Making glass art with high-quality borosilicate glass is what Scott Pernicka prefers since this hard glass has the required clarity. His contemporary magical spheres made out of this glass have given a new dimension to glass art. His handcrafted glass spheres showcase an incredible amalgamation of glass, physics, artistic vision, and meticulous attention to detail. Little wonder his glass orbs look like some piece of the universe or a galaxy or the deep sea with swathes of different colors.
Pernicka uses a flameworking process to heat up the glass to a whopping 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit, turning it from a solid to a gas. He then introduces his choice of metals for the desired colors. He uses a combination of 99.99 percent gold, silver, crystallized metals, and/or metal oxides for creating an array of colors. It comes as no surprise that each exquisite and complex vortex sphere becomes a one-of-a-kind collectors’ item.
Pernicka’s work is not easy, but for him, it’s a labor of love. Just to show how difficult this art is, he took seven years to create his signature piece called the ‘Dichroic Swirl’. It involved folding crystallized metals in half, then spreading them in different directions, and, finally, swirling the hot glass into a vortex. And it’s not only vortex spheres that he creates, but also a range of breathtaking custom jewelry, comprising beautiful pendants, and necklaces, that is much sought after.
Pernicka, born in Santa Fe in New Mexico, USA, always had an artistic bent of mind. In college, he started experimenting with 3D space in sculpture, but couldn’t continue. afterward, he took up glass blowing and found his true calling. What motivated him to take up this form of art, he states on his website, “I’ve always had an interest in sculpture, painting, and science with an eagerness to rise to a difficult challenge and succeed with beautiful color.”
Pernicka has been sculpting glass for the past 24 years. According to him, it’s his perfectly rounded vortex spheres with spirals of color that have catapulted him to fame.
Internal Fire Glass
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