Meet Laura McKinley
Laura studied glass at Buckinghamshire University, switching from ceramics almost overnight following her first glassblowing session. After graduating in 2008, she was awarded a scholarship to study at the world famous Pilchuck glass school, near Seattle, in the USA.
On her return to England, she commenced training at LoCo Glass, following by a stint at the Henry Moore Foundation prior to being hired as a Gallery Manager at London Glassblowing.
In 2018 Laura graduated with her MA in Ceramics and Glass at The Royal College of Art and a year later co-founded a glass studio in Camberwell, London, with three fellow graduates.
About The Work
Laura’s fascination for glass as a creative medium stems from its capacity to constantly alter her initial thoughts and expectations. The spontaneity of the hot material demands instant visual judgments that give rise to shifts in her ideas. These allow her to make tangible her explorations of volume, scale and the random interplay of forms. Serendipity and the unexpected often point the way to the next starting point for making.
An element of her inspiration is the Italian technique Incalmo. This involves the hot joining of two separately blown glass bubbles of different colour to form one piece, the join then becoming invisible.
Once cold, the fluidity of these objects is interrupted by cutting to expose voids which enable the viewer to see both the internal and exterior spaces. Laura’s work is an invitation to engage with the tranquil beauty of the incidental.
