2012 Fire & Light Soiree Auction Items

The Bay Area’s top artists working in metal, glass, fire, wood and mixed media have donated fine art for tonights auction. The live art auction will take place during dessert. Be sure to have your paddle ready, and good luck. We’ll have your artwork packaged for you when you leave for the evening.

Click here to download a PDF version of the full auction program.

	1. VIDYA RING Sculpted Jewelry $500, AndyLifschutz.comAndy Lifschutz is a native Oregonian now residing in New York City. His exploration into metalwork began in Brooklyn with renowned designer Kristin Hanson, where his natural inclination for design and bursting expression finally found its discipline. He then went on to study under William (“Billy”) Thomas King at the Sterling Quest School of Jewelry Design and Creation in San Miguel De Allende, Mexico and graduated in 2008.Andy creates pieces that symbolize the force of the natural world while articulating the balance between old and new. His work ranges from functional adornments to fashionable and thought provoking ornamentation.
	2. CORSET FROM “MACHINE: A FIRE OPERA” Silk, Cotton, Steel $550, DarkGarden.comAutumn Adamme and her team of over a dozen women design, dream up, cut, sew and otherwise bring into being corsets, gowns, costumes and clothing for all types of special occasions including, but certainly not limited to, Red Carpet celebrity moments, Playa weddings, traditional weddings (and occasionally Crucible performances), as well as lingerie in leather, lace and silk which have been worn all over the US and in Europe.At the forefront of the world’s corset market for over 20 years, using the finest fabrics, Dark Garden’s talented craftspeople built each corset and tailored garment on-site. Based in Hayes Valley since 1997, they have been making the world a curvier, pervier, more beautiful place, one waist at a time. This auction item was commissioned for The Crucible production MACHINE: A world premiere Fire Opera.
	3. THREE OF… Plastic Resins with Walnut Wood Base $1,100, BillyHiebert.comBilly Hiebert received his MFA for sculpture in 1965 from the California College of Arts. After a few years of sculpting with metal, carving marble and teaching sculpture and design, he was attracted to industrial processes involving molding and casting. This soon lead to a full-time business that offered model making, molding and casting to both artists and industrial clients from 1966 to the present time.His exposure to new methods and materials soon led to a different direction in his sculpture. Billy left behind welded steel and carved marble to embrace a world of molding and casting. Most of his current sculpture is expressed through molded plastic resin using both modern and traditional techniques. He has now lives in the San Francisco Bay Area since 1961.
	4. METAL BOOK ON STAND Forged and Fabricated Steel $800, RedFrogMetalDesign.comCarla Hall has been making decorative ironwork for over 15 years. She was greatly influenced by the experience of growing up in central North Carolina with a family history of tobacco, cotton and moonshining. She has a diverse education including studies at Penland Craft School, the Evergreen State College – where she received her BFA in metalwork and through multiple apprenticeships.She has a strong belief in arts education and in empowering youth through exploring industrial arts. Her greatest creative influences come from Japanese folk art and architecture and from old industrial structures. She currently runs Red Frog Metal Design and is the Youth Program Director at The Crucible.
	5. KOLIBRI Bronze, Forged Steel, Wood $2,000Daniel Yasmin uses sound to explore the influence of space and time on matter. He cultivates his aesthetic through collaborative performance and collaboration in Oakland.Chris Niemer, blacksmithing area head at The Crucible, was born with metal in his blood; both his father and grandfather were machinists. For Chis, metalsmithing is a form of alchemy, forging the past into the future using the tools that are present.
	6. RUSTIC KITCHEN KNIFE Steel, Wood $350Cliff Bohm specializes in bladesmithing and decorative blacksmithing. He finds beauty in the juxtaposition of polished steel next to the rough “unspoiled” textures generated by the forging process.He strives to create well-crafted objects with appealing design which possess a timeless quality to leave the viewer wondering if they are looking at a rare antique or a newly created object. Cliff currently teaches Introduction to Blacksmithing and Bladesmithing at The Crucible.
	7. HAND MANIPULATION Cast Iron $400, CynthiaHandel.comCynthia Handel has been sculpting and casting metal for the past twenty years and teaching sculpture at universities for the past fifteen. Currently, she teaches at The Crucible and Alfred University, Alfred, NY and performs at conferences.Her work combines cast elements with steel, wood and other materials such as silk and beeswax to create abstract forms which are minimalist in form, distilled down to the bare essentials. Her work can be seen in private and museum collections in the U.S. and she exhibits pieces throughout the USA, Europe and Mexico.
