Interview with Kevin O'Connell

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This interview was conducted during Glass Week - an event in the artisan crafts gallery dedicated to glass but due to technical reasons is only just now being released.


Kevin O'Connell a.k.a. Nobody is a unique artist who specializes in creating glass sculptures and shooting amazing abstract macro photos of them, which could easily be mistaken for digital paintings.
This interview offers an insight into his working methods and artistic experience and is a delight to read.

If you enjoy the interview, support Kevin by leaving :+favlove: or a comment to the article, go to his profile to tell him how awesome he is and then feel free  to go fav-hunting in his one-of-a-kind gallery.  :love:









:bulletred:When and how was your interest in art first sparkled?

:bulletgreen:My name is Kevin O'Connell and I work in glass. I grew up in Oakville Ontario, where the only interesting thing is the semi secret glass program out of Sheridan college (although soon hopefully it will be host to my own studio as well). I'm a gamer, mostly pc based, and like a lot of pc gamers thought computer programming would be my career path. I went to Sheridan for it and that is where i discovered my passion for glass. I happened to walk down the wing where the glass blowing rooms are and pretty much that week decided that glass is what I wanted to work in, I dropped out of programming, applied to the glass program and haven't looked back at programming since.




"I like finding things people overlook."


K. O'Connell


:bulletred:You specialize in creating colourful glass sculptures and making abstract photographs of them which is a very innovative thing. How did you come up with it?

:bulletgreen:I'm the sort of person who can't just skim over something (an art piece, a hiking trail anything really) and feel like I've really experienced it. I like finding things people overlook so I spent a lot of time exploring and looking at objects from every angle (likely why I like steam-punk style so much, you can see how everything works). So when I first began to experiment with glass I was noticing fine lines of colour that you had to really stare into the glass to find. I decided to try doing a macro-photograph of the piece to see what else was there that I couldn't see and once I did it just astounded me the depth of the colours, patterns and textures. Once I had that one photograph I had to keep looking into my pieces and began to try to have more control over the reactions that produced them, trail and error keep me going as well as my continued fascination with the details that are normally overlooked.





:bulletred:When you create a glass sculpture and then photograph it, how do you go about it?

:bulletgreen:I work with borosilicate glass (rods, frit and powders) for most of my pieces, soda-lime or soft glass just don't have the same feel. My style really depends on what I'm trying to do, and if I'm trying to have a certain look in the glass or just playing around. The photographs I have in my gallery are of small "coins" of glass resulted from either stamping a hot clear rod in glass frit/powder, creating distortions with tools and then re-stamping a backing colour or having rods of varying colours that I use as a paint brush to "paint" (melt) colour onto a clear rod.


"it never provokes as strong a reaction in me as when something is completely unique."


K. O'Connell




:bulletred:You mention you have an aversion towards popular trends. What genres in art besides abstract photography and glass works attract you the most and do you have any artists you particularly admire?

:bulletgreen:I've never been one of those kids that did something because everyone else was, I just never felt that I would be doing it for the right reasons. And it's the same in the art world for me, I can understand that each artist doing one style is unique and can see and appreciate talent, but it never provokes as strong a reaction in me as when something is completely unique. For example take auto tuning, the first song you heard it in was like "hey neat effect" but now that so many artists use it in every single track on every single album, it's just a cheap way of hiding less than perfect vocals. In terms of art styles I like steam punk is one of my all time favourites (only just behind glass), it's something I want to merge with my glass art in the future.





:bulletred:Where do you draw your inspiration from?

:bulletgreen:I get inspiration from two main sources, the first of which is my dislike of the mundane world that I see people around me getting caught up in, same routine, safe coloured cars, cookie-cutter houses, in Oakville even cookie-cutter flower gardens, every day the same thing with no creative outlets. I almost fell into that pattern myself when I was in programming. I guess it's an odd thing to take inspiration from but it drives me to do things that are beyond that world. I love when people pick up a piece I've made and see things in it. I've had comments range from seeing the shape of a dog to religious figures out of abstract colours and shapes.
The second big inspiration is space. It's another thing you can only see the surface of with your naked eye but is really so much more detailed. It's also full of unrealised possibilities which makes it all the more mysterious and exciting.






:bulletred:Which of your works are you most proud of and why?


Line by Kevin O'Connell

:bulletgreen:This piece was the first one I photographed where I was completely satisfied with the results. I slaved over this piece and even though it's been about two years since I made it I feel the same pride I did when I first looked at it every time I see it. This was the piece I put into the show a Toronto gallery hosts for Sheridan graduates. I printed it out 4 feet by 2 feet and had it professionally framed. I ended up selling it which was both an amazing feeling and a horrible one since I sold it as a unique print, meaning I can't ever print another physical copy. In the end though I'm glad I did sell it, that was really the turning point where I first thought I could work with my glass as a profession not just a hobby.




"it hurts to hear so many people automatically assuming them without even a second glance at the things I've spent ages working on."


K. O'Connell




:bulletred:What is the most encouraging or discouraging thing anyone has said about your art?

:bulletgreen:I did my first show a few weeks ago I got both my best and worse comments there. I didn't do very well, didn't even completely cover the booth fee, but my neighbour who was a trade show veteran had the best comment. She told me not to think it was about my work that it was just the wrong venue, that I shouldn't be trying to sell what she saw as modern art in a more rural community. She suggested sticking to the big city art shows, which I had avoided because of them being notoriously less vendor friendly, higher competition levels, and higher price range. She seemed to think I would be in more risk of running out of product than in failing to sell anything.
And the worse comments I got at the show were along the lines of "cheap, china made glass pendants, coloured rocks and crappy computer generated images for how much?". Even if none of those comments are what my work is it hurts to hear so many people automatically assuming them without even a second glance at the things I've spent ages working on.






:bulletred:How do you imagine yourself as an artist ten years from now?

:bulletgreen:I hope to have built up on the studio I have now to include all forms of glass art. I'm working now to create a studio where I would work with other artists to do everything from art installations in galleries and homes to trade shows and classes. At the moment I have a temporary lease on a place that I have my flame working studio set up in and hopefully by the end of next month I'll have some other artists things in my store front. Ideally I would like to built up the glass community in Ontario to be connected, right now we have an AMAZING glass blowing school, some really amazing flame workers and local glass blowing talent, but unless they are in the small section down town Toronto no one would even know that they exist. Hopefully in ten years we will be there.





:bulletred:Tell us about any projects you are currently working on.

:bulletgreen:Right now I've got a few prints I'm trying to make, but they have taken a back seat so that I can finish up a wedding gift for some friends.  They are very musical (going for masters and PHD in music theory!) so I'm working to get a print that embodies that.  It's been a bit difficult since they like more abstract and darker music whereas the colours I'm best at are my vibrant and bright ones!  I thought I had the print perfect but after hearing more of their music I'm not sure it is right, so it's back to playing with colours for me. It's been tough for this print since normally I go very abstract to begin with and then see what it turns into, but for this one I have an idea of what I want the abstract to represent and am trying to match that idea in the glass.  It's been pushing me to use a lot of techniques I never thought I'd use for my more abstract techniques.  Hopefully the piece will be great in the end.



Music WIP by Kevin O'Connell



Thank you very much, Kevin!





It was a delight for me to interview this amazing artist and I hope it's been a pleasure for you also to read his replies.

Here are some more interviews included in Glass Week and conducted by our artisan grafts GM Nobody:

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Yasny-chan's avatar
:nod: nice interview!