GUEST ARTISTS
A Selection Of Available Work by Established Glass Artists | NZ and International

Guest Artists Works Available At Black Door Gallery

Previously Exhibited Guest Artists Works At Black Door Gallery

Artist Information

​Heike Brachlow

​Heike Brachlow discovered glass while living in New Zealand, where she worked as a glassblower in a small studio in Rotorua. Today, Brachlow produces her works from her studio at Parndon Mill, she also tutors in Ceramics and Glass at the Royal College of Art, as well as regularly teaching summer school courses at the Studio of the Corning Museum of Glass and other institutions. 

Brachlow draws her inspiration from architecture and geometry to create complex works of cast glass that explore the interaction of colour, form and light in glass solids. Due to a love of colour and a frustration with the limited palette available in glass, she makes her own coloured glass. 

Christine Cathie

Christine Cathie is an Auckland based artist working in the medium of cast glass.

Cathie draw lines through space, exploring the translucent nature of glass by using twists, turns and sweeps of curve and shifts of density to lend a smooth and tactile nature to the contours of the forms. Cathie aims to achieve a sense of lightness, rhythm and frozen action by creating a feeling of tension ​within her work. As the artist describes, "I am interested in the paradoxes of these forms – how the glass can look fragile yet is strong, is balanced yet looks precarious, and weightless - yet with form and substance."

Luke Jacomb

Luke Jacomb is a leading glass artist with an impressive technical skill set in that crosses a range of glass blowing and casting styles. ​Jacomb's work combines elements of traditional Maori and Polynesian motifs with sleek design and intricate Venetian glasswork techniques (reticello, murrine and incalmo). 

Luke Jacomb trained extensively in glassblowing techniques in the United States developing a sound foundation. Upon his return to New Zealand he established a studio in West Auckland. Here he produces work full-time, utilising his range of skills and knowledge in the creation of exhibition style work, commissions, production work and collaborations. Jacomb is well established on the international glass art scene and his work can be found in a number of important public collections.

Tim Shaw

Born in Cyprus and raised in Yorkshire, Shaw has explored his artistic practice and glassmaking skills throughout the world. He has three degrees in glassblowing. Attaining his BA (Hons) from North Staffordshire Polytechnic in the UK in the early 80’s, he went on to study at the avant-garde Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam, where he continued to develop and experiment creating a unique style of art glass. Upon his return to the UK Tim established a hot glass workshop in London. Whilst there he was invited to undertake his second MA at the prestigious Royal College of Art in London. Here he further refined and honed his glassmaking skills whilst pushing the boundaries of his artistic expression.

Shaw now lives Australia and works from a hot glass studio nestled in the stringy bark forests of the Adelaide Hills. His unmistakable style is a result of years mastering his skill and continually exploring his creativity.

Te Rongo Kirkwood

Auckland based artist Te Rongo Kirkwood works with fused glass, textile, and other media to create objects that blur the lines between sculpture, craft, and personal adornment. Te Rongo creates her language of symbol and pattern drawing on the natural world and celestial themes. 

Kirkwood has been working in glass for 15 years exhibiting within New Zealand and abroad since 2009.

​Tribal Affiliations: Tainui – Wai o Hua, Ngai Tai ki Tamaki, Te Kauwerau a Maki, Ngapuhi, Taranaki

Laurel Kohut

Melbourne based artist Laurel Kohut discovered the art of glass blowing whilst studying for a Bachelor of Applied Arts at Monash University in Melbourne at the age of 17. She immediately fell in love with glassblowing not just for the beautiful objects that it can create but also for the technical skill it requires and the physical challenge it poses.

​After completing her bachelors degree, Laurel moved to Adelaide and joined the associate program at the reknowned Jam Factory glass studios where she refined her skills for a further two years, featuring in a number of exhibitions and creating large-scale art installations for the Adelaide Botanical Gardens and the Manhattan Hotel in Hong Kong.

Laurel has now completed a Master of Fine Art at Monash University, producing her exegesis entitled 'Object and Attachment', exploring the ways in which people form relationships with objects and their emotional significance.

