Biography
"Only the glass and gold give an idea of the price of wisdom" Book of Job 18.27.
My name is Guillaume Thoraval, I am flameworker since 2002.
My journey started very young with a strong attraction for minerals, stones, metals and fire .
At 16 years old i decided to learn flameworking, I studied during 4 years at the "Lycée Dorian" in Paris which is the only place in France where your can get recognized diplomas into this domain. I've to tell that my parents encouraged and helped me a lot to find my own path, i thank them infinitely because today i can't imagine my life without glass and flameworking.
My teachers at school Mr Claude Robert, Mr Jean-Jacques Page and Mr Jean-François Boutry passed me their passion and knowledge during 4 years. During my second year degree i made a training session into an University's workshop beside Mr Stéphane Louis. Thanks to him I really evolved into my understanding of the glass and into my technical skills.
After a lot of broken glass and few tears dropped, i obtained two degrees diplomas in scientific and artistic glassblowing ( CAP/ BMA ).
During our 2 last years of BMA, we had the opportunity to learn artistic glassblowing beside our teacher, Mr Claude Robert.
We also learned a lot about history of arts thanks to our teacher Mrs Totet.
Then I worked during two years for a company called « Techniverre » where i learnt quartz glass blowing and how to realize different types of glass to metal seals. There i learned a lot from Mr Daniel Malo and especially from Mr Patrick Philippe who were passionated and experienced glassblowers. I learnt a lot with the quartz glass which is in my opinion the most beautiful glass that it exists.
It is hard to melt and it's no easy to work with, but it's pure and shiny. The light that it generates at this melting point is incredibly intense and attractive.
In 2008 i started to work as scientific glassblower for the University « Paris 7 Denis Diderot », to can contribute to scientific researches, developments and progresses is very interesting and regarding. I've to tell that scientific glassblowing learnt me the rigor and also useful skills which has helped me a lot to be able to start to realize my artistic dreams and projects. To learn about glass technology also permitted me to comprehend more deeply the glass..
Since 2014 I'm the Président of the Association of French Flameworkers, the A.V.C.F. I always took a lot of inspiration from the existing foreing flameworking Associations as the ASGS, the BSSG, the ISGB or the Colorado Project which are all doing a fantastic work for their members but also for our worldwide flameworking community. The absence of an active and visible community in France made me realized that we were isolated and divided from eachother, the exchanges were rare between people and especially between flameworkers from different domains.
Seeing the work and positive emulation generated by these different foreign associations has inspired me a lot and helped me to believe in my dream of creating this "Association des Verriers à la Chalumeau de France". My primary goal was to encourage and facilitate exchanges between artistic flameworkers and scientific flameworkers in order to generate a positive emulation beneficial to our entire community. I also wanted to gather my colleagues together with creating a visible, strong and active Association in order to have the capacity to carry out actions beneficial to our whole profession.
Here our website: http://www.avcfrance.com
About my Work
Since my early childhood I feel drawn to fire and the multitude of different materials on our planet, with a predilection for metals and especially for minerals.
More than 90% of the Earth's crust is composed of silicate minerals, silica is also the main chemical component of glass (SiO2).
In 2013 I started to combine my knowledge, my understanding and my passion for glass with my love for these natural materials, my first goal was to highlight them and to sublimate them with glass.
Interested by the metaphysical properties of different materials as well as by lithotherapy, I also wanted to use the capabilities of silica (quartz) to amplify the specific energies of other materials by combining them with borosilicate glass. My goal was also to develop our manual and technological know-how, I wanted to accentuate our understanding and mastery in the subject of the compatibility of different materials with glass.
So I focused my work on the research and development of new techniques based on the combination of glass with different materials. Over the last four years, I have developed specific inclusion techniques for many metals and minerals that until now are still considered incompatible with glass due to their coefficient of linear thermal expansion difference with the latter.
I was very attracted by the prospect of pushing the boundaries of the possible while bringing new perspectives and possibilities of creation, in the scientific as well as the artistic field. Over time, I have also created colored glasses as well as "composite" materials with unique properties.
I apply the results of my research in my artistic achievements and in particular in the field of glass marbles which are a fantastic field of expression for us glassmakers. Each glass marble is a small Universe, their spherical geometry evokes perfectly the art of working hot glass which is based on the control of rotation and the domestication of gravity. It is also because of gravity that nature loves spheres, we can see it everywhere in our Universe. Rotation is also a universal life principle (cycles), galaxies, stars and planets spinning, even electrons and atoms.
This spherical geometry is also ideal for highlighting the materials I use because when I add it to the optical qualities of transparent glass, glass marbles then become real magnifying lenses like those that can be equipped with microscopes or telescopes. I like making marbles in which the void and the full cohabit harmoniously. The observer can then look in detail at the decorations, textures and materials present at the heart of each of these small Universes in which young and old can dive.
In realizing my work, I seek to generate an interaction between matter and spirituality. I also try to arouse curiosity and wonder by creating a bridge between the infinitely small and the infinitely large.
