Whether her work of art is inspired from a personal photo, a patron’s photo, or as a form of play thru geometric design, Gretchen Niver receives great pleasure creating and sharing her paintings made of glass. “I grew up doing various crafts with my mom, went into Graphic Design in college, and continued doing crafts such as batik, screen printing, calligraphy, and air brushing. But once I tried my hand at stained glass I fell in love.”
GN Designs, Gretchen’s Studio, has been opened to the public every December for over twenty years. In the late 80s she learned to work with traditional copper foil stained glass while working in a stained glass shop in Cary, North Carolina. Wanting to carry her art into a new home she was building with her husband in 1995, Gretchen taught herself how to fuse glass in order to make glass tiles.
Now she creates stunning works of art using both traditional stained glass methods as well as fusing pieces of glass on top of other pieces of glass. The effect is similar to applying layers of glazes in oil painting. When light passes through Gretchen’s two and three-dimensional artworks, magic happens. While melting, fusing, braiding, and slumping glass requires scientific know how, the “art part” is any thing but scientific.
In order to melt the glass, it is placed in a kiln and then must be heated to at least 1480 degrees. While Gretchen’s artistic intentions are often well determined in advance of a firing, often the final piece is a quixotic mixture of science, art, and chance. She is playing with fire after all. Sometimes the process causes frustration for the artist. But mostly she finds it very exciting. “It is the movement of light streaming through the glass that always fascinates. I do not see a time when I won’t want to continue creating artworks with glass.”
See more of Gretchen’s work on her Chatham Artists Guild gallery page.