John White

White is an artist whose practice is infused by discovery and history, and that which is shaped and influenced by our world. He likens this diverse subject matter to how his life has taken many paths through achievements of skilled-based trades. 

White's current themes are informed by the origin of the metric system in eighteenth century France and how history has impacted and moulded individuals, countries and societies as a whole.

John White completed a Bachelor of Arts with Honours, Majoring in Glass, at the Australian National University.
He has received High Recognition and acclaims for his artwork, exhibiting his first Solo Exhibition at the Toyama Museum Of Glass, Japan (2016), and a solo exhibition at Sabbia Gallery, Australia (2017). His work is held in the Wagga Wagga National Art Glass Collection, and he has successfully exhibited around Australia.

Harry Brown

Harry Brown is an Australian visual artist who works from his studio in Inglewood, Western Australia. His sculptural forms explore utilitarian objects- through rendering them in unfamiliar materials he re-presents them for the viewer's contemplation. Brown uses the processes of cold working and carving to create his glass forms, synthesising them with other media such as Sheoak wood.

"This isn't an axe, I have used the form of an axe, and everything that comes along with it and made something which focuses on the aesthetic using fine materials"- Harry Brown

Brown is a member of the Western Australian Glass Society, he exhibits his work widely and has work in a number of private collections. He is a technical assistant at the Art Glass Studio, Australia.

Galia Amsel

Known for her dramatic cast-glass sculptures, British-born Galia Amsel is one of the leading contemporary glass artists now working in New Zealand. A graduate of the Royal College of Art in London, Amsel relocated her studio and family to the rural edge of West Auckland in 2003. She has achieved international recognition for her highly developed understanding of glass, with a visual language uniquely her own.

Amsel’s sculpture revolves around the central paradox of glass as both a fluid and a solid medium. Through shape, translucence, texture and colour, she conveys her preoccupation with movement, tension and balance and her resulting works manage both drama and subtlety.

​She has a prolific exhibition history in the United States, England, Europe and Oceania. Her work is represented in numerous international collections including the Corning Museum of Glass, USA; The Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa; the Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Ulster Museum, Ireland; and Glassammlung Ernsting, Germany.

​Eileen Gordon

Born in Norway in 1961 to glass artists Alasdair and Rish Gordon, Eileen was inspired to work with glass. After completing a broad glassmaking education in the UK, which she coupled with subsequent work experience and further study, Eileen joined her family and emigrated to Australia.

The early 80’s was a progressive era for the Studio Movement and glass experimentation in Australia, and Eileen spent a further three years studying at the Jam Factory Craft & Design in Adelaide. She went on to help establish the Tasmanian Glassblowers where she met Grant, who was managing a farm nearby. After gaining more experience overseas, Eileen returned to Australia. In 1990, Eileen and Grant set up the Gordon Studio Glassblowers in Numurkah, Victoria. The studio is now at home in Red Hill, in the heart of the Mornington Peninsula.

Eileen’s pieces reflect her understanding of the difficult medium; they are skilfully crafted and yet deceptively simple. They show her love of nature and elegant forms, allowing light to give life to colour.

Rish Gordon

Born in the north of England in 1935, Rish was educated at Kenya High School in Nairobi before enrolling in the Edinburgh College of Art where she met Alasdair. After graduating she worked as a freelance engraver with Whitefriars Glass in London before joining Alasdair at Hadelands Glassworks in Norway in 1958. While raising four children – Susan, Eileen, Cameron & Kevin – Rish produced freelance watercolour paintings of the Norwegian flora and fauna. But during her early years in Kenya, Rish developed a keen interest in African wildlife and considerable abilities in watercolour and eventually she chose to go back to the medium of glass engraving as a vehicle for these visions.

​Over the years she has refined a sandblasting etching technique which is very much her own. Rish exhibits nationally and abroad, and has been commissioned for engraved presentation pieces for HRH Prince Philip, Bill Clinton and for Prime Minister Bob Hawke. She is also represented in the National Gallery, Canberra.

