The Crafts Study Centre is honoured to show the work Things we can know (2024) by glass artist Fiona Byrne in its ground floor showcase. The work is the culmination of the inaugural Farnham Craft Town artist residency that Byrne undertook in February-March 2024.

Fiona byrne, things we can know, 2024. photograph by seamus flanagan

The work arose from a workshop with local makers, where tools were fashioned with found objects and used to make sketches in clay and paper. Byrne then translated the marks made on clay into glass, both directly by blowing molten glass into the clay, and indirectly by making plaster molds of the clay. Playing with scale, dimension, and materials she created a series of forms that reference Farnham’s cultural heritage, drawing inspiration from vernacular architecture, museum artefacts and the area's history of ceramics. The final outcome is characterised by Byrne as a work of ‘collective intelligence,’ an assembly of objects from different stages of the making process, including tools, marks and blown glass forms.

Byrne designed the work to be flexible, so that it could respond to each venue in which it is exhibited ‘enabling the artwork to absorb more collective knowledge as it continues to interact with the world.’ In the Crafts Study Centre showcase we will display one portion of the work: two glass bowls, one covered in gold leaf, containing two snail shells, atop a clay slate bearing the imprints made by participants in the community workshop. This assemblage sits on a thick, mottled cylinder of glass.

The exhibition of Byrne’s work marks the Crafts Study Centre’s involvement in Farnham Craft Town, a network of organisations that support the practice, enjoyment and exploration of craft, which is celebrated annually in the town during Farnham Craft Month in October. Things we can know will be exhibited in other venues in Farnham including during the exhibition SHAPING GLASS / SHAPING FUTURES a showcase of glasswork by staff and alumni of the University for the Creative Arts.