Contact: Kerrick Johnson
kerrick@kerrickjohnson.com
(423) 667-1523

For immediate release

Artist Combines Hot Glass, Cold Working and Metal Fabrication Creating Optical Sculptures

Through a dedication to the highest level of craftsmanship, Kerrick Johnson is a sculptor in the most traditional sense. Johnson creates one-of-a-kind sculptures by marrying the intensity of hot and cold work that magnify the wonder of glass as a sculptural medium. Through his unique methods of cutting, grinding, and polishing he amplifies the optical qualities inherent to glass. "I make work to represent exactly what glass is. The transparency of glass requires the creator to pay homage equally to the interior quality as well as the surface quality," said Johnson, a glass sculptor who takes pride in what seems to be the fading skill of cold working. To experience Johnson's sculptures, one can't simply look at them, one must climb inside and view the glass from every conceivable angle.

Johnson accentuates the optics in his work by first choosing high-keyed colors, either a shocking single hue or by layering brights, such as lime over blue or amethyst over red. He blows them into aqueous, linear forms encased in clear glass, calling to mind abstracted waves, sea horses, and sinuous oceanic plants. Once Johnson begins the cold working process, nature bends to light and optics. He carves diverse patterns into each sculpture, including grooves, ribbons, sunbursts, and snakeskin. The cuts are mirrored on the opposing sides of the sculptures, creating engaging, optical phenomena within each fluid form. Johnson cradles each sculpture in a custom stainless steel stand that mirrors the curves of the glass.

Johnson's emphasis on materiality is owed much in part to his progressive education in Greenville, South Carolina, where he studied painting, jewelry, and film at the Fine Arts Center high school. In high school, while studying ceramics “the look I was searching for was glass”, he said. Johnson first studied the art of glassblowing at the New Orleans School of Glassworks, and later under artist Curtiss Brock at the Appalachian Center for Crafts in Smithville, Tennessee. During his time in school, Johnson received five prestigous Niche Awards and the Bacchanal Scholarship. After graduating in 2002 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Glass and a minor in Art History, he built several glass studios as well as managed a glass studio. In 2005 he launched Kerrick Johnson Glass Studio, and was awarded the competitive ArtsMove grant to build a studio/residence in an developing Chattanooga neighborhood. In 2010, his cold working and metal studio will be expanded to include a blowing studio. Kerrick Johnson's work is currently represented by Pismo Gallery and Stewart Fine Art Gallery.

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American Style Magazine, selected as one of eight Emerging Artists. Click Here to View.

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