Terra Firma Gallery -- Micah Lamar Glass Art

Micah Lamar is a glass artist based out of Santa Barbara, California. He studied with Maestro Ola Hoglund, owner of Hoglund Art Glass in Nelson, New Zealand, and attended the Pilchuck School of Glass in Seattle, Washington. Some of his collections include the Bead Museum in Washington, D.C. and The Crown Princess Victoria of Sweden.

Growing up along the coast of California among a family of artists, Micah''s understanding of form and color began at an early age. At 18, he built his first glass studio where he quickly became addicted to glass blowing, and intrigued by the process of building glass studios.

In 2003, Micah felt an incredible urge see the world and to experience the art of glass from other cultures. He spent a summer in Europe, visiting glass studios in and around Venice, Italy, and six months along the East Coast of Australia, visiting studios such as Colin Heaneys in Byron Bay. Micah then spent three months in Asia, where he built Saipan, Micronesia's first flame working studio, and shortly after, built a studio for up and coming glass artist Clare Gaylord in Bangkok, Thailand.

Finally, Micah moved to New Zealand, where he fell in love with Ola Hoglunds garden studio in Nelson. After spending two years in New Zealand, teaching glass bead making to over 300 international students, and studying the art of large scale blown glass from the masters, Micah decided it was time to return to his family in California.

His family has always been a source of inspiration. “I gather strength from my brothers, beauty from my sister, compassion from my mother and an artists eye from my father. I'm inspired by world wide travels and the artistic evolution of human beings“.

Micah's Technique

Micah uses the painted graal technique for all his sculptures. What is a painted graal?

As legend goes the Holy Grail (Graal) was the chalice used by Christ at the First Communion. Lost over the decades, many myths encompass the search for the Holy Grail. Some believe this chalice could bring everlasting life and help find ones inner peace.

The graal technique was developed in Sweden in the 1920s. Creating a graal requires exceptional skills during its lengthy and complicated process, taking up to fifty hours to make each piece.

To create a glass graal, Micah first blows a small colored graal blank (glass cylinder) from a crucible of molten glass charged at over 2000 degrees Fahrenheit. Several days later when the graal blank has been annealed (controlled cooling), Micah paints his designs straight onto the surface of the graal blank using special glass paints made from finely ground colored glass and pine oil.

Once the graal blank is finished being painted, Micah slowly reheats the blank to 1100 degrees Fahrenheit. As the graal blank heats up, the pine oil burns off and leaves pure glass pigment on the surface of the glass graal blank. Micah then picks up the graal blank on a long metal blowpipe and submerses the blank in molten glass. Immediately fusing the paint to the glass, capturing Micahs imagery, permanently encased within layers of clear and colored glass.

The graal blank absorbs so much heat from the submersion in liquid glass that it too becomes liquid. Once the piece is liquid it is re blown and shaped into its final enlarged form. Due to the intricate and complex process, each of Lamar's graals is a unique, one of a kind work of fine art.

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