About Himizu Glass Arts, LLC

Located in historic Bucks County, Pennsylvania, Himizu Glass Arts carries on the strong artistic tradition of its home through one of the oldest and most fascinating mediums on the planet - glass. Officially founded in 2007 by Pamela Pollister and Vince Albicelli, a professional artist for over fifteen years, Himizu Glass Arts was first envisioned as an outlet for flameworked beads. In 2005, a chance meeting with John Crossley, founder of Vitrium Corporation, led to a shift in the artists' interest in lampworking to larger kilnformed glass pieces.

Since then, they have focused their glass studies on making glass sinks, tiles, and other glass vessels, with instruction at Corning, Warner Stained Glass, The Pennsylvania Guild of Craftsmen, and with Lisa Vogt. Each piece is custom made to your specifications, making a unique functional work of art that should give you a lifetime of enjoyment.

Artist's Statement

Artistically, our goal is to excite the imagination, which is not forced to conform to social dictates about reality. Opposites can then exist together, and the blending of opposites is a running theme through our work. We focus on a fusion of East and West, traditional and modern, and the synthesis of the customer’s voice and our vision to create custom artisan pieces.

Himizu is the Japanese word for Fire (Hi) and Water (Mizu). Through a series of synchronistic events combined with our studies of Japanese culture, we decided that the word perfectly summarized our experience creating glass sinks. A less literal meaning of himizu is discord, which we feel is extremely relevant to working with glass. While a crystalline structure at a microscopic level is usually desirable in most solids, crystallization in glass is both unsightly and weakens the glass structure. The microscopic chaos of the amorphous solid is part of what lends glass its clarity, beauty, and stability.

Typical pieces you'll see at our shows

Weaved Votive Holders
The weaves evolved from a playful exploration of fused glass vessels. The question I grappled with was how to make a bowl less useful, and therefore not a craft object. Put a hole in it...distort it surrealistically as in a dream...without an essence or use. The bowl then manifests itself as a product of the imagination - a playful non-thing with beautiful, sensual shapes. As I was experimenting with different configurations of size and shape, the play of reflected and transmitted sunlight on the weaves inspired me to bring the bowl-that-is-not-a-bowl back into the realm of craft - as a useful thing. The dancing light from a votive flame casts flickering opaque and colored shadows, projecting the weave outward beyond the physical dimensions of the sculpture and simultaneously providing light while transforming the room into a dynamic, immersive experience.

Confetti Plates
These plates arose from a technical challenge that I gave myself: to use layers of confetti - thinly blown shards of glass - to create a feeling of movement and chaos frozen within the ordered confines of the plate while still controlling the air bubbles trapped between the layers. With as many as 10 layers of glass in a given spot, it took numerous attempts of adjusting the firing schedule to get the balance I desired. I wanted the final result to be a reflection of the nature of glass itself. While an orderly crystalline structure at a microscopic level is usually desirable in most solids, crystallization in glass (devitrification) is both unsightly and weakens the glass structure. The microscopic chaos of the amorphous solid is part of what lends glass its beauty and stability. In the same way that the holes in the weaves are an integral part of defining the sculpture, the clear glass and air bubbles - seemingly negative space - define the boundaries for the chaotically distributed explosion of color and form.