Sipos Balázs

“I intended this glass bathtube object for my wife as wedding present, but I had no time to finish. About two years after, it happened to get into my hands again. I do not sense it was to be done as planned. That this object does not contain sexual thoughts, geishas are bathing in the glass bathtube.

I graduated at the University of Applied Arts in 2003. Immediately I found a job at the Ajka Glass Factory as designer. That time the factory was inquired to design and produce a glass horse, as a prize object of the “Prima Primissima” celebration (a yearly gala to decorate the most outstanding public achievement in Hungary). This was my first job.”

In this way I succeeded to establish a casting workshop inside the plant. The major customer of this workshop is the Fabergé company. We produced glass figurines for them, the most popular was the “bull and bear”, the icon of the bankers. A real banker must have one on his desk. Objects produced by the Ajka Crystal Works are typical manual products of craftsmanship even now.

After two years he left Ajka. Since then he works for companies commissioned. He continuously gets orders to design and create award objects.

A year ago he bought and furnished this workshop. His technology is the casting, that is, the lost-wax (“cire perdue”) procedure.

“This is just like a bronze foundry. I can totally utilize my industrial experience.” This refers not only to the technology and the materials but to the negotiations with the partners on images, deadlines, financial items as well.

The workshop was furnished for the ‘cold’ technology, for there is a demand.

At the university there was an other attitude. The so-called studio glass means experimental art there, for him, it is different. The basic difference is that while the randomness, even a technological breakdown is fitting into the experimental work, he must refine the given technology until the imagined and designed result come up exactly. Therefore, he does not conceal anything what he learned.

He investigates the method to specifically shape of the inside and outside forms. What we can see from this, 5-6 % is for the design, the other part is skilled works. He works in mind even for a year. Why ‘Suzy’ keeps up her hand, why the dog is swallowing the man? The answer: the candy dish needs a lid!

28/11/2011 Budapest