In her sculptural glass work, North Carolina artist Amber Marshall focuses on fresh colors and forms that seem effortlessly elegant.
The artist: Marshall grew up in Collinsville, IL, a small town near St. Louis, and graduated from Illinois State University in 2001 with a degree in art and a specialization in glass.
For the next eight years, she worked as an assistant to other glassblowers and taught beginning glassblowing classes at Third Degree Glass Studio in St. Louis, while also waiting tables.
Ready for a change, she applied and won a three-year residency at the EnergyXchange in Burnsville, NC.
The innovative green program, which was canceled halfway through her residency, was billed as a business incubator, providing studio space and use of glass furnaces and kilns powered by methane gas from the former landfill on which the complex was built.
When the residency ended, Marshall decided to stay and work, surrounded by the mountain beauty and communities of artists.
The studio: Amber Marshall Glass started in 2011. Marshall’s studio is in Bakersville a 25-minute commute through winding mountain roads from her home In Spruce Pine. She shares studio space with her partner Mike Hayes and Greg Fidler, both glassblowers
The goods: Hand-blown sculptural glass, often arranged in groupings, and wall installations. Glass is sandblasted and acid etched for a soft matte surface.
Most popular: A toss-up between the clean-lined dappled vases ($300 to $750) and Pouffe wall art ($1,200 and up) that can be customized by size, color and composition.
What’s new: Exploring new texture and techniques with skein pieces (solid glass pulled into very thin rods). These new wall pieces were inspired by a weaving class she took at nearby Penland (NC) School of Craft.
Where to see & buy: ambermarshallglass.com and the Ariel Gallery in Asheville.
Get social at: amberjmarshall1on instagram
