Enjoyed coming back to GROW 1.0 this week for a small piece. This version of prairie is inspired by seeing the stems and leaves in circuit board lines. It makes my prairie girl heart happy : )
GROW 1.5 hand cut glass inlay 15x24 c Heather Hancock 2019
detail | GROW 1.5 hand cut glass inlay 15x24 c Heather Hancock 2019
GROW 1.5 hand cut glass inlay 15x24 c Heather Hancock 2019
I’ve loved coming back to GROW with some new directions. My ‘ivy on concrete’ wall has evolved to include abstracted text forms and an expanded role for the matte grout as a canvas for etching + varnish elements.
Grow 4.1 48”x30” hand cut glass inlay c Heather Hancock 2019
GROW 4.1 is ready for installation at a Chicago law firm. The firm’s design incorporates biophilic design elements (including potted plants and a living wall). Looking forward to seeing this piece installed as part of their contemporary art program.
Grow 4.1 48”x30” hand cut glass inlay c Heather Hancock 2019
The client opted for a lower contrast iron gray grout for this project. This gives a true concrete look and allows the etched elements to be more visible.
WIP | 1/8” glass is embedded in 1/16” thinset bed.
Just add light. GROW is happy in any lighting conditions.
GROW 4.1 detail
My work has made it around the world to Seoul. First stop: Korean International Art Fair at the end of September. This five day international art fair hosts 175 galleries from 17 countries and this year a record 82,000 visitors.
Gallery Sklo included my work in their crisp white and gray booth.
Urban abstractions from my REFLECT series are inspired by our everyday experience of moving through the city. Light and shadow play across architectural surfaces offering moments of surprise and discovery. The work explores the vibrancy of the cityscape understood as light and shadow, repetition and variation, information and chaos.
Ms Kim, Gallery Sklo and Andrew Bae, Andrew Bae Gallery
All photos courtesy of Gallery Sklo.
I found some time over the summer to experiment with compositions featuring structural elements. I am always on the look out for coherent built world lines. Trusses and structural beams might be the ultimate in coherent lines. Inspired by the modernist structural beauty at McCormick Place, these studies explore the visual interest (and beauty) of structural elements.
Reflect 1.58 and Reflect 1.57 | Truss studies | each 24”x24” mixed media with glass inlay c Heather Hancock 2019
For years I have noticed the pop of orange pipes weaving through the trusses when driving past on Lake Shore Drive. This created the opportunity to experiment with introducing a color element into this series.
Reflect 1.59 | Truss study 3 | 24”x24” mixed media with glass inlay c Heather Hancock 2019
Looking forward to more in this series.
I came to my art practice with a strong interest in biophilic design. Having worked in healthcare for more than a decade, I am well aware of the importance of natural views and light, organic shapes and forms to well-being. EO Wilson’s concept of our innate attunement to the natural world has been widely adopted as an important restorative element in our urbanized lives.
Grow | urban vine 15”x24” handcut glass alongside matte black grout c Heather Hancock 2019
Growing up on the Canadian prairies I was surrounded by spare natural beauty. I’ve learned to find similarly spare, hard beauty in Chicago’s urban landscape. Setting glass alongside industrial materials such as grout, cement and metal points to the contrast between the natural and manmade worlds and creates tension between light and dark, brilliance and opacity, vibrancy and restraint, fragility and permanence.
Grow offers abstracted organic shapes alongside urban line and texture for a bold visual element relevant to biophlic design. Hand cut glass shimmers and shifts for an engaging visual experience.
rendering Scan with client relevant content+imagery embedded | 2@48”x30” c Heather Hancock 2019
This invited design proposal incorporated content and imagery relevant to the clients in a health+wellness related space. Biological systems and synapses appear in abstract form alongside key words from the clients’ mission statement.
synapses + biological systems encoded along with client’s mission words
I’m thrilled to introduce a new line of artist prints, Urban Moments. Three layers of lasercut paper and acrylic create a dimensional version of my fine art work in glass, at a lower pricepoint.
Imagery is taken from three recent art pieces inspired by Chicago architecture.
Read MoreLooking forward to being part of the 6th Annual Evanston Made, a month long celebration of the arts in our community.
Read MoreI was recently invited to develop a concept for a printed environmental installation using Scan as the starting point for the composition. Working with anchor words provided by the client, the goals for a visual concept included:
printable/easily fabricated wall installation for a 100” x 30’ hallway
integrate the clients’ words in an abstracted way
create an engaging visual experience for an interior employee hallway…traffic going in both directions.
