Oiva Toikka and Other Glass Artists I Admire

I enjoy the beautiful designs that can be created by glass blowers. Could it be that I began my fascination by admiring beautiful designs in marbles as a child? I always had my favorite colors and designs! Now I just enjoy anything in glass that has beautiful, intricate design and vibrant color.

Some of my favorites are in the collections of the Birds of Toikka created by the designer Oiva Toikka. These are the beautiful glass blown birds that would look lovely in any décor. They convey a touch of whimsy with striking colour combinations and beauty in form.

This collection began in 1972 when Oiva Toikka designed his first bird: the Flycatcher, One variation of color is a small red, blue and black creation. This translucent bird had a bright, red, round body and small, sapphire blue wings that sit on top of the round body sticking up in a simulation of flight. The base or leg area is red and looks like the base of a wine glass. The bird is finished off with a prominent long black beak and a stub of a black tail that sticks out the back. There is a touch of humor in the design. The design was re-released in 2008.

This little bird started a collection that has spanned the decades and won the designer many awards.

The birds are created with a team of skilled glassblowers at the Nuutajarvi factory in Finland. With amazing skill and dexterity the birds come to life, some with beautiful patterning of plumage and colours imitating the real life plumage and other times just being artistic, but each has a charm that has created a global following of collectors.

While the Birds of Toikka are by no means the artist’s only creation, and he has expressed in interviews that they have become a huge commercial enterprise; he still is creating them! Since at this date he is approaching his eighties, he is still at work when he most likely doesn't need to, there still must be something in creating these little works of art that still drives him!

Interview with the artist (PDF) :

A Canadian Artist, whose works of glass art, I enjoy is Jill Allan. She has been inspired by the Scandanavian designs of Iitalla ( the home base for many glass artists, including Oiva Toikka). Jill is a graduate of Alberta college of Art and Design. Her designs have the same lovely colors and shapes reminiscent of patterns in nature. If you like modern design, her website is worth a glance for a selection of flying carpet bowls, tide pools, shot glasses and cylinders.

Alex Anagnostou, artist in residence at Living Arts Centre, glass studio has extensive experience in creating gorgeous works of art. Her works are inspired by time, space and nature and the beauty of the microscopic world.

Another Canadian glass blower creates unique and beautiful pieces, some of them 15 to 30 pounds in weight from his studio in British Columbia. Not your average decoration! Sol Maya has nature themes and colors in his creation. His signature is a ring he incorporates in his creations with a technique he invented. Solomaya.com

I love beads and didn't realize these hand made ones are available for sale. This Canadian artist is a dentist by day and a beadmaker by night...how does she find the time! Her creations are beautiful. If you want to create your own jewelery or else buy a ready made version visit Gillian Soskin at brilliantbeads.net for a display of her creations.

Creating a hand blown piece of artwork is a fascinating and artistic process, that goes back to antiquity. Interesting to imagine how someone discovered the process? Were they bored and poking around with a hollow tube in molten sand?

It is a process that is fascinating to watch. There are some  Hubs on HubPages that describe this process so I won't duplicate, but rather give you a link. My favorite link is to Theherbivorehippi The Hub has a great explantion of the process and I recommend a visit if you are interested. If you would just rather enjoy watching a glassblower at work, watch the video below!