	8. EMBODIED JOY Ceramic $2,000, DamienJonesArt.comDamien Jones has always had a deep affinity for geometry and mathematics, which clearly expresses itself thru many of his artworks. The unshakable foundation of pure truth that these subjects provide is the basis for all scientific knowledge – all the myriad facets of the universe we have explored and understood, which have yielded an enormous degree of technological sophistication and the ability to direct our lives and world in amazingly complex ways.He often features chaotic, random glazes patterned by geometric series (circles, ellipses, parabolas, etc…) and Fibbonacci spirals, organizing and harmonizing the chaos in meaningful and beautiful ways.
	9. GEOMETRICS Photograph on Watercolor Paper $750Durwood Zedd’s photography celebrates the beauty of simplicity in natural and man-made design. A long-time art collector, auctioneer and fitness trainer, Durwood’s passions are evident in his work. His appreciation for art and design, his curiosity about the objects that shape and bring enjoyment to people’s lives and his respect for the human form are clearly visible in his photographic images.He prints in silver gelatin and iris, as well as pigment on canvas. A self- taught photographer, Durwood began experimenting with 35 mm in 1999 and quickly moved to larger format cameras. Well received by the San Francisco art community, his work was immediately sought after by private collectors and designers across the country.
	10. TRIO Fused Glass $600Gabrielle Kuzsel started working with glass through classes at The Crucible, drawn to the vivid colors and possibilities of form. Always appreciative of combinations of function and beauty, she designs a line of tableware and lighting meant to be enjoyed for entertaining everyday use.
	11. SIGNED CANDLESTICKS Forged & Hammered Copper $3200, HesselStudios.comA Wisconsinite by birth, metalsmith Greg Hessel works his magic on hammer forged copper in the San Rafael based Hessel Studios, which produces over 60 different hammer forged copper candlesticks designs.Each design has its own distinctive personality, and each is given a mythical or romantic name, like Callisto or Flirtation, which is engraved on the underside of the base. The polished surface can be maintained, though some prefer to keep the surface unpolished, so that over time it develops a rich warm color, reminiscent of a fine antique.
	12. SPECIMEN Acrylic on Archival Watercolor Paper and Wood Frame $1,500, JennybirdArt.comJennybird Alcantara received her BFA from the San Francisco Art Institute and lives in San Francisco. Her minutely detailed paintings are filled with objects that possess un-borrowed symbolism, drawing the viewer deeply into a world both strange and beautiful. The majority of her work is oil paintings on wood, but she also creates art dolls inspired by her paintings and acrylic works on paper.Jennybird’s artwork has been exhibited broadly in the US and Europe. Her work has been published in the Hi Fructose Box Edition Set, Ideafixa Greatest Hits, The Age of Feminine Drawing, several small publications as well as Hi Fructose, Juxtapoz, Raw Vision and Art Doll Quarterly magazines.
	13. PORTAL Cast Glass $500, JeremyScidmore.comJeremy Scidmore earned a BFA at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and later returned there for an MA in Arts Administration and Policy. While in Chicago, he owned and managed a public glass-arts resource center, completed numerous private and public sculptural and architectural art commissions and taught glassblowing and kilnforming.Scidmore joined Bullseye in 2011 and is now an Instructor and Studio Coordinator for Bullseye Glass Co.
	14. CREATURE VESSEL Bronze $300, Gottbrath.BlogSpot.comJoey Gottbrath was born and raised in Louisville, KY. He received his BA in Functional Design from Murray State University, where he studied with Kentucky furniture maker Paul Sasso. Gottbrath received his MFA in Sculpture from Arizona State University in 2002, studying with woodworker Tom Eckert and sculptor Mary Bates Neubauer.In 2004 Gottbrath was a recipient of the Arizona Commission on the Arts Artist Project Grant, one of five artists in the state to receive the grant. Venues that have exhibited Gottbrath’s work include Tryptich Gallery, Andorra Gallery, Gallery Materia, Boxheart Gallery, Anderson Ranch Arts Center, Oakland International Airport and the de Young Museum.
	15. AND THERE WE ARE Copper, Stainless Steel, Bronze $1,500Jonathan Hyman started as a sculpture at the College of Marin and went onto do TIG welding professionally for aircrafts, restaurants and pharmaceutical companies, while always making sculptures. For the past forty-one years, his pieces have reflected his spirituality and his Spirit is transferred to the Metal. Most of his work is in stainless and copper.He has been shown at Elsewhere Gallery and at the Davies Symphony Hall, as well as many private collections throughout the United States, England and Canada. His work can be seen publicly as the sculptures spanning Highway 880 near University Avenue. He also produced the stainless work on Scott Donahue’s statues on the pedestrian walkway.