FIve anchor words created the vertical elements for the composition floating along the wall. Oversize circle frames were added to bring more of the playful shape into the concept and soften the rectilinear nature of the hallway span. Compositions were completed by bringing in additional abstracted text elements, creating visual rhythms and variations across the span. First versions were envisioned in a neutral palette integrated with the existing colorway of the hallway. Crisp white, silver sheen and medium gray provided adequate contrast while being visually integrated within the hallway.
Additional concepts incorporated graphic takes on waves and a tree. Borrowing built world forms to represent natural world forms is a modernist trope that I have always been drawn to.
While this installation did not go forward to fabrication I loved the challenge of transforming an everyday corporate hallway into a compelling visual experience.
My weekend at Corning Museum of Glass was truly incredible. I am thrilled to be part of this landmark survey show of contemporary glassmaking and thinking. The contemporary wing is drop dead gorgeous with natural light filtering through high ceiling beams. The Corning Museum team created a cohesive installation with the diverse range of glass art.
Read More
#newglassnow is a global survey of contemporary glassmaking, featuring objects, installations, videos, and performances made in the last three years by 100 artists of 32 nationalities. Heather’s Reflect 3.2 Curve, above, was chosen by selectors Aric Chen and Beth Lipman:
Heather Hancock uses glass inlay to re-create the geometries of mid-century modern architectural facades, capturing a sense of the ephemeral within their otherwise highly rational compositions. —Aric Chen
The show is hanging through January 5, 2020 at the Corning Museum of Glass.
rendering | Reflect triptych | 48”x30” | glass c Heather Hancock 2019
Original Voices opens this Friday 5/3 at Ken Saunders Gallery in Chicago. Work from my architectural abstractions series, Reflect, will be shown alongside work by Demetra Theofanous, Alicia Lomne, Anjali Srinivasan and Weston Lambert.
Reflect brings urban energy to a human-scaled canvas. Familiar—if overlooked—line and rhythm of architectural facades are encountered by viewers in the streetscape. Repeating geometries offer a shifting rhythm as we move through the city. Realized in glass, the work re-creates light interacting with architectural surfaces in the street, the natural world animating the built world.
Reflect 3.7 urban mountain | 48” x 30” | glass c Heather Hancock 2019
Reflect 3.8 curving | 48” x 30” | glass c Heather Hancock 2019
rendering | Reflect triptych | 48”x30” | glass c Heather Hancock 2019
I am thrilled to have work headed to the New Glass Now show at the Corning Museum of Glass. The show opens May 12th and runs through January 5, 2020.
New Glass Now documents the innovation and dexterity of artists, designers, and architects around the world working in the challenging material of glass. A global survey designed to show the breadth and depth of contemporary glassmaking, the exhibition will feature objects, installations, videos, and performances made by 100 artists of 32 nationalities working in more than 25 countries.
Earlier work from my Reflect series was included in last year’s CMOG New Glasswork Review (39). Now I am looking forward to having new work included in this extraordinary exhibition of art from around the world.
A recent invited design proposal gave me the chance to explore new concepts with Scan. Abstracted text forms point to the infinite creativity of language. Our minds are attuned to detecting pattern, scanning for relevant information and finding meaning in the world around us. For this proposal I combined abstracted text forms with backgrounded urban and natural imagery. Simple graphic elements are inspired by my interest in finding beauty in unexpected places. Living in urbanscapes requires new ways of seeing beauty around us and staying connected to the natural world.
rendering | Scan: UrbanLines (concept1) 4 @ 28”x48” c Heather Hancock 2019
rendering | panel1 Scan: UrbanLines c Heather Hancock 2019
rendering | Scan: urban lines (concept2) | 4 panels at 24”x48” c Heather Hancock 2019
Panel4 Scan: UrbanLines 22”x34”
c Heather Hancock 2019
I was recently selected as a semi-finalist and invited to present a design proposal for an art installation at the newly renovated Health+Sciences building at Triton College in River Grove, IL.
Goals: Create a responsive visual experience in Commons area celebrating the extraordinary contributions of faculty and students to broader community. Activate space with shimmering glass and encoded content with relevance to faculty and students in Health+Sciences building.