MY ADVICES :
- Do not be afraid of mistakes or failure, mistakes allow us to learn and it is also thanks to them that we can discover every day new possibilities of creation.
- Always try everything, even if what you want to do is supposed to be impossible to achieve.
- To be able to realize your wildest dreams it is first of all necessary to believe in our capacity to be able to make them reality.
- If you want to continue learning you must know constantly to question your deepest certainties.
- Take the time to observe nature, you will learn everything faster.
My Inspirations
"To become a good glassblower you need to be humble"
M. Claude Robert, Flameworking teacher at the Dorian School in Paris.
I started my artistic journey with Glass beside one of my teachers at the flameworking school, Mr Claude Robert. Thanks to him the young and close minded scientific flameworker that I was becoming realized that working for science and industry weren't the only paths possible for me as flameworker.
His work deeply influenced by nature and light inspired me a lot, i decided to become a better flameworker to can be able one day to create as him with glass.
After few years passed to work mainly on scientific realisations, i discovered the worldwide glass community thanks to facebook and all the groups dedicated to flameworking. It was for me a real rebirth because after the end of my studies at glass school i felt suddenly really isolated, the vision i had of glass was sudently reduced to the glasswork that i had to do as daily job and my vison of the glass community reduced to my rares colleagues and ancient classmates. I learned a lot , dreamt a lot, and took a lot of positive energy thanks to the emulation generated by the worldwide flameworking community. It helped me a lot to evolve as flameworker, with the Shakespeare's language but also to believe into my dreams to create thanks to glass. I can't express how much i feel blessed to be a part of this "glassy family", i thank infinitly all my colleagues who inspired me and supported me during these years.
Later I discovered the glasswork of Mr Paul Stankard who is specialized into the realization of glass paperweights. I completely fallen in love of his spheres and orbs which associates perfectly beauty of nature and spiritual messages. I have been deeply inspired by his work, by his vision of glass but also by his career which he started as scientific glassblower. To read his book "No Green Berries or Leaves: The Creative Journey of an Artist in Glass " been for the scientific glassblower that i was a powerfull electrochoc, a spark that gave birth to the flame of my creativity.
Attracted by his work on glass paperweight i discovered the glass marbles's universe and community. I dreamt a lot in front the fantastic glasswork of flameworkers artists as Travis Weber, Yoshinori Kondo, John Bridges, Tim Keysers, Kenan Tiemeyer, Nathan Gorman, Masataka Joei, Scott Tribble, Jared Delong, John Kobuki, Takao Miyake, and many others that i forget here...
Their glasswork inspired me a lot and thanks to them i opened more my eyes on the infinite possibilities which offers glass, as material but also as medium and bridge between matter and spiritualty.
Since my chilhdood i feel very close to Nature, i always been fascinated by space and was very attracted by the different materials that our Universe offers to us, especially by metals and minerals. Over 90% of the Earth's crust is composed of silicate minerals, silica is also the principal chemical component of glass ( Sio2).
I share this passion for minerals and metals with an american colleague and friend, Mr Dammond Taylor.
I met him 3 years ago now and we become very close together because we have the same vision of glass and interest about alchemy and glass technology. We worked together on similar researches and developments with the aim of encasing or mixing different types of materials with glass, materials which was considered to be incompatible with glass at this day.
Our work these last years contributed to break some limits and to open new doors, for art but also for science. We are very happy to can participate activly to the evolution of our understanding of glass with our researches and developments.
I also have to tell that i feel extremly lucky to have met my loved one, Miss Nathalie Crottaz.
She is also flameworker and specialized into the realization of beads in soda lime glass. We are sharing common human values, the same attraction for life, for glass, for spirituality and also for nature. Her work is extremly fine and subtle, she always wants to do the best of herself and when she realize something it's always with a technical challenge and a spiritual meaning.
I appreciate a lot these qualities, to can exchange with her on our common glassdreams and realizations is something that i enjoy very much because we can motivate us while learning from eachother.
Together we are also working for the french flameworking community through our young French Flameworking Association that i dreamt to create few years ago, she is deeply involved into it and always have given a lot of time and energy to build its foundations. Thanks to her i did can keep the force to continue to work for this project and dream which is now shared by our dear members.
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We are also sharing the same dream to found a beautiful place with a house and its garden where we will can live and build our flameworking workshop for realize our art.
FACEBOOK : Nathalie Crottaz Unique Glass Beads
FACEBOOK : Neha Crea Glass Beads Jewelry Line
GLASS BLOWING: The Art of a Science and the Science of an Art
" We’re really living in the Glass Age " M. Mike Suza, Flameworker at Princeston University
Glass have played and still has a primordial role in our evolutionary developments thanks to its unique physical and chemical properties.
Thanks to the glass we have been able to see the infintly big and the infinitly small which changed our perseption of life and of our Universe.
Nowadays it is everywhere in our day lifes and necessary for our scientific and technological inquiry.
