following the currents…

Aron Leaman’s graceful glass birds soar with a spirit of their own in his most recent works at Schantz Galleries. A Massachusetts native, Leaman works out of his studio space, Mill City Glass Works, in Lowell, MA, which is part of the Western Ave Studios – a space that includes 250 artists. Leaman has taught throughout New England but has been primarily working and teaching out of his own studio since 2014, turning Mill City Glass Works into a space for molten creativity.

For Leaman, the pandemic came in stages, shutting down his studio in the beginning, and coming back to find that like many he would have to adapt. Leaman’s larger sculptural works were put aside for the time and he began with smaller, more utilitarian pieces, he could make without an assistant.

From there he moved to the second stage in his pandemic creativity; making the preparatory elements of color and patterns for future pieces, as well as playing with some old techniques in glass that were new for Leaman - murrine. He used these murrine to create egg shaped vessels with bands of pattern. “I had the idea of rebirth, with everything going on [with the pandemic], and that was the shape I settled into. I don’t know what will happen with those works, but it was something I did more for me than anything else, and it was fun.”

After shutting down for the summer (part of his usual process in the hottest months of the year), Leaman came back in September with an assistant and a renewed spirit to start exploring his larger sculptures again and put that stock of prepped materials to use for his graceful, abstracted bird pieces. While these tall shorebirds are simplified, the intention is clear. “It’s a really graceful and beautiful form, you have these tall slender delicate pieces, but also very bulbous towards the bottom. I can get great curves in these. Also, in terms of a canvas I have an area where I’ll be “sketching”, where it is blown out more. That’s going to do something else to the color... it’s a really nice canvas for creating on and showing off a color scheme.”

For Leaman the birds are symbolic of home and speak to his inner connection to the ocean, something he has cherished all his life “I tend to stay near the ocean, I grew up on the ocean and it is part of me. If I don’t see it for a month or so, I start to feel it.”

On his newest birds, Leaman takes inspiration from sand bars and tidal areas. He tells us “I really love those aerial photos when they show things like that. I put a lot of lines under the surface of the glass, which for me are again those current lines and that is something I have been doing with newer color schemes – they have been all about current.” Like the tides, Sand Bars On An Outgoing Tide, 2020, seems to change throughout the day with shifting light and time, giving each piece a cycle of it’s own. (learn more in the video below…) 

Leaman’s work has a unique abstract quality. “I have always been attracted to abstract painting and less to realism. Even looking at the clouds, I am making shapes out of things I see. The patterns I use are loose -- I know how to control things and what is going to happen -- but there is always an element of surprise to the final pattern.” Leaman also likes taking the subject of birds and building on it to create a larger representation. In the work Humo Trio, 2020, 400 various lines created through his process of using cane, all come together giving it a sense of graceful movement.

In addition to his careful use of line, Leaman also often uses pieces of shattered glass to create eye catching designs. These areas of pattern in his work often take on a life of their own. “The more you look at it, the more you are going to see. One of those bubbles often times turn into an eye and then your imagination builds some kind of creature off that eye, you can’t help it. Even if something is abstract, our minds try to find a form out of it, and I like that.” To create the glass shards, Leaman takes bars of colors which he blows out to be eggshell thin, which he then shatters. When rolled up into the work, the heat creates wrinkles in the shards and traps air forming bubbles that once heated, burst and become part of the pattern. The results can be unpredictable, and this usually works in his favor to create a spontaneous abstraction.

These tall, graceful birds are mounted on granite bases with a slight metal support that both anchors the piece to the base and gives the illusion of long legs. Leaman gets bases from the castoff pile at a local a fourth generation granite quarry, where one or two times a year, he finds treasure in what they consider pieces too small to be of use. Much of the excitement of presenting birds together is the way they interact with each other “They look great in pairs, or groupings, because it creates a relationship.”

Aron and his wife Maria have two sons, Luca 5 ½ and Leon 3 ½. “One thing about the pandemic that has been good is I got to spend a lot more time with my family because I was home significantly more. That part, spending more time with the boys and my wife, has been wonderful, camping in the backyard and going to the beaches.”  As an artist, Aron is looking forward to the post-pandemic future; going to shows, talking to people and witnessing the response to his efforts. The desire to create is impossible for him to ignore, yet the sense of purpose derived from sharing the work fuels the creative spirit, and the artist has learned to flow with the current.

Aron Leaman speaks about the process and inspiration…

Video and artist portrait by Henry Marte.