Featured Artist: Cheryl Chapman, La Pine, OR

Hi, I’m Cheryl Chapman and my business is Silly Dog Art Glass. I have been working with glass since 1990 when I took a stained glass class at the local junior college. I have been making a living with glass pretty much the whole time, first working at a small studio designing and building windows, then building and installing windows for private clients and even working as an office manager of a glass supplier and glass beveler for many years.

I’ve been fusing for about 20 years and when I began enameling on glass about 15 years ago, I never looked back. I fell in love with the process of painting on glass to present my drawings in a way that is unique to me. I am mostly self-taught. I don’t have any art schooling and have taken only a few glass classes – two semesters for stained glass at the junior college, one weekend of glass fusing with Gil Reynolds, and one several day workshop on glass enameling with Cappy Thompson. The rest I have figured out on my own with trial and error and research. When I began painting, I simply knew what I wanted the results to look like and then figured out how to get that look. I tried all kinds of shortcuts, but finally settled on methods that may take longer, but satisfy my aesthetic.

I do teach my reverse enameling techniques at workshops here and there as well as occasionally at my home studio in La Pine, OR. I like teaching the in-person workshops, but I also sell a video tutorial that gives you the basics of my process as well. Many people find that taking the workshop and having the video as a back up after the class works well for them to help remember all the steps and stages. I’m also always available to answer questions long after the class is done.

I’m always looking at new ideas for “products” to make and sell. I currently have my work in four different galleries/shops and find that in order to make money selling glass work I must have a good combination of accessibility (pricewise) and unique designs. So, I make several different types of items at different price points ranging from $15 to $500. And I frequently get bored making similar items over and over, so they tend to change and adapt over time. I have a few new ideas to work on this spring and am looking forward to getting to work on them.

Before I moved to Oregon, I lived in a small mountain community in southern California. That is where I joined an artists’ network that got me excited about being an actual artist and I forged friendships that will last a lifetime. I’m glad I’ve finally joined this glass guild and I hope I can meet many of you in person or virtually. I love seeing what other people are creating and hearing about how they got where they are today and what they are excited about doing in the future.