ROBERT RYAN
Robert Ryan Glass Artist:
Robert Ryan Glass art is completely unique, in both approach and creation, with a heavy emphasis on the play of light.
Robert is a contemporary Scottish artist specialising in glass art which is vibrant and exceptional. Robert painstakingly applies copper wires, crushed gemstones and metal elements into each piece of glass. He calls them ‘jewellery for walls
He originally started out his career as a metal worker. He confesses he had no interest from day one and says in his own words, that he was the worst metal worker on the Clyde!
Moving on from metal work, he started a business buying and selling cars, improving them and spray painting. He did this for around twenty years, before opening a business with his brother Martin.
Robert’s new business was a step closer to his creative nature, designing, making and selling mirrors with his brother, leading to a successful 15 year career, supplying large jewellers and gift shops with mirrors and frames. Later, Robert started to work on small decorative metal panels, stepping even closer to the work he produces now.
Robert travelled to Australia on many occasions, living there for years at a time. Travelling the country led him through many colourful places such as Thailand and Bali, and is reflected in his work. When living in Australia, Robert worked for a special effects company, which gave him opportunities and inspiration to try new and different types of decorative work, eventually leading to his ‘glass canvases’. His jewel-like works have been an amalgamation of travels, experiences and memories.
. The precise method of his craft is a well guarded secret but the process starts not with a blank canvas but with clear, blank glass and a shard of an idea. Multiple layers of minerals, crushed gem stones, metal work, paint and a great deal of imagination are applied, the idea of which is only evident in Ryan’s head – the result of which is often not all that it seems.
In Ryan’s own words ‘Like an old memory it starts in the back of my mind. I make no attempt to catch the idea, rather, it flits back and forth over days and weeks, an anxiety builds slowly… then the work becomes a pleasure which in turn is felt by you the viewer completing the connection between us’.
The joy of Ryan’s work is twofold. Firstly, the interaction with light and how that dances in his ‘paintings’. The second is the interaction with the reader’s imagination. Although Ryan has created a masterpiece in each of his pieces, the enchantment is in your interpretation.
Ryan sells out year on year at London’s Affordable Art Fair amongst other events, with customers being drawn to specific pieces then returning to snap up more of his work.