This magnificent 2280mm x 1550mm work,”Requiem for the Murray River”, of leadlights containing screen printed and kiln-fired glass set in riveted aluminium was generously loaned to the artVision 2011 exhibition by the artist, Peter Toyne.

Glass in a fragile world

artVision 2012 will be an exciting event on the Arts Council of Mansfield’s Spring ArtsWalk program. It builds on the success of last year’s artVision architectural art glass competition and exhibition and aims to achieve a respected place on the national art glass competitions calendar. The theme for artVision 2012 is “Glass in a fragile world”.

The Arts Council of Mansfield (ACM), with the support of Australia’s glass artists’ representative bodies and a number of local, regional and national sponsors, will conduct a contemporary glass art competition with prizes in 4 categories: architectural glass, studio glass and the work of emerging professional artists and those who are new to glass art.

ACM is delighted that Michael Scarrone, Curator at Australia’s National Art Glass Collection in Wagga Wagga, has agreed to judge the three artVision competitions this year. In addition, Peter Kolliner, OAM, Director of Kirra Galleries, will judge the Kirra Galleries Emerging Artist Award. This award  includes an opportunity for a mini-exhibition at Kirra Galleries.

Judging will be followed by an exhibition of architectural and studio glass art and a sale of glass works. The exhibition and sale are expected to bring many hundreds of glass artists, collectors, building and design industry representatives and other visitors to Mansfield.

artVision goals:

In conducting a contemporary glass art exposition in Mansfield, ACM’s goals are to:

1. Exhibit contemporary architectural and studio glass which has artistic merit that will enrich the life of the community.

2. Provide opportunities for local, interstate and international glass artists to compete for increasingly significant prizes and to exhibit and sell their work.

3. Achieve recognition for artVision as one of the top five events on the Australian glass art calendar within five years.

artVision advisers:

Anne Clifton, President, Ausglass Ltd
Donna Cooper, Executive Director, Architectural Glass & Design Australia (AGDA)

artVision background:

Four years ago, the Rector of the Anglican Parish of Mansfield, Fr. Chris Huxtable and Brian Langevad from Jamieson initiated ‘artVision’, an annual spiritually themed visual arts competition and exhibition as part of Mansfield’s long standing High Country & Spring Arts Festival. In 2011, in partnership with the Arts Council of Mansfield (ACM), an architectural glass art competition and exhibition was introduced.

The new glass competition was well received by the community, glass artists and glass artist representative bodies. There were 32 entries from the Mansfield region and Melbourne as well as from the ACT, New South Wales and Queensland. The President of Ausglass, Anne Clifton, spoke at the official opening and many hundreds of people visited the exhibition to appreciate the stunning contemporary glass exhibits and the wonderful large work entitled ‘Requiem for the Murray River’ (pictured above) presented by Peter Toyne, Artist in Residence at Axess Glass Products Australia.

In March 2012, the Anglican Parish Council decided that it would not continue to support artVision and handed the competition over to the Arts Council of Mansfield. The spiritual theme will not be retained.

1 The two major Australian glass artist representative bodies are: Architectural Glass & Design Australia (AGDA) and Ausglass Australian Association of Glass Artists Ltd.

2 “Architectural” glass is defined by AGDA as any type of glass (eg. leadlight, stained glass, kiln formed or laminated) in a flat or 2-dimensional form eg. a window, door, skylight, door surround, as a room screen or a partition, or affixed to a wall as a functional or decorative element.

3 “Studio” glass is defined as any type of glass (eg. leadlight, stained glass, kiln-formed or blown) in a 3‐dimensional form that is decorative and/ or functional eg. a sculpture,  vase,  bowl, bead or paperweight.

4 The ‘New’ category is open to developing artists who have taken up glass art professionally in the last three years and others who may have only ever practiced glass art as amateurs but whose work is reaching higher standards. The New Glass Artist prize is offered to encourage participation by those who have not exhibited their work more than once in the last 3 years.

5 An ‘Emerging’ glass artist is a professional artist whose work is not well known to glass collectors or galleries (or known but showing marked development) and whose entry, in the view of the judge, is original, proficiently executed, realistically priced and made in Australia. In order to be able to take up the opportunity of a mini-exhibition at Kirra Galleries, the artist must be committed to a career as a glass artist, be commercially viable and have a good body of work with artistic merit.