It is one of the most ancient materials created by man. As beautiful as useful it is used as a medium by artists since its discovery, by the industry for utilitarian purposes and by scientists since the beginning of alchemy in ancient Egypt.
For the ancient Egyptians, glassmaking was a holy profession under direct control of the Pharaohs. Imitation of gems was well known in this civilizations, and glass enjoyed an even higher ranking than gold. In ancient Egypt, all activity within science and the various branches of art was tied in with the Mysteries.
Artisans in ceramics, enameling, goldsmithing, wrought-iron work, glass blowing, all labored within and under the protection of the temples.
They answered directly to the priests and their work was filled with sacred topics.
ALCHEMY: The Science Of BEING
"All human beings are made of the same divine quintessence. The only difference betweenthem is that some have learned to work on this quintessence and to develop it while othersleave it dormant. Lead cannot do what gold can do, because it is not of the same nature. As for us, it can be said that we contain within us an atom of gold, but it is completelysurrounded by an entire gangue of base materials. Our work is to transform these worthlessmaterials into gold,which is the true meaning of alchemy."Omraam Mikhaël Aïvanhov
Alchemy, was born in ancient Egypt (the black land of Kemet), it said to be the invention of an ancient Egyptian god called Thot (Hermes Trismegistus) who written the famous Emerald Tablet (Tabula Smaragdina) which is the primary document of alchemy.
The consensus is that the word alchemy is derived from the word "Khem," the ancient name for Egypt, added to the Arabic article "al," meaning "the," thus forming the word "al-Khemy." According to the ancient Egyptians, 'Spirit' and 'Matter' are two "expressions" of the same Principle: pronounced 'Neteru' in Egyptian, and 'Natura' or 'Nature' in later tongues. According to them, everything has a spirit, and every spirit has a body.They knew talking to the spirits within Elemental Matter and revealing their secrets to mankind. This process of "talking to matter" is based on "the four phases of the great work", and the "five spiritual (platonic) solids".
This process was symbolized in Egypt in the pyramidal form, and was said to involve four stages (the four triangular 'faces' of the Pyramid) requiring the application of "five great spiritual Forces" emanated by the principles of geometry (symbolized by the five actual sides of the Pyramid.). Alchemy did in fact lead to the discovery of Chemistry, applying the principles of the "great work" to the physical transmutation of the elements which always results in a more deep understanding of the Laws of Chemistry.
The primary studies of the first alchemists was to lead man into a higher spiritual state of consciousness and discover the sacred keys that unlock the doors of Divine Wisdom, as opposed to material knowledge. It is the purpose of the "great work", harness the spirit within matter into the service of the humanity.
Glass is a melding of the four elements, EARTH, WATER, AIR and FIRE.
Through fire and air the silica (earth element) is made molten and transmuted into a liquid before returning to its earthly state as a solid.
In physics , glass is considered as solidified water. These four elements are considered as basic principle to all bodies.
Innovations in glassmakingenabled thinkers to redefine their perspective on the nature of matter and inspired the alchemical theory of transmutation.
The increasing perfection with which glassmakers could imitate natural gems and stones laid the foundations for the theory and the practical and spiritual art of transmutation.
The famous medieval alchemist and glassmaker Guillaume Sedacermade a major work in this domain, in his book the "Sedicina totius artis alchimiae" he doesn't hesit to describe glass as the philosopher's stone.
Others medieval alchemists as Arnaud de Villeneuve and Raymond Lulle were agree and told that who knows the secrets of glass making knows how to make the philosopher's stone.Metaphysically, glass represents and carries the energies of transformation, rebirth, merging of elements, focus and communication.
GLASS AND LIGHT
There is a strong connection between glass and light.
Glass can focus light, allow light to pass through the invisible
or carry informations by lightwaves and at a great distances through fiber optics.
Although colored glass has been in production since ancient Egypt,we most commonly associate it
with the Medieval Christian churches. They were largely created to illustrate Biblical teachings to a mostly
illiterate population. Only the rich and the clergy knew how to read and write during this period.
So it was already a way to pass knowledge (light) to all people.
We can definitely learn many things on us thanks to the glass. When the light hits the glass it reminds us of our inner light.
Our souls, spirits and auras can be compared to stainless glass windows, unique, shiny and inspiring
I really love this quote from Elizabeth Kubler Ross which illustrates it well :
"People are like stained glass windows: they sparkle and shine when the sun's out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is light within" Elizabeth Kubler Ross
I personally think that glass can be compared to man, it is sensitive and fragile, but at the same time solid and flexible.
He hates being forced or controlled and needs attention, respect, patience and a lot of love.
If we take care of these points and show humility, I think that glass will follow us wherever we would like to go.
It allows us to highlight our most beautiful qualities as our worst defects
Days after days it helps us to become better and to realize our wildest dreams.
I thank you to have taken the time to read these words.
I hope deeply that you will enjoy discover my developments and glasswork into this website and wish you a pleasant visit !
Silicated and warm regards
Guillaume Thoraval