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Job titles disappear at Staff Arts and Crafts Exhibit

Posted on | August 12, 2009 | 888 views |

by Adam King

When Andy Hudson gets lost in his work, he’s not talking about his role as an associate director of medical education in the College of Medicine. Instead it’s his time spent near a 2,000-degree furnace as he turns a ball of molten glass into a distinctive visual interpretation of his happiest emotions.

Thoughts about the mortgage, bills and daily drama drift away into nothingness as Hudson sits in the heat at the Glass Axis studio in Grandview, shaping the next of his many creations. His latest, entitled “White Viva Colori,” is a vase that was shown at the Ohio State Fair last year and will be his 16th entry into the 18th annual Staff Arts and Crafts Exhibit that opens Aug. 20 in Bricker Hall.

“It’s a physically involved form of art,” said Hudson. “It’s like liquid and you can freeze it in time, and that’s what’s so gorgeous about it. Seeing how layers of color interact with light is unpredictable. You’re seeing through the piece and it makes it a real challenge and a creative opportunity.”

Hudson first saw glassmaking in the 1960s when he was attending fine arts school in North Carolina. The Pennland Craft School started a fledgling program of blowing glass and melting Johns Manville marbles.

“It’s now one of the glass centers of the world,” Hudson said. “But we actually have one of the best programs in the nation here at Ohio State.”

Hudson said he is amazed at the talented students who come through the glass program, but he is equally impressed by the staff who bring their imagination to the Staff Arts and Crafts Exhibit.

He can’t forget a piece a fellow staffer entered the first year he entered a piece: A life-size depiction of a person using different-colored drier lint.

“I like the fact that there’s so many talented people here on campus,” said Hudson, who has earned a vice president’s recognition ribbon for his work in the exhibit in previous years.

“It’s a good way to get staff and the administration together for a celebration of creativity. We see each other as roles usually and the exhibit breaks down those barriers. When you have that kind of sharing, you get to know people better.”

Creatively Hudson shares by stepping out of his glass walls and working with wood or metal smiths to collaborate on an art piece. Because they haven’t worked in his medium, they are able to challenge his sense of what glass blowing can and should be able to do.

“They suggest things I don’t even think of, and it really gets the juices flowing,” he said.

But one of Hudson’s favorite glass pieces isn’t even his own. He taught his granddaughters to blow glass at age 6.

“To them it’s like blowing bubbles, but it’s glass,” he said. “When you see them light up at something they’ve done and made a vessel or ornament, it’s magic, so that makes me really happy.”

Glass blowing is an expensive pastime, costing about $30 an hour to use the furnace at Glass Axis. So Hudson creates a lot of Christmas ornaments to sell and support his artistic exploration.

But time is only part of the equation. Hudson joked that “White Viva Colori” took him 10 years and one hour to make - 10 years learning the techniques and an hour to form the piece itself.

“The technique is what glass is about,” he said. “You have to learn various techniques and applications and then learn to combine them on your own. But once you get into it, it just takes over.”

For more information on the 18th annual Staff Arts and Crafts Exhibit, which is sponsored by the Office of Human Resources and the University Staff Advisory Committee, visit hr.osu.edu/special/artscrafts.

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