Spotlight on the Arts | Glass Blowing | Season 2022
(light music) - [Ray] Furnace right now is running about 2,100 degrees plus, which is a perfect temperature for the glass for me to work with.
As being a glass blower, it gets awfully warm in my studio, therefore, I have fans running about 24/7, couple exhaust and couple intakes, just to keep the temperature under 110.
I basically can't work at the furnace for more than two, two and a half hours, because I sweat out so much electrolytes while I'm working.
Right now, I have a blow pipe sitting up in front of the furnace, it's warming up, and I slide it into the furnace, turning it and gathering molten glass on the end, like one would gather honey out of a honey jar.
Remember starting a balloon up.
When you first try to get to expand the balloon, you have to blow a little hard, but as the balloon gets larger, you don't have to blow as hard.
Once I get the piece blown to the certain size I want, I have to remove it from the flow pipe.
To add, introduce color, there's two ways of doing it.
I roll out chips on a table, color chips, and I pick it up into the molten glass.
I believe most people are surprised on how difficult it is, and how easy I make it look.
(metal tapping) (light music)
ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7sa7SZ6arn1%2BrtqWxzmiepZmjqHqjuM6woKefXaq4dIGYrWY%3D