Grant Donaldson

Born in Australia in 1959, Grant started out working on the land. He earned an understanding and respect for the cycles of life and the rhythm of the seasons, fascinated by how plants and animals fit into the environment by evolving and surviving without the assistance of mankind.

While farming, Grant met Eileen Gordon and saw glassblowing for the first time. In 1994 after droughts and floods, Grant moved from farming to full time glassblowing. With Eileen’s patient training, he slowly learnt the complex skills. Grant then joined the loving Gordon family of glass artists and developed the skills to be able to express his ideas.

​Grant loves the physical and mental challenge of working with molten glass, and the thrill of creating works that show who he is and where he has been.

Christine Robb

Artist Christine Robb is the partner of glass blower Lynden Over, and together they run Lava Glass, Glass Blowing Studio in Taupo. The artistic couple met at art school and have worked together on their creative vision, since graduating from their Bachelors of Applied Arts at Northtech.

Starting from a bare block of land in 2002, Lynden and Christine have continuously developed the space to incorporate a world-class gallery, an award-winning café, and a garden of national significance, all adjacent to the bespoke studio space for the artists to create their masterpieces.

Robb is constantly striving for new innovative ways of depicting the New Zealand landscape in glass. The dramatic landscapes are the inspiration, glass the canvas.

Lucy Palmer

Lucy Palmer graduated with Honours in Visual Arts, specialising in Glass, from the University of South Australia in 2014.

Currently working from her studio at the Canberra Glassworks, Lucy strives to utilise the unique qualities of kiln formed glass to create an illusory sense of distance and depth; depicting vast landscapes, expansive skies and the quiet horizon where the two dissolve. Her inspiration derives from an interest in the incredible potential of distance and space to draw the viewer away from their immediate physical environment and allow the mind to escape.

​Palmer will exhibit a piece from her 'Sky Wedge' series. Each piece is an individually made and designed wedge of solid kiln formed glass. They are made using multiple sheets of glass fused together and ground in the workshop. Palmer aims to create gradual colour gradients which mimic the ever-changing moods of the sky.

Lee Howes

Born and bred in Newcastle NSW, Lee initially started a career as a PE teacher at a local high school. Eventually Lee left PE teaching to raise her three boys until school age. A creative at heart, Lee attended a leadlight course with a view to renovating the family home. The course changed Lee’s career direction as she fell in love with glass and the creative opportunities and challenges it provided. Once the boys hit school age, Lee opened a leadlight business in Newcastle.

Lee Howes Glass has grown from strength to strength, completing work for various commissions, churches, schools, nursing homes and private residences. The increasing demand for stained glass repairs saw Lee venture into the world of ‘hot glass’. Purchasing her own kiln, Lee taught herself to paint using glass paints and enamels and soon discovered a world of possibilities.

After attending a number of workshops on fusing and casting techniques, the experimentation begun. Combining a variety of different techniques Lee has created some striking glass art, and her work has been selected for inclusion in the Ranamok Glass Prize, the Emerge international glass prize and the Waterhouse Science Prize. Lee has also won the Vicki Torr Memorial Glass Award twice, an award voted by her fellow glass community.

Anne Sorensen

​Tasmanian born Anne Sorensen's work began with stained glass in 1990, before moving to kiln formed glass.  Anne developed her skill set in kiln form glass for some years, experimenting and learning from workshops with Australian and International artists. Sorensen now has developed her own distinctive body of work that finds its inspiration in the love of the land and her environment. Anne is confident producing work that is both small and large scale, in the past she has created works that are up to 1.8m tall. 

Anne works with artistic partner Barry Sorensen, who is also a glass practitioners in Bouvard, Western Australia. They each enjoy in their purpose built studios and workshops that Barry designed. Here their develop their individual works while supporting each other's practise. 

Anne Sorensen has won awards for her work, she exhibits her work in major galleries in Western Australia and the Eastern States, she also regularly secures public and private commissions.

​Silvana Ferrario

Silvana is an award-winning glass artist who creates work that draws on experiences, memories and surroundings. Her experience as a subsea engineer and scuba diver speaks to much of her work, but since working from her glass studio in the hills of Perth, the rural surroundings also inform her work. She is also intrigued by the geometry present in both man made and naturally occurring structures, and its opposition to the fluidity of the natural elements. Her work makes use of the movement arising from the fluidity of the glass when it is hot.

