Gals of Glazz - Tegan Hamilton

Hey there friends, I have had a lot of stuff (thats putting it politely) going on recently, and it's making me think long and hard about a lot of it. But in the midst of it all I remember Gals of Glazz! Gals of Glazz makes me ridiculously happy to write about. It reconnects me with my joy. LAdies and glass! What's not to like about that? I also like it because it's not work for me. It's like a nice kind of distraction. An extra curriculum activity. (Makes me think of Rushmore and Max Fishers love of extra curriculum activities, beekeeping, fencing, theatre productions...I fucking love that movie, the scene with Bill Murray on the diving board, scotch in hand, ciggie dangling from his mouth...gold)

So today (night), I bring you Tegan Hamilton. Tegan went to the same Uni as me but was a couple of years above (I think?). Tegan is now living her dream, blowing glass in Seattle. You little ripper. This lady has ballz! I really admire that she went, you know what?, I want to blow glass and where better to do it than Seattle. I'm moving there. Amazing. I think it takes a courageous person to chase their dreams. So here you go, get to know her a little better:

Gals of Glazz

Tune in for 10

1.             Who are you and what do you do?

           

My name is Tegan Hamilton and I am an Australian glass artist living in Seattle, Washington, USA. I help other wonderful people make their work and make as much of my own work as I can!

2.             What do you make?

I make unique functional work which includes octopus inspired vessels and screen printed tumblers. I also make less functional work which is inspired by natural history and anatomy. My Masters work explored the relationship between medicine and art, and my more recent work looks at natural history in a broad manner. I love sculpting, blowing, printing and painting among other things.

3.             Why do you make?

I make because it warms my soul. I would be incomplete and not as happy in life if I weren't creating.

4.             What’s you colour palette?

I have a pretty subtle colour palette generally. I prefer one colour at a time and love transparent colours. The transparency of glass still fascinates me after 12 years.

5.             What’s your proudest achievement?

My proudest achievement is packing up two suitcases with no planned job or place to live and flying to Seattle to follow my dreams. It was so scary and in hindsight very brave!

6.             Hot or Cold?

Love the hot. There is nothing like the warmth of the furnace on your skin when gathering glass. However, warm and cold are integral to my processes.

7.             What’s your dream project?

My dream project is a mountain of time developing my own work.

8.             What’s your influences?

There are so many influences on my work. I take inspiration from the brilliant scientific illustrators like Vesalius, Henry Carter and Da Vinci. I'm inspired by natural history museums which capture the human fascination of collecting categorising and preserving the world around us. I'm also influenced by my glass peers and the glassblowers who came before me. I would not be where I am today without the 

9.             What’s coming up for you? Or what are you looking forward to?

I am currently involved in a glass holiday show at the Pilchuck Glass exhibition space in Seattle until the end of December (there will be a fun opening on the first Thursday of December) I also have a glass exhibition coming up in Melbourne in February, so I get to come home for that.

10.         If you could only eat 3 foods for the rest of your life what would they be?

Steak, green beans and dark chocolate!

Thanks for sharing with us Teges! 

You can check out more of her stuff here.