selected featured items at GalleryFive.com.

In honor of Father’s Day, come browse the virtual drawers at Gallery Five for unique gifts.

History of Father’s Day

Sonora Dodd, of Washington, first had the idea of a “father’s day.” She thought of the idea for Father’s Day while listening to a Mother’s Day sermon in 1909.

Sonora wanted a special day to honor her father, William Smart. Smart, who was a Civil War veteran, was widowed when his wife died while giving birth to their sixth child. Mr. Smart was left to raise the newborn and his other five children by himself on a rural farm in eastern Washington state.

After Sonora became an adult she realized the selflessness her father had shown in raising his children as a single parent. It was her father that made all the parental sacrifices and was, in the eyes of his daughter, a courageous, selfless, and loving man. Sonora’s father was born in June, so she chose to hold the first Father’s Day celebration in Spokane, Washington on the 19th of June, 1910.

A bill was introduced in 1913. In 1916 President Woodrow Wilson went to Spokane to speak in a Father’s Day celebration and wanted to make it official, but the Congress resisted, fearing that it would be commercialized. President Calvin Coolidge, in 1924, supported the idea of a national Father’s Day. Then in 1966 President Lyndon Johnson signed a presidential proclamation declaring the 3rd Sunday of June as Father’s Day. President Richard Nixon signed the law which finally made it permanent in 1972.

As we know, Father’s Day is a day honoring and celebrating fatherhood, paternal bonds, and the influence of fathers in society. It is celebrated on the third Sunday of June in 52 of the world’s countries and on other days elsewhere. It complements Mother’s Day, the celebration honoring mothers.

Many Feng Shui practitioners use chimes to enhance the energy flow in a space. Sound and movement are powerful sources of increased energy flow. Solar chimes attract energy and keep it flowing indoors to create harmony for people within an environment.

Gallery Five has a collection of Sunblossom Solar Chimes. The artists are committed to contributing beauty, joy, and harmony within the world, creating products that impact your life in unique and positive ways: sometimes soothing, sometimes energetic, and sometimes whimsical and fun. They provide you with a respite from your hectic life and can provide food for your soul.

Solar chimes provide you with magical chiming and movement. You will be delighted and soothed without needing wind or batteries. You will be presented with random, lilting tones drifting through the air with our indoor chimes, or with the delightful waving of a flower clasped a SoulMate’s hands. Perfect for your home or office.

Color collection includes purple-blue, blue-green, purple-green, yellow-orange, red-purple, and green-orange.

Each of LaserGlass Art’s Inner-Glow Collection shells is comprised of 45% leaded crystal, compared to the 38% component found in Austrian crystal. The shells are individually hand-cast using their own adaptation of a casting method originally developed by the ancient Egyptians to make gold jewelry. The crystal shells are molded from actual seashells and exhibit all the fine detailing of nature’s originals. The use of the more expensive 45% leaded crystal permits the capture of such definition.

Glass Artist, Geoffrey Caplette, B.S., California Polytechnic University, is a dichroic glass specialist, with 23 years thin film experience. He creates dichroic glass by evaporating precise thicknesses of refractory oxides onto glass in a carefully controlled vacuum. His exacting techniques produce colors of a purity unmatched by any other methods.

Glass Artist, Patricia Caplette, B.A., University of California, Berkeley, has been a sculptor for 20+ years and has won numerous awards for her work. She has also been a glass designer for the past ten years, with extensive experience in glass casting and slumping methods, and knowledge of glassblowing techniques.

Browse the Gallery Five collection of Patricia and Geoffrey Caplette’s LaserGlass Art’s Inner-Glow Collection as well as more  Glass Art.

The main characteristic of dichroic glass is that it has a transmitted color and a completely different reflected color, as certain wavelengths of light either pass through or are reflected. This causes an array of colour to be displayed. The colors shift depending on the angle of view.

A plate of dichroic glass can be fused with other glass in multiple firings. Due to variations in the firing process, individual results can never be exactly predicted, so each piece of fused dichroic glass is unique

A Gallery Five online collection of handmade fine crafts showcases ceramics, wood, glass, metal, fiber, sculptures, wall art, and functional art by prominent and promising craftsmen throughout the United States.

Wearable art collectors enjoy Gallery Five’s ever-expanding selection of beautifully crafted textiles and jewelry.    The store specializes in wearable art, focusing on high quality clothing, designer jewelry, and accessories, all handcrafted by American artisans.

As new site-surfers browse the user-friendly site, they begin to appreciate the depth and breadth of this cyber-gallery of American fine crafts and beautifully made wearable art.

In 2005, “American Style Magazine” named Gallery Five one of their “Top 100 Craft Galleries in the Nation,” an honor Paul and Paula Coben take very seriously.  Continuing this tradition of excellence, Gallery Five online offers personal service to satisfy even the most demanding shopper.  Wearable art looks beautiful online, but no  buyer can fully appreciate wearable art until they’re wearing it!!

Visit Gallery Five 24/7.

February 14th is Valentines Day – a worldwide celebration of love and romance, marked by giving red roses and hearts or giving unique gifts and by sending valentines.

Gallery Five has a collection of unique gifts and art-to-wear jewelry handcrafted by prominent and promising artisans.

glass hearts by Lisa Aronzon

metal clocks by Hays-Cash

heart rattles by Caroline Koons