Ferrario started working in fused glass in 2009 and has attended numerous courses with renowned glass artists. She has exhibited in art shows all around Australia and won several awards: Emerging Artist Award at MAGE 2014; finalist at Tom Malone 2017; winner of the Gordon Award at Glass+ 2017 & 2019; 2nd Prize at Claremont Art Show. 

George Agius

George Agius is interested in exploring the roles that culture, heritage and circumstance have in constructs of the self. Concepts of memory and identity within the context of place and time occur in the work. 

Agius' work offers a cross-pollination of material processes entrenched in the physical act of making. Agius combines blown and hot sculpted glass with cold processes and most recently have played with dry-point etching and photography to convey the diverse psychosocial need to establish, affirm and confirm existence.

I have exhibited in Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Germany and assisted prominent contemporary glass artists.  

In 2013 George completed the JamFactory Associate Training Program in Adelaide and has since exhibited in the Waterhouse Natural Science Art Prize, Kennedy Art Prize, KIGA Illuminating Glass award and the Wagga Wagga National Emerging Art Glass Prize. In 2015 George was awarded the Vicki Torr Memorial Prize at the Australian Glass Conference. 

Devon Ormsby

Auckland based artist Devon Ormsby produces cast glass works that explore the familiar ornament and re-imagine it in a new form. Ormsby graduated from Elam School of Fine Arts (Hons) in 2015 and currently works in a Glass Studio in West Auckland.

Ormsby's recent project "Glass Fruit Series" injects a contemporary flair into the still life genre; while paying homage to the blown glass fruit makers and collectors from the 1960’s. Through the lost wax casting process she carefully captures the subtle surface details of fruit to create delicate and elegant sculptures that look wonderful poised in the light. These objects are intended to provoke the senses and occupy a space where time may be kinder to them.

Mark Elliot

Sydeny based Mark Eliott is a contemporary artist working primarily in flame-worked glass. Elliot's conceptual interests include environmental issues, sculptural abstraction informed by synaesthesia, the dance between improvisation and structure, and the representation of biological organisms influenced by the 19th -20th century glassblowers Rudolph and Leopold Blaschka. 

Mark completed a Master of visual arts and Master of studio arts at Sydney College of the arts as well as associate diploma in Jazz studies (saxophone) at Sydney conservatorium of music. Mark has taught flame-work at many venues including 107 Projects in Sydney and Canberra Glassworks. He exhibits his work predominately across Australia.

Matt Hall

Matt Hall is an Auckland based artist who works primarily as a technician for renowned artist Luke Jacomb producing a range of work using blowing and casting techniques. Matt has also assisted a number of New Zealand and international glass artists in the creation of their work as an adept assistant.

Matt Hall shows his own work in galleries throughout New Zealand. Technically focused, Hall has a passion for creating minimal, beautiful glass objects that play with light. His work often aims to explore the parameters of the glass process, playing with density, optic effects and the qualities of colour. Equal parts designer and artist; Hall produces utilitarian serveware as well as exhibition pieces.

​Having opened his own glass studio and workshop in Auckland this year, this is an artist we can expect to see more of soon.

Mariella McKinley

Mariella McKinley is an award-winning Australian glass artist who specialises in hand blown and cold worked glass. Her unique exhibition pieces feature exquisite surface patterns and harmonious, sculpted forms. Her design work is created with a focus on colour, form and function.

Mariella graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Art (Honours) majoring in Glass from Monash University, Melbourne, in 2006. She was then selected for a two year Associateship in the Glass Studio at JamFactory Contemporary Craft and Design, Adelaide, a rare opportunity which attracts young artists from around the world. In 2010, Mariella worked as an assistant to internationally renowned Sydney artists, Ben Edols and Kathy Elliott, before returning to Melbourne to establish her own studio. Through these experiences, Mariella gained valuable knowledge and skills and continued to develop her own art practice and individual style.