John Croucher's Hot Lips Trilogy

John Croucher was an important influence on the development of glass in Auckland and New Zealand. After some experimentation and with the support of the Queen Elizabeth II Arts Council John set up Sunbeam Glassworks in Jervois Road in 1976. Formed as a loose co-op of several craft-workers, glass production included hot glass, flat glass and flame working. In 1981 two new glass-blowers became partners with John Croucher at Sunbeam. Ann Robinson was a student at Elam in 1980, and while there met Australian Garry Nash.  After Ann graduated from Elam, she and Garry joined John Croucher at Sunbeam in 1981. They developed the new Sunbeam studio in McKelvie Street in Ponsonby. This was a highly successful partnership, and the Sunbeam artists brought wide exposure to this new art form. 

Photo: Krzysztof Pfeiffer, from Pacific Glass '83.

John Croucher at Sunbeam, 1982 Photo: Mark Wilson

One of the Sunbeam pieces that made quite an impact was John Croucher's Hot Lips Trilogy, made in 1982. John has told me that the inspiration for the design came about purely spontaneously while he was trying to make welded lip vessels.  Hot Lips Trilogy was one of John Croucher's entries in Pacific Glass ’83, the first major exhibition of glass in New Zealand. The exhibition opened at the Govett-Brewster Gallery in New Plymouth to coincide with the second NZSAG Conference, held at Inglewood, before touring the country in 1983–84. 

The 1982 trilogy from Pacific Glass '83 was acquired by the Dowse Art Museum in Lower Hutt in 1983 (1983/25/1, 1-3.  The pieces are 33cm, 28.5cm and 13.5cm h).













A very similar trilogy, made in 1983, was acquired by the Powerhouse Museum in  Sydney in 1984; only a monochrome record photo is currently available.

Photo: Powerhouse Museum A10096 from http://www.powerhousemuseum.com/collection/database/ 

Still another Hot Lips Trilogy in grey and red was acquired by Auckland War Memorial Museum in 1986 (G.428, 1986.9). Its date of making is not recorded, but was probably 1985. 



The writing of this blog is stimulated by my own recent purchase from TradeMe of a small Hot Lips vase, the second in my collection, shown below on the left.

SP collection, red piece 
signed J Croucher 83. 29cm h

SP collection, unsigned 11.5cm h 

 

Although it is not signed, the style is very distinctive.  In a email, John Croucher confirmed this as a piece he had made, saying  'Yep that's one of the very early hot lips series -probably about 1982?'

The larger piece on the right I have mentioned in a blog previously (http://newzealandglass.blogspot.co.nz/2014/09/so-who-was-gbc.html), but I'm happy to include it again now I have two.  I'm one vase shy of a trilogy, but still looking! 

John Croucher's original partner at Sunbeam was James Walker, who sadly died in 2011. (I wrote about his death in my blog on 9 April 2011  http://newzealandglass.blogspot.co.nz/2011/04/james-walker-1948-2011.html). James bequeathed two Hot Lips vases to Hawke's Bay Museums Trust. Although not signed or dated, these are much more decorated than the original forms.  It would be interesting to see how many variants there are.   

 

Hot Lips Vases, John Croucher (b.1948), from the estate of Mr James Walker, Collection of Hawke’s Bay Museums Trust, Ruawharo Tā-ū-rangi, 2011/14/2 (front and reverse) and 2011/14/3 (below)

26.5cm high

14.5cm high

 
This piece in my own collection is another variant, combining Hot Lips with the optical mould formed opaque glass with black wavy lines that both he and Ann Robinson used at Sunbeam.  Although not signed, this recent TradeMe acquisition is also clearly a Hot Lips piece

SP collection, unsigned 31cm high

So Who Was GBC?

One of the great thrills of hunting for glass on internet auction website TradeMe is when you buy something you don't know what it is, but you have a hunch, and it turns out to be something quite special.

Of course, there are also those occasions when the hunch proves to be wrong, and the piece turns out to be nothing, or something of no interest that I can't identify. Which is why I have a box of motley pieces ready to be donated to the Opp Shop...

But here's one of the success stories.

A chunky art glass goblet, the trader said, with GBC 1979 engraved on the base. No other clues as to its origin or the identity of the maker. The auction was set for bidding to start at $20, with no reserve price.

