A hot sculpted, encased flameworked red dahlia

4 inches

These designs revisit my “Red Dahlia,” recreating dahlias in sculptural forms that push the limits of hot-forming glass in a torch. After more than thirty years of torch work, I had developed great control over hot moving glass. This drip design however poses extreme difficulty because of the need to control the sculpting of the exterior molten glass so that its motion does not distort the molten glass flower encased inside the sculpture. This sculptural process takes planning and constant vigilant control over a large drip of molten glass, while protecting the molten interior design. I wanted to separate each design by a space, yet keep the thinnest connection possible. These drips were very challenging and exciting to make and they threw open the doors to creating entirely new shapes.

Collection of the Corning Museum of Glass