Kóródi Zsuzsanna

In London I bought a lenticular bag of skull-and-camera pattern. I still love it. I cannot resist the funny childhood things: a winking wallet, a color-changing sticker. Passing by a grating fence, or seeing a perforated trash-bin on the street, I almost feel a childish happiness caused by the sight of the vibrating slats and the jumping points. I always wanted to be an artist. I imagined my future that I’m in a room with brush and canvas, and I do what I want. The dream finished at this point, but how to be on? I had no idea. Then I found the answer, when I saw, fortunately, an American movie on the glass blowing. I registered into the glass major at the Art High School, then at the Moholy-Nagy University of Art (MOME).

It was both a rational and romantic decision. My professor, Bohus Zoltán  told a lot about Pilchuck  the famous glass school.  I decided not to miss to visit. Even now, closing my eyes, I can see that in the chilly morning mist the founder, Dale Chihuly and his friends are blowing the molten glass. Before starting the courses, through days young volunteers are producing spectacular glass objects. Selling these objects covers, partially, the operational costs of the school. I took the liberty to register to the “cold shop” for a season. Together with a Czech guy, we two polished the quite popular pieces into their final form.

For the glass major students at the MOME university industrial design is expected primarily. The main slogan: make all except statue! After all, everybody makes his/her statue, anyhow. “ That time I was unable to decide whether my interest is in the picture or in the statue. I have been assured that the figurality no longer attracts me, so I fell in love with geometry. I also knew that I wanted to do something with flat glass. So the op-art came, the art of optics.”

“My master’s thesis consisted of glass sheets. For their edge, I glued color foils and glass, alternating rhythmically, that the scene be different when moving the angle of view. I was physically exhausted when finished, so I decided not to prepare objects of 20 kilos anymore. And yet, fortunately, the success came. I was contacted about the reconstruction of the Wesselényi street building of the Music Academy, to take part in the planning of the large glass façade. At the huge surface, densely fragmented by the windows, colored stripes run between two glass layers. It is called ‘moiré’, when meeting of two rasters generates interference, and we perceive an undulating motion.”

“For the 2012 HuGlass exhibition I presented an object, for which I did not color the glass from the edge. The digitally constructed pattern was created in two layers. The lower layer contained a graphics of printing, while screen print was burnt into the upper one. Glass thickness gave the scene. For constructing, I had to trust in my imagination, because the shadow of the graphics was unobservable at the computer. “

Lenticular effect can be achieved by corded (finned) glass surface. For her first objects she rounding glass strips. The current series contains glass bars, glued together. These bars (cords) unite the disassembled picture, containing four layers. “ I scare the lot of colors, and the hologram effect. You can run into the kitsch quickly. I like to make photos, and even though I will surely use them for my objects, I want to avoid any temptation – there are many examples for it in the world.”

Let is turn now back to Pilchuck and to Mr. Chihuly. Even now, he creates objects of dazzling shapes and of incomprehensive size. “ The last time when we (me and –Gáspár György– ) held a summer course in the States, we succeeded to meet the master. We were to visit his workshop only, not to meet him. Inside the huge hangar, it was shocking to see how they arrange the room using gigantic steel racks, imitating the size of the later real ambience, to test the appearing of the bizarre and organic glass objects… and, suddenly, he came. He still did not depart. In three minutes while we were talking it turned out that he has Hungarian roots as well: his grandparents were native Hungarians in Slovakia.