Glassblowing Reflection Essay

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My body is frozen but burns from the heat radiating nearby. The room I’m in is small, so I am pressed against the student next to me. I tense up every time one of the teachers squeezes by with a hot, long rod. On the end of the rod is molten glass; heated up by the furnace that is taunting my shoulder with its blaze. The teachers weave in and out of the crowded space (which was crowded to begin with), rolling the hot glass into shapes and reheating the piece with a second furnace called the glory hole. The entire process of rolling and shaping the molten glass is repeated until the teacher finds the shape ready for blowing. After a series of coordinated, precise steps the two teachers manage to create an admirable glass vase with a spout and a handle. This is the art of glass blowing and even though I did not personally blow the glass, being in the same space was an artistic experience in itself. When I first entered a small art studio space to observe glass blowing for my writing class my claustrophobia kicked in. I was less concerned about how intriguing the glass blowing process was, and more concerned about how I was going to somehow get caught on fire by the furnace I was standing way too close to. However, it did not take long for me to calm down because the two teachers demonstrating moved in a knowledgably-choreographed fashion. When one teacher spoke his eyes glistened with as much sparkle as the glass. He taught us about how glass can be naturally found all over the world. Glass is naturally made from volcanoes to form obsidian, when lighting hits the sand/ground to form fulgurite, and when a sea sponge produces glass hairs off its structure. My favorite natural glass would have to be the sea sponge because it creates a love story in its glass. Two mating shrimp get stuck in the glass structure and have babies. All the babies can eventually escape,

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