Artist Statment
I was immediately grabbed by the beauty and spectacle of working with hot glass at the start of my undergraduate studies. From my first introduction, glassblowing and hot casting demand my focus in a way that silences all distractions and mental noise. The processes of hot glass techniques drew me in, and as I dove deeper into the medium, I experienced how the material naturally possesses qualities that allow glass sculpture to describe invisible entities that surround us everyday. This led me to make wearable glass sculptures and installations that explore how the innate hardness, transparency, and fragility of glass can be used to create and accentuate built, natural, and bodily environments.
Biography
Courtney Tanner is a glass and mixed-media artist whose work investigates how the innate hardness, transparency, and fragility of glass can create and accentuate built, natural, and bodily environments. Recently, her artwork utilizes multidisciplinary techniques that test the structural capabilities and limits of glass. Discussing themes such as emotional and structural tension and the human experiences. She holds a BFA in Glass and a BFA in Architecture from Massachusetts College of Art and Design. She has worked in the glass field at various studios as a production gaffer, public studio teacher, and fine art kiln casting fabricator. Her work has been exhibited at the Naturalist Gallery of Contemporary Art, Godine Gallery, and at various other galleries and was published in the New Glass Review 45, the Penn Journal of Arts and Sciences, and more. Courtney lives in Providence, RI and works in Boston, MA.
