Interview with Pat Doyle

Here you go — cleaned up and ready to drop into Kadence using standard blocks (Headings, Paragraphs, Columns, Image, Gallery). I’ve corrected spacing, flow, and punctuation while keeping Pat’s voice intact.

Glass is light, love, color, possibility, magic.

Humankind has a long history of using glass to adorn, to express, to protect, and to defend. Glass beads have been used to purchase something as valuable as an animal, a piece of land, and even something as precious as another human being’s life.

Stained glass has illuminated churches and cathedrals for centuries, speaking to faith while telling historical and mythical stories through light and colour.

Glass itself is a bit of a conundrum. It is sometimes liquid, sometimes solid. Sometimes strong, sometimes fragile. At times sharp and dangerous, other times smooth, sensuous, and beguiling. Its amorphous qualities make it difficult to define, yet the glowing colour, light, contours, and shapes it takes on allow the artist’s vision to become something as unique as their own voice.

As a medium, it can be opaque, transparent, or translucent. It can be fanciful, functional, practical, or frivolous — and sometimes all of the above. While we as artists can cut, assemble, heat, manipulate, and melt it, ultimately the fate of a piece rests in the hands of our tools, gravity, the power grid, and a bit of happenstance.

It can be uplifting, magical, heartwarming, or heartbreaking — but you never really know until it’s done.

Basically, to me, glass is light, love, color, possibility, magic.

I have been creating for as long as I can remember — with paper, paint, crayons, markers, even macaroni.

My dance with glass began in the 1980s while living in the Yukon. I started in stained glass, but it felt too linear and rigid for me. I moved on to fused glass and was completely hooked. Wanting even more fluidity in my work, I added lampworking to my repertoire. Getting lost at the torch is one of my favorite places to be.

I also enjoy vitrigraph, abstract acrylic painting, silversmithing, felting, silk painting, and videography. I host and produce a local cable TV show with Shaw called Artisans Alley, showcasing local creatives.

One of my greatest joys is introducing beginners to lampworking and glass fusing. I teach at the Vernon Community Arts Centre and have also taught at the Red Deer Summer Series of the Arts.

Getting lost in the torch is one of my favorite places to be.

Light, composition, and nature inspire me deeply. I am also driven by the challenge of achieving elusive results — sometimes that process takes years.

My dear friends and mentors, Leslie Rowe Israelson and Melanie Rowe, were among my first glass teachers and continue to inspire me.

Other artists who have influenced me include Loren Stump, Joanne Andrighetti, Bandhu Scott Dunham, Ikuyo Yamanaka, Leah Fairbanks, Lezlie Winemaker, and Vi and Alexx Cheng — all generous, inspiring souls.

http://www.bellavistaglass.com/

My next show will be at Gallery Vertigo in Vernon this June. Together with Gale Woodhouse, we exhibit collectively as Art Studio Vesta, honouring the goddess of Hearth and Home. With sacred fire as her symbol, we celebrate our shared love of fire in our art.

This show reflects a yearning for the sound of the ocean — made even stronger during these non-traveling pandemic times.

My goals moving forward center on honing my craft and continuing to use glass as my primary vehicle to share my love of nature, light, and texture.