Paul Schwieder

Paul Schwieder is a glass artist born on December 6, 1962, in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. In 1987 he received his Bachelor’s degree from Sheridan College, School of Craft and Design located in Mississauga, Ontario. Then in 1992 he received his Masters degree at The University of West Bohemia. From 1995-2004 he served as a glassblowing professor for the Le Centre Des Métiers du Verre du Québec, in Canada.

He is known for organic shapes that are stunningly fluid, they audaciously challenge the solidity of his medium to come alive. With his work, Schwieder wants to challenge the relationship that people have with glass. He starts with a “blank” blown glass vessel and removes areas of glass tiny chip by tiny chip until, by subtraction, his final work is revealed. When he first started his career, Schwieder was trying to find a way to articulate his perception of his relationships, particularly with women. To him, this newly discovered medium of molten glass had a most female-like disposition, so he tried to express that through blown glass with mostly unsatisfactory results. He was more pleased with the results when he added the sandblaster into the equation.

He would try to blow a piece of unique character and beauty; it would have to be alluring and seductive as a form. With the sandblaster he would then attempt to enhance or deny the original qualities that he had tried to instill in the form. The result, when it was successful, would be a piece that would draw the viewer to it while simultaneously forcing the viewer to consider how intimate a relationship they were capable of maintaining with such an object.

Since that time, he has explored many different approaches to designing and executing his work. Drawing on inspiration from nature, man-made objects, personal relationships, and his unconscious all with varying degrees of success. Any time he feels himself getting lost in the creative process either by making what are to me unsuccessful pieces or by suffering from a complete dearth of ideas, he often refers back to his original concept and start again.

It is important to him that the objects he makes not only have a strong conceptual base but that they also build upon the qualities inherent to the material. Strength, fragility, transparency, opacity, fluidity, and stasis; these are all elements that he attempts to instill or refute in his work. People often comment on how the pieces seem like sea creatures or sea forms. Having been raised in Saskatchewan, Schwieder strives to draw on the grand sweeping gestures and vast subtle movement of the prairies more than on the qualities of the sea, with which he is quite unfamiliar.

The most successful pieces are often executed in a kind of fog. The forms are primarily simple and unique; To Schwieder they are an evocative of someone, something, or someplace. The designs are a natural extension of this simplicity and personality. Too much thought inhibits the expression and causes the piece to look forced.

He is represented by David Anthony Fine Art in Taos, New Mexico.