EMERGE | design concept 3@36”x84” | c Heather Hancock 2019
EMERGE | design concept 3@36”x84” | c Heather Hancock 2019
In Scan, abstracted text forms suggest the infinite creativity of language. Our minds are attuned to detecting pattern, scanning for relevant information and finding meaning in the world around us. I combined abstracted text forms with backgrounded imagery referencing biological process and systems. The color palette was taken from the colorways established by FGM Architecture. Simplified graphic forms offer visually ambiguous elements—ranging from synaptic transmission to electronic circuitry to a thriving vine. Abstracted text also drawn from the biological sciences provide vertical rhythm, encoded content and bold color elements.
EMERGE | design concept 3@36”x84” | c Heather Hancock 2019
Rendered in shimmering glass, this installation creates an endlessly dynamic and varied visual experience for faculty+students and visitors to the building.
additional art installation site | EMERGE 2@30”x60” c Heather Hancock 2019
This large-scale commission was created for a recently renovated early 1900s home with a contemporary industrial aesthetic. The clients, committed to incorporating local art, sought a piece that would complement their dark charcoal gray dining room wall.
After seeing my architectural abstractions in a gallery show, the clients selected a 60” x 36” horizontal composition inspired by the exterior beam structure of 875 N. Michigan Ave. The expanded format allowed for a deeper exploration of urban rhythms and structural beauty.
Material & Composition: Bold architectural lines in a monochromatic palette echo the home’s industrial-modern design.
Spatial Integration: The piece interacts with the space’s dark walls, white moldings, glass chandelier, and zinc countertops, creating a rich material dialogue.
Serves as a striking focal point, enhancing the dining room’s architectural character.
Reflects the clients’ passion for local art and their personal connection to the cities they’ve lived in.
Balances contemporary abstraction with the warmth of their home’s historic framework.
Looking to incorporate custom artwork into your space? Let’s collaborate!
Reflect 4.3 beams | glass | 5’x3’ c Heather Hancock 2019
Reflect 4.3 beams | glass | 5’x3’ c Heather Hancock 2019
Installing Reflect 4.3 from Heather Hancock on Vimeo.
I was honored to be a semi-finalist for the State of Illinois Art-in-Architecture project at Joliet Jr. College.
I proposed a glass and metal mesh installation for the exterior site wedged between parking lot and walkways. Key words from the JCC’s mission statement was abstracted for the installation. The color palette was taken from the surrounding natural world. Metal mesh connects with the metal cladding on the surrounding buildings.
Rendering | invited design proposal 2 double-sided panels at 5x3 and 4x3. c Heather Hancock 2019
Rendering | invited design proposal 2 double-sided panels at 5x3 and 4x3. c Heather Hancock 2019
Rendering | invited design proposal 2 double-sided panels at 5x3 and 4x3. c Heather Hancock 2019
Overview
Client wanted a vertical composition from Scan series to hang in a 2-story open stairwell in her new contemporary home in Dallas. The light-filled stairwell offers ideal natural light conditions for shimmering glass.
Scan 6.5+6.6 | urban vine | glass | each 28” x 48” c Heather Hancock 2018
A vertically stacked hanging of two pieces each 28”x48” was determined to be the best proportion on the wall.
Scan 6.5+6.6 urban vine | each 28” x 48” glass c Heather Hancock 2018
Goals
The vertical composition of abstracted text in Scan is inspired by our incessant scanning and filtering of information in our daily lives. The fonts selected offer a vertical rhythm which functions as a sort of urban vine, continually transforming and endlessly creative.
Process
The client was provided with renderings of possible sizes/proportions of pieces in her space. The client opted for color accents in the art pieces given her neutral interior design palette. A nature-inspired palette of grays with accents in bright green was suggested and rendered for client approval. Bright green and an iridized green/blue glass was selected to bring in a wider color range. Iridized glass is also uniquely effective in catching ambient light, adding to the dynamic quality of the hanging.
Work shipped framed and ready to hang with a 3 week turn-around.
New work in the Reflect series was delivered and installed last week in a contemporary urban Chicago condo. The client wanted a single panel of the “beam” concept, inspired by the exterior architecture of the Hancock tower. A strong diagonal composition with an emphasis on the intersecting beams created a strong single panel for an interior wall in the client’s open floor plan living/kitchen/dining room. Flooded with natural light from the wall of windows directly across the room makes ideal conditions for this piece to shift and shimmer.
Reflect 3.5 beam | mixed media with glass 30” x 48” c Heather Hancock 2018
Reflect 3.5 beam | mixed media with glass 30” x 48” c Heather Hancock 2018