Old school demos-woven pieces

[LewisW]

Just a weird thought. I think that it would be cool to have some demos of woven work by those that know how. I was taught by Miquel Bonilla and we called the work running stitch annd loop stitch. Around the Dells it was called drop stitch. I have also heard it called knit, lace, carnival, and other names. It will fit in nicely with Shane's talk.
I know that RAM, Bill Rassmussen, Steve Sizelove(?), and maybe a few old school types used to do this type of work.
It would be something fun to do . If no one has seen it done it would be a treat.
Most might not want to know that this , but this is where the American lampwork movement came from.
Most all American lampworkers did woven pieces untill Bill Rassmussen did the first solid animals at Disney in the mid 1950's.
These should be kept and put on display for others to see.
Lewis C Wilson

[MileHiMama]

Great idea, Lewis. It might be a good idea for everyone to get a chance to try this technique with some of the knowing people in attendance to help. Kind of a demo with a class attached at the end. See you soon. (I'm the one who took your picture at the last AGI and got Jim of Glass Line to put it on the cover.) Deb

[gypsea]

i was taught in 78 by Richard McCleary (Dick) in Charlotte, NC. I have learned that he has since died at an early age. The guys in our shop did a variety of woven stiches, the ones Lewis mentioned, and the one i learned to do was called the drop loop stitch. i think the main one that Dick did was called the mexican roll or the acalpoco roll, or something like that...he used it to construct giant things like castles and coaches, it was very sturdy compared to the other types of woven stitches.

[steven p selchow]

Didn't know you were around my home town of the Dells Lewis, yeah, I did the running stitch,(piece of crap, most susceptable to cracking) drop, and the knit, mostly thats what jerry hall wanted me to make, I did a demo at AGI a few years ago centered around that topic. I'm still pretty efficent at it, but rarely use it..after 10,000 pianos later back in the seventies, ya kinda get burnt on it, but i'd be glad to demo it again, maybe you, Bill and me doing a 3 amigos demo using that technique..heh heh.

steve

I can always make 1 more piano for old times sake.

[JANKYglass]

i was hoping that tech would just be forgotten,maybe a pipemaker can take it and improve on it.

[steven p selchow]

Im gonna make one just for you Puff Danny, maybe put it under your pillow. :lol

[Mr. Whale dick]

mike dennis does it too

[pyrorob05]

ive always thought some of those would look cool with a powder on the outside and get all sorts of cool textures

[LewisW]

I forgot to add that in no way should anyone try and make anything to sell using these techniques. The work is actually making cracking sounds as you make it. that is normal. It is just for the novelty of doing it to show where we came from.
I would not think that there is or should be a way of improving woven work.
I had done a few woven pieces out of colored boro and it still looked like woven crap-just colored woven crap.
Steve, I never was in the Dells area. When I learned at Disney World in 1973 we got lots of work from Jerry Hall and most was the drop stitch.
And I also know about the thousands of a kind work. i did 1,000 in a row of only three items in three months. Crab, teapot, and birdbath.

Lewis

[steven p selchow]

heh heh, I was assigned the piano, bird bath, and the infamous wishing well, we didn't have kilns then, so the pinging sound was as you say, normal. I have made some lace work for sale for custom orders, It can be sold, and I've done some cake toppers, but thay are annealed now, even though it still isn't a sound product, I have no problem selling a knitted piece per special request...I can do one that still holds together, but with a disclaimer explaining its more for sentimental value than considered art work...my knit work is tight, and sturdy, but still knitted.

[MileHiMama]

Hey, Steve, Remember the cake topper you did for Cindy's birthday cake a couple of AGIers ago?? The "Harley" cake topper. I have since then started "writing in thin air" (like the letters) and love it. Maybe you could give me a couple of pointers at AGI. Your writing was so beautiful (better then the girls in 6th grade!!) And, yes, knitting can hold together...just look at Bandhu's work. It's not "old school" knitting, but knitting just as well. And... what about that lady (The name escapes me right now) who makes huge sculptures and furniture with just stringers (90 COE mind you) and a little butane torch?? See you soon.... Deb

[steven p selchow]

sure thing. I was taught to write letters in glass back in 1983, plain or real writing, mostly for personalized cake tops like cindys. Most the knitted work I do, which is little, is for personalization

[MileHiMama]

Great...I'll look forward to the lesson. Deb :D

[Robert Mickelsen]

Knitted or woven pieces derive their strength (what there is to derive) from the inter-locking structure of the stitches themselves. A knitted piece is composed of humdreds or even thousands of cold seals and invariably, some of them break apart. This happens even while the piece is still being made, which is one reason annealing does little to strengthen a knitted piece. The piece is often mostly cold by the time it is finished and sticking it into a hot annealer will cause many of the seals to pop further weakening the piece. I still have a knitted stagecoach I made in the mid-70's and it is dusty as hell, but still solid in spite of never having seen the inside of an annealer.

