Abstract
In my theoretical and practical research I explore the notion that a particular strand of contemporary South African creative glass practice,1 that I have identified, occupies liminal and hybrid spaces that are located within varying categories. Historically, the hierarchical classifications of fine art versus craft have been the predominant categories in which glass practice has been located. I posit that my identified strand of creatively intentioned glass works is non-fixed, mutable and fluid; thus having associations with different categories enabling ‘in-betweenness’ across varying categories2 such as design, fine art, craft, decorative, and studio glass.
The theoretical component of the research which takes the form of a dissertation is complemented by a curated exhibition of selected works by glass practitioners, all of whom are South African based and whose works may be argued to display characteristics of hybridity and liminality.
I briefly outline the history of the glass medium (within a South African context) in order to foreground how the various modes of glass practice have developed from their foremost uses in industrial spaces to their subsequent use in artistic endeavors. I discuss these approaches by looking at work by selected glass practitioners namely, American Dale Chihuly, Southern Africans Bongani Dlamini, Lothar Böttcher, Martli Jansen van Rensburg, Retief van Wyk and my own work.
I locate my study within a post-modern and post-colonial paradigm. The notions of liminality and hybridity are the conceptual tenets upon which I base my arguments. I draw upon the writings of anthropologists Arnold van Gennep (1909), and Victor Turner (1967,1960), as well as post-colonial theorist Homi K Bhabha (1994) to support the basis of my theoretical premise. I use the same conceptual tenets to posit the argument that the formal elements of the glass work[s] informs its presentation from a curatorial...
M.Tech. (Fine Art)