	16. BLUE GREEN FRIT BOWL Cast Glass with Glass Frit $4,500, JohnLewisGlass.comAs a graduate student in architecture at the University of California at Berkeley, John Lewis was introduced to blown glass by professor Marvin Lipofsky. John founded the first private hot glass studio in California and later received his MA in design in 1970. His early work in blown glass led to an interest in glass casting.With the help of a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, he built an experimental facility to explore the possibilities of cast glass. At his state-of-the-art casting studio in Oakland, Lewis designs and produces cast glass sculpture, tables, vessels and site-specific architectural projects. He has completed numerous commissions for private and corporate clients and is represented by galleries internationally.
	17. OCEAN LUSTER BOWL & GLASSES Hand Blown Glass $650Kier Lugo began blowing glass fifteen years ago in Southern California. He has spent over ten years as a production glass blower for various art glass studios in both Southern and Northern California, while pursuing his own work.Kier became a member of The Crucible family in 2003 when he moved to the Bay Area to attend SFSU and began volunteering at The Crucible. Since then Kier has become a Senior Studio Manager, Foundry Instructor, as well as, head of the glass blowing department which he started two years ago.
	18. SACRED WATER SOURCE Recycled Steel,Window Glass, Plate Glass, Electrical Parts $1,950Mary Bayard White is a glass instructor and co-head of the glass casting and fusing area at The Crucible. She was the head of the glass program at the School of Art and Design at San Jose State University from 1985-2005. She holds an MFA in Glass and BFA in Ceramics from California College of the Arts.Her current investigations include images of dwellings and use of recycled materials. During 2009-2010 White was a Fulbright Scholar at the National College of Art and Design in Dublin, Ireland.
	19. SIDESTEP TABLE Wood, Steel $900, JustFineDesignBuild.comMatt Wolpe graduated from The Evergreen State College in 2005 with an emphasis in Urban Studies. He has worked with a variety of nonprofits including The Center for Urban Pedagogy, The Riverside Park Fund and a Post-Katrina Design/Build trip with Designcorps. Matt has studied woodworking, natural building, sustainable design and carpentry at Yestermorrow Design/Build School in Vermont and recently published a book on sustainable Coop Design and completed his tiny house project.Kevin McElroy is a part-time fabricator, part-time winemaker and full-time thinker, tinkerer and artist. He enjoys working on a broad range of projects, including sailboat and bicycle parts, furniture, commercial space design and sewing. Kevin has a B.S. from Stanford University and volunteers regularly at The Crucible.
	20. INTERSECTION Cast Glass $4,200, MichelleKnox.comMichelle Knox, a New Jersey Native, relocated to the San Francisco Bay Area in 1997 where she attended and graduated from The California College of the Arts in 2000 with a Bachelors of Fine Art. Michelle has studied under many respected artists like Clifford Rainey, Pamina Traylor, Therman Statom, Deb Cerzedsco, Silvia Levenson and most recently Gene Koss at Tulane University where she received her MFA on full scholarship in 2011.She has exhibited pieces at the Oakland Museum, The Museum of Craft and Design and the National Liberty Museum, along with numerous other fine art galleries. She has been an instructor at The Crucible since 2011 where she teaches glass casing, glass coldworking and glass blowing.
	21. HEAVY METAL Found Objects: Electric Guitar, Engine Parts, Antlers, Electric Jackhammer, Toy Motor, LED Lights, Vacuum Cleaner Parts $1,800, Nemomatic.comKinetic Sculptor Nemo Gould earned his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree at the Kansas City Art Institute in 1998, and his Master of Fine Arts degree at UC Berkeley in 2000. Then quickly threw himself into the pursuit of his childhood dreams. “My work appeals to the 7 year- old boy mind, because I still have one…I take silly very seriously.”In 2007, Gould was selected as Artist in Residence at San Francisco Recycling and Disposal, Inc.’s Solid Waste Transfer and Recycling Center, an opportunity highly coveted among the Bay Area’s found object artists, who are given free access to the tons of consumer detritus collected daily at the dump. For Nemo, this was a dream come true—when his lifetime of collecting worthless things transformed into recognition as a standout maker of his generation.
	22. FOUNTAIN BELL Bronze, Water $1,600Nicholas DiPhillipo has channeled his interest in burning and melting things into relatively non-destructive activities. For almost 35 years, he has worked as a professional metal caster in the areas of sand casting and lost wax casting, with a focus on designing and building equipment used in the casting process.Things he does are mostly bells but a lot of other stuff too. His pyromania is managed within legal and reasonably healthy limits. Nick also teaches and heads the foundry department at The Crucible.
