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TOLEDO, OH – The Arts Commission is pleased to share the finalists for Momentum | Intersection, a new opportunity for regional artists and designers to collaborate with Pilkington Glass North America (Nippon Sheet Glass Co., Ltd.). Inspired by the studio glass movement, The Arts Commission seeks to provide new collaborations between applications of glass as an artistic medium and manufacturing processes.
Jurors Alli Hoag (Glass Area Head at Bowling Green State University), Kyle Sword (Manager of Business Development at Pilkington North America), and Diane Wright (Curator of Glass at the Toledo Museum of Art) selected the six artists to tour Pilkington facilities and receive a sampling of glass of their choice. After experimenting with the materials, each artist will submit formal project proposals due November 15, 2018. Up to three artists selected from the six candidates will be given materials, a stipend, technical support and learning opportunities through Pilkington, and exhibition space during Momentum 2019.
The initial tours will take place during the Momentum festival September 13-15, 2018, with a product introduction for selected artists. The weekend includes a free downtown-wide music event and a festival of art, music and public art in Promenade Park and surrounding waterfront. Momentum | Intersection will launch during the festival and continue to build through September 2019.
The finalists are: Richard Harned, Loraine Lynn, Sean Merchant, Catie Newell, Tom Patti, and Zac Weinberg.
Richard Harned creates sculpture and kinetic sculptural installations which utilize properties of glass and technology. His work has been in 13 solo and 180 group exhibitions, in 27 states and 7 countries. Harned has been the recipient of an array of Individual Artists Fellowships in sculpture, craft and media arts from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Ohio Arts Council and the Greater Columbus Arts Council. He received his BFA in 1973 and MFA in 1977 from Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI, under Dale Chihuly. He is a professor of art at the Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio, where he heads the Glass Art program and has been a faculty member, visiting artist and artist-in-residence nationally and internationally. He founded the Glass Axis, a not for profit workshop and artists organization in Central Ohio, and has served as a panelist and site visitor for national and regional art organizations and as treasurer and president of the Glass Art Society.
Loraine Lynn is an interdisciplinary artist based out of Toledo, Ohio. She is interested in working with materials and methods that are fluid, such as glass, fiber, video, and installation. Her work is intended as a critique of structures we adhere to and perform within. This is achieved through an interrogation of labor, mastery, identity, and the scripts that all of these follow. She earned her BFA from the Cleveland Institute of Art in Glass and Sculpture and completed her MFA in Three-dimensional studies at Bowling Green State University. She has shown work nationally and internationally in countries such as South Korea, Italy, and Ireland. She has also curated exhibitions within the Toledo area and writes about art in the region. Currently she is an adjunct professor in Glass and First Year Studies at Bowling Green State University.
Sean Merchant is an artist and educator currently based in Brunswick, Ohio. Sean was raised in Northwest Illinois and received his Bachelor of Fine Arts from Illinois State University in 2005. Sean completed his Master of Fine Arts from Ohio State University in 2017. From 2007 to 2014, Merchant was the art director for the architectural glass firm Jacksonville Art Glass, in Jacksonville, IL. Sean’s work has been featured in Sculpture Magazine (Oct ’17), as well as American Glass Now: 2017 (American Glass Guild). Merchant was included in the 2017 International Sculpture Center’s Outstanding Achievement in Student Sculpture awardee exhibition, and in 2016 he participated in Bullseye Glass’s biennial exhibition and catalog “Emerge/Evolve” 2016. His work has exhibited recently at the Collective Artist Network (CAN) Triennial in Cleveland, Ohio; Belger Crane Yard Studios, Kansas City, MO; Logan Center for the Arts, Chicago, IL; and the National Cathedral, Washington D.C.
Catie Newell is the founding principal of the architecture and art practice *Alibi Studio and the Director of the Master of Science in Digital and Material Technologies at the University of Michigan. Newell is also an Associate Professor of Architecture at the Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning. Newell’s work and research captures spaces and material effects, focusing on the development of atmospheres through the exploration of textures, volumes, and the effects of light or lack thereof. Newell’s creative practice has been widely recognized for exploring design construction and materiality in relationship to location and geography, and cultural contingencies. She is a Lucas Fellow, a Kresge Artist Fellow, and a Fellow of the American Academy in Rome.
Tom Patti is an artist who thinks like a scientist and engineer. Patti received a BFA and MFA at Pratt Art Institute in Fine Art, Industrial Design and Architectural Theory. Over the past four decades, his innovations in glass have progressed from smaller, intimate sculptures to large-scale architectural and environmental installations. Much of what he does has grown out of partnerships with architects, glass companies and related manufacturers. Commissioned by public institutions, corporations and art collectors, he has been awarded research grants, been enlisted for R&D consultancies by TESLA, Pilkington, PPG, Guardian, Bayer and Owens-Corning and has received numerous awards for his collaborative work with architects on projects using hi-performance glass and plastics. Honored in 2012 as a Pratt Icon, and chosen by Corning Inc. for a Specialty Glass Residency in 2015-16, Tom’s work is included in the permanent collections of many major museums worldwide.
Zac Weinberg’s projects address the systems by which we interpret and allocate status to objects. His glass and mixed media works have been exhibited at home and abroad in venues including The Robert Lehman Gallery, NY, Glassmuseet Ebeltoft, Denmark and Glasenhuis, Belgium. Weinberg received a BFA from The New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University and a MFA from The Ohio State University. He lives and works as an artist/educator/technician in and around Toledo, Ohio.
Momentum is generously sponsored by: ProMedica, Owens Corning, The University of Toledo, Bowling Green State University, Key Bank, the Ohio Arts Council, NSG North America, and Toledo’s philanthropic community.
Additional information available at momentumtoledo.org.
For more information, contact The Arts Commission: 419-254-2787 | [email protected] | www.TheArtsCommission.org | Facebook.com/ArtsCommission | Twitter.com/ArtsCommission | Instagram.com/TheArtsCommission | YouTube.com/TheArtsCommission
The Arts Commission is the longest standing arts commission in the state of Ohio, founded in 1959, administering the City of Toledo’s 1% for Art Program since 1977. The Arts Commission is supported in part by the Ohio Arts Council.
