June 2018: Rosey Covert & Hazel Glass

Hazel Glass creates layers of intricately hand cut paper. She discovered paper=cut art, most of what she saw was made out of single sheet of black or white paper. Hazel immediately pushed those boundaries, by using color and multiple layers to create interwoven contrast and compositions with depth. Firmly believing that bigger is not better, she finds both the meticulous technical challenges and resulting delicacy of working small too intriguing to ignore. Using an x-acto blade, she hand cuts each layer separately, building them up from a 2D drawing into intricate bas-relief sculptures. Her inspirations range from the meditative symmetry of illuminated manuscripts and Islamic art, to the organic patterns of nature. From textiles and tiles, to sediment strata, rusted metal and weathered wood grain, Hazel strives to reinvent them with nothing but paper. The results are precious windows into abstract worlds. Whether the palette is vibrant or muted, it is an integral part of the work. And while the design is what Hazel’s art is saying, color is the tone of voice through which each piece speaks.

Rosey Covert weaves willow into what she calls woven sculpture. “My first year weaving I tried everything, any class I could get my hands on, and many different styles of weaving. In my second year of weaving I began to learn to harvest and process different plants.  In the second year of weaving I explored my way past the delicious hunger to try everything while figuring out what I like and don’t like, into an exploration of what it looks like when I weave from my own imagination and wandering. They begin in circles, overlapping and intertwining. They are made of pathways, they feel like rivers to weave. These sculptural pieces, loosely called baskets, are made from red osier dogwood that I harvested from the Hoyt Arboretum in February of this year. Also the ones I’ve been working on this winter are from the trees in my neighborhood, willow from a local farm and red osier, again after the harvest. Playing with lines and shapes in this organic branch twisting way has been dreamy and wild and sometimes frustrating and wonky.”