I racked my brains to think who GBC might be, but to no avail.  There was a photo, which had hints of NZ glass - Keith Mahy seemed a possibility, but he clearly wasn't 'GBC'. The photo wasn't as clear as this one, which I took once the piece arrived, but it was good enough to encourage me to bid. So I did. There was no interest from anyone else, so my opening bid of $20 was successful.

Garry Nash has always been helpful in my NZ glass research (as indeed have others), and he was involved in the glass scene in 1979, so I thought I'd send him an email to ask what he thought.  A few days later I happened to be in Auckland so I called in to Nash Glass to see if Garry had any thoughts about it.  Talking about it with Garry Nash and his colleague Claire Bell, Claire said ‘that could be a J, what is John Croucher’s middle name?’ Garry said at once ‘Barry, John Barry Croucher’.

Which made for a really exciting possibility.  Once the piece arrived and I could handle it, I could confirm that it indeed it had JBC 1979 on the base, as you can see in the photo on the right.

I sent the photos off to John Croucher, who replied, saying: 

'Yep you have a very early Croucher. We had just started blowing full time then. Amazing that people bought enough of that stuff that we could keep on doing it!'

So I am thrilled to be able to add this to my collection. I have several early Crouchers, but this is one of the earliest, and certainly the earliest signed one. The glass is very similar to that used in the decanter I have blogged about before, that was bought at Sunbeam in 1979 but is not signed.  (See 'An Early Piece of Sunbeam Glass?' from May 2007). John was unable to be certain which of the early Sunbeams had made the decanter, identifying Danny Keighly, Ken Cooke and himself as possibilities, though he didn't think he had made it.  But with the signature, there can be no doubt who made this goblet.

Just to round out the story, here are two other early pieces signed by John that I have bought on TradeMe, though I paid quite bit more than $20, since the vendors knew what they were. 

 

The vase at left is signed 'J Croucher 1982' and the 'Hot Lips' sculpture at right is signed 'J Croucher 83'.

Lino Tagliapietra, Italian Glass Master at Sunbeam Glass

Lino Tagliapietra was born in Murano in 1934, and has a long career as a maestro in making glass.  Significantly, through his connection with Dale Chihuhly, he fostered the process of sharing the Muranesi glass making skills, until then closely guarded secrets, with the wider world.  Lino taught at Pilchuck in Washington in 1979, and undertook teaching, classes and demonstrations in many parts of the world.

In 1990 Garry Nash and NZSAG arranged for Lino to give a masterclass at Garry's Sunbeam Glass studio in Ponsonby.  I was thrilled to have an opportunity to visit one of the sessions at Garry's invitation.  Lino made a number of pieces during his time here, and I was delighted recently to be able to add one of those to my collection after it was offered on TradeMe.

This dolphin goblet is a classic example of Venetian glass making, but it is signed Lino Tagliapietra NZ 90.  It's made in clear glass, but the eyes are red murrini with white centres.  It's just under 20 cms high.

 After I bought it, I asked Garry and Peter Viesnik, who was NZSAG President in 1990 what they could tell me about it.  Peter replied: 'this was the one goblet Lino made that I really wanted to buy and Danny Keighley beat me to it by asking Lino if he could buy it before they were put up for sale in Garry's workshop! I was very disappointed.  Was it Danny who sold it?'

It was indeed Danny Keighley, but I confess I was not familiar with the name. You live and learn.  Danny was part of the original Sunbeam Cooperative of John Croucher and James Walker.  He has told me he blew glass for some years from the 'Egg Furnace'.  Danny said: 'John Croucher was probably my best guide initially, and we struggled to 'wrench' shapes from glass when we should perhaps have been more fluid in our approach - but we did some good work.  I took on the role around 1980 of touring the country with boxes of mediocre glass vessels blown by everybody and persuading craft shops to take one or two.  Their interest grew, but was minimal initially.'

Danny has told me more as well, but this blog is supposed to be about Lino.  The remarkable thing about that Sunbeam workshop was that not only was Lino there, but also two American master glass makers who had learned with him at Pilchuck, Dante Marioni and Dick Marquis. I was too new to the world of glass to understand then just how significant this was, but as Garry has said the workshop is still talked about today among glass artists, several of whom were greatly influenced by their exposure to these masters.  I have a dolphin goblet Garry made in 1990 directly as a result of that influence.  Sadly it has come apart, so I can't include a photo, but it's still a treasured piece.