Knitting was invented because it enabled lampworkers to make shapes that they could not otherwise. It was also economical since it required much less gas and glass to make something of a particular scale than it would making it out of solid glass. But it was successful because the pieces had a naturally pretty surface, refracting light in little spectral highlights, one per stitch, which made the pieces (when they were clean and new) literally sparkle. This helped the sales in the markets that were being pursued at the time... carnivals, malls, etc. Sales were directed mostly at low-income people seeking cheap gifts for holidays like Christmas and Mother's Day. For these purposes, the technique of knitting worked very well.

But lampworkers who were serious about their craft never liked knit work. We all aspired to do more aesthetically pure work and that meant solid and blown pieces, not knitted. I made my last knit piece around 1978 and never went back. Today, I could not knit if I tried. I have tried... and I have forgotten how.

Curiously, the sparkly aesthetic of little strands of glass has been re-invented in recent times, just not as knitting. Anna Skibska was the pioneer, but many others have used her technique.. welding together tiny strands of glass into much larger forms... to make all sorts of things that are regarded as fine sculptural art.

Here is an example: http://www.sofaexpo.com/chicago/2004/img/gal/fullsize/Bullseye%20(1st%20L)%20B%20Battaile.jpg

And another: http://www.mickelsenstudios.com/catalog/Diana.htm

As in all things, the technique is not what makes the difference between kitsch and art. It is the form and idea. It will be interesting to see if anyone learns to knit and then makes something that could be considered "art".

- RAM

[MileHiMama]

I agree. Kind of brings in the old sayin of "If you buy a PERSON a fish, you will feed him/her, if you teach THIS PERSON HOW to fish, you will feed him/her forever.. " (or something like that - Just changing a little on the gender thing - LOL) This could be a very interesting experiment. Deb

BTW - nice history lesson

[steven p selchow]

I have BIG fish stories..ha ha. Ya, Robert hit it up pretty much. Did the mall thing, kinda miss the big cash for a short time period..most of all the special requests that kept me in shape, but from an artists point of view, knit work I don't consider art.

funny though, the bigger a person goes...the more artsy it tends to become, never beleived that, big is not always what it seems, impressive maybe, but not necessarily art.

I've done a life size fishing rod, reel, the whole works, about 6ft high, mostly solid, with spun accents, didn't consider that art myself, only other people did.

Now you can do some knit work, maybe 3" diameter, such as a base, and complete it with no cracks, then bushy flame it, and melt in the welds (each loop) solid to the one below, or next, and it becomes almost solid, but its not like a solid, such as a horse for instance, where the leg is attached, and no seem is visable, completlly fused as one piece.

Of course most spun I see is nothing but cold welds, the glass, the loop before is still hot enough to stck the next loop on, but the thermal shock takes its toll.

I did a ship once about 3 ft high, and still heard it pinging a year later, was damn proud of that, until my sister-in-law knocked it off my shelf and I just laughed thinking its about time I got rid of that dusty piece of crap.

[Robert Mickelsen]

In James E. Hammesfahr ad CLair Stong's book, "Creative Glass Blowing", "knit work is carefully described but with one important difference... the work is done using SOFT glass. This may seem like a minor difference at first, but when you consider that molten soft glass carries enough heat to partially melt the strata underneath it when seals are made (which is how most furnace work is constructed), it becomes apparent that the soft glass knit work was probably much stronger and less prone to checking than the work made later on out of boro. Why, then, use boro? Easy... because it was so much faster to make. Artisans of the times cared nothing for work that lasted. They cared only for work they could make and sell quickly and easily.

Imagine the earliest knit work that was made using soft glass... COLORED soft glass... When glassworkers switched to boro, they had to resort to using cheap stains to color their work. Much was sacrificed to the holy pursuit of a dollar.

Are we any different today? I sure hope so...

- RAM