	23. IGNIS COGNITO Stainless Steel, Forged Steel, Borosilicate Glass $2,500, PeterKropf.comPeter Kropf creates sculptures with a variety of materials, and often seeks to include fire as a focal point. He is always looking for different and interesting ways to share his joy of fire with the community at large. Peter can often be found at The Crucible working as a Senior Studio Manager. In his spare time, he is known to drag chaos through their IT department.Cliff Bohm specializes in Bladesmithing and Decorative Blacksmithing. He finds beauty in the juxtaposition of polished steel next to the rough “unspoiled” textures generated by the forging process. He strives to create well-crafted objects with appealing design which possess a timeless quality–somewhere between a rare antique or a newly created object. Cliff currently teaches Introduction to Blacksmithing and Bladesmithing at The Crucible.
	24. A GARDENER Welded Mild Steel $525, RustyNoodleStudios.comRob Nehring received his BFA from the University of Milwaukee, Wisconsin in Inter-arts, which included theatre, dance and sculpture. After professionally dancing for 17 years and 18 years in the candy business, he dropped everything to take a class at The Crucible. Driven by the definition of sculpture as “Something you back into when looking at a painting,” he strives to produce thought-provoking, yet whimsical work in three dimensions.An accomplished artist, Rob’s sculptures are in galleries and private collections throughout the United States. His sculptures are created from 99% recycled materials. Through found scrap materials, Rob lets the materials dictate what they will become. Rob runs Rusty Noodle Studios, teaches and is the Adult Program Director at The Crucible.
	25. STEAMPUNK MESSENGER BAG Crafted Hard Leather $500, WallerLeather.Tumblr.comSam Waller has been working with leather in the Bay Area for six years. Specializing in custom pieces, he has been providing for the Renaissance Faire and Burning Man communities.Sam currently lives in West Oakland teaching adult leather working classes at The Crucible. A section of his work is featured at Crown-Nine in downtown Oakland.
	26. RED HOT SABINA Hand Sewn Felt, Feathers, Silk, Glass $500, HouseOfNinesDesign.comHouse of Nines Design, founded by Tricia Roush, is a couture hat maker for men and women. She sells internationally online, in retail stores across the US, and direct to customers in San Francisco.She uses a mix of traditional and modern techniques and only high quality materials, including fine fur felts, handwoven Panama straws, rare vintage veiling and ribbon. All House of Nines Design hats are individually shaped and trimmed by hand in her studio.
	27. YOUR PORTRAIT HERE Cast Glass, Custom Etching $625Warren has been a glass artist, Cold Working and Kiln Casting glass for more than 20 years. His education includes four years of study with the Glass Department at the California College of Arts and Crafts, one semester of study in the Czech Republic, Kiln Casting at Pilchuck Glass School 1989 and Glass Engraving, also at Pilchuck in 1999. Upon leaving CCAC Warren promptly opened his own cold working studio, where for 12 years he has offered cold working services to dozens of San Francisco Bay Area glass artists.He currently teaches Kiln Casting Glass Sculpture and Cold Working at The Crucible. Warren maintains his private studio at The Crucible working full-time creating his own kiln cast and engraved artwork.
	28. DESIRE Canadian Yellow Wonder Stone, Steel $1,800William Rose began creating art more than 30 years ago designing and building custom homes, all the while traveling to many locations throughout the United States creating sand sculpture.In searching for a more permanent medium, William joined The Crucible four years ago and began stone carving under the guidance of instructor and master sculptor Barry Baldwin. William’s focus has recently expanded to include welded sculpture.
	29. PEACE VACE Blown Glass $500, ZachRudolphGlass.comZach Rudolph started blowing glass in 1997, in Seattle. He completed his internship at The Seattle Glass Blowing Studio and Gallery. After gaining proficiency, he was invited to be a part of the Dale Chihuly’s team. Zach worked for Chihuly Inc. for one year. He yearned for California and moved to Santa Cruz.Things aren’t what they were in Seattle though, he remains involved in the glass arts. Zach continues to grow as an artist and creates beautiful glass art steeped in traditional glass making techniques.
	30. UNTITLED Forged and Hammered Copper $TBD, HesselStudios.com Once again Greg Hessel will dazzle us with his hammered copper pieces, and this one he wants to be a surprise! A Wisconsinite by birth, metalsmith Greg Hessel works his magic on hammer forged copper in the San Rafael based Hessel Studios, which produces over 60 different hammer forged copper candlesticks designs.Each design has its own distinctive personality, and each is given a mythical or romantic name, like Callisto or Flirtation, which is engraved on the underside of the base. The polished surface can be maintained, though some prefer to keep the surface un- polished, so that over time it develops a rich warm color, reminiscent of a fine antique.
Special thanks to: Lagunitas Brewing Company, Periscope Cellars, ORO Pisco, O’Shaughnessy Winery, Grace Street Catering, Classic Party Rentals, Durwood Zedd and Greg Hessel.