AAE Glass is happy to share glass art works from Michelle Copeland of Thistle Glass. Michelle is a pro's pro and takes the time to develop her art by experimenting with ideas that are outside the box. I will let Michelle tell you about her work below. Thank you for sharing Michelle!
Hello, my name is Michelle Copeland and
I am the artist/owner of ThistleGlass.com. When Tanya and Mark asked
me to write a little about myself for their blog I was flattered and
happy to have the opportunity to let such a large audience know who I
am. I have been a glass artist for over twenty years now and have
wandered all over the map as far as glass disciplines go. My journey
began with stained glass, then fusion, lampworking, casting and
eventually glass blowing. My love for light and color frequently
leads me from one discipline to another and back again, and
occasionally I blend glass techniques to create something completely
out of the box.
This leads me to the latest development in my
glassy journey! I have tons of stained glass on hand from the custom
windows I have built over the years and have been dreaming of great
ways to finally make good use of it, all while still keeping busy
with my fused glass. It was at this point that I found AAE Glass,
offering the curious “new to me” enamel decals. WOW, how very
exciting is this? I had trouble believing their claim that the decals
were strong and never wear or fade. Of course I had to test it out
and I placed my first order. My test after fusing my first round was
to scrape hard with an exacto blade, then I sand blasted, the decals
were still thick enough to withstand this rudeness! I also left one
in the hot sun for several days, and then did the underwater test for
a few more days. Nothing went wrong yet, these decals were crazy-good
quality! My daughters witnessed the decal abuse and exclaimed, “Mom!
You are going to have to scrub the glass on cement to ruin those
decals!” I took that as a hint and have been offering the decal
glass to my clients ever since. Necessary side note here: I tested
other decal brands and not only did they fade, they sandblast off
right away. This means they are super thin, just so you know.
The
next part of the decal journey was my test firings of decals onto
stained glass. OK, really? The glass and decals came out perfect
using the low fire schedule, and with the high fire schedule, the
glass edges developed needles, which were easily ground off. After
this succeeded on the first try, I cut and ground them into the
desired shape and foiled them for stained glass mini windows!
Putting the decals to a whole new test now, (full-color, black,
and white decals), I was pulling no punches here. I ground and foiled
the decal glass, then flux, soldered (remember this is super hot and
DID touch the decal!), washed, scrubbed with 0000 steel wool, cleaned
with rubbing alcohol, applied black patina (which acts as an acid and
did not stain the white tree decal), then applied polishing wax. Now,
if that didn’t wreck the decals, nothing ever will! It’s a big
plus to give the decals yet one more use. They make a gorgeous focal
point to your stained glass pieces and you get to use the stained
glass that’s so different from the fusible glass available on the
market. So, mix it up, go for it, and make something beautiful!
My
personal goal over the years has been to learn as many glass
disciplines as possible so I could someday blend them. Being self
taught, this took awhile, but I did it! One glass lesson in
particular became very clear…. I am never done learning, as glass
is infinite in its possibilities. I leave you with my happy thought
for the day; YOU can do ANYTHING and anything is possible! All glass
all ways, Michelle Copeland.
