millenniumartglass.com
Millennium Art Glass Company
(A division of fruitcratelabels.com)

PAGE 1) A BRIEF HISTORY: After thirty years spent in label collecting, and historical work, and the thirty-eight years I have been a jazz musician... I have decided in October 2000, to get into stained glass work. My wife had built a window years before which hangs in our home to this day. But, her glass and tools lay dormant for over twenty years in a box in the shed. In 1994 we toured parts of Europe with backpacks and webnt to all the big cathedrals and duomos, and all the major museums in France, England, Italy, parts of Germany and several other countries. The stained glass was amazing, even considering how much was lost in World War II. But, as much as i could appreciate it, I had no idea what it took to create such things. So, I didn't think anything about it again until late in 2000, when for no real reason I can recall, I thought I would try making a little window or two just for fun. I started slowly, by dusting off my wife's old materials and buying a few used books on the subject and collecting some scrap glass to play around with, and setting up a work bench in a little tool shed. I found a photo on the Internet of a girl leaning against a tree and thought "I'll try to do this in glass." So I drove to Rainbow Glass in Sacramento, bought a couple big pieces of glass, a grinder and a Taurus II ring saw and went home and started making a mess. However, in short order I had broken several pieces, gotten glass fragments all over the floor of my garage, and realized i knew nothing about glass. So, I decided if I was going to do glass, i had to build a little garden shop with electricity and some lights and a work bench, so I had room to make a mess away from the house. This would take a year to do before i had aplace to work, so I stopped work and started gathering building supplies.

Nonetheless, I immediately became fascinated and within a couple years, I had glass scraps from all the shops, studios and artists I could find along the Pacific Coast (from the S.F area to Seattle!) piled up in boxes, waiting for a place to put them. I was studying glass on the Internet, hanging out at glass shops, and finally began building some windows in 2005, shown below. The shop was built in 2004. And although it was only 10x10, I crammed everything I could into it! Then in February 2005, I decided to start a modest hobby/business in it, called Millennium Art Glass. This name was new and nowhere on the Internet, so I boldly advertised it as my new company name. My plan was to be very busy with outrageous, highly detailed custom designs and commission work in the years to come (of course I had no reason to believe I could actually DO that, but it sounded fun). And, so I began cutting and plinking and making a mess.

But, my real addiction to stained glass began in earnest in February 2005, when my wife and I took a 5 week, one night per week class in Colfax from Thaddeus Little at Legacy Glass, a small glass and pottery shop near our home. My first project was a small window I saw in a pattern book he had in the shop. He said, "let's just start with a little 20 piece project, and see where it leads." Istarted with a 40 piece project (troublemaker that I am.) Then he put a big box of scrap on the table and said "go ahead and find some glass you like." So, I pulled out some ring-mottles, and Kokomo water-ripple and a lot of textured pieces, to which he replied "you might want to start with something less unusual for your first piece." But, I said, "no...., I think I can do this." And, being a patient teacher and fine glass artist himself, he said, "okay let's see how far you get." Over the next few weeks we worked one evening a week at his shop, and then I took the pieces home to do more work at home. On the fifth evening, we soldered everything together and our windows were complete. There are 41 pieces and all the glass was from his scrap box. This pattern is called "The Pool" by Gary Kazanjian, but I call this modified artwork "The Whim," because I changed several major elements of the original design. "The Whim" 15x15, 41 pieces February 2005. We were all very happy with it, and I loved it, because iIhad never made anything like it before.

This only took about 22 hours from start to finish, and we were all happy with the result. So the next window I completed, was one I had TRIED for two years to find time to work on, although I did not have any skills, just a ring saw a grinder and a desire. It was from a photograph I saw on the Internet. I named it the "Jennifer window," I am not sure why. My wife had done stained glass years earlier, and I had never done any. So, I simply bought some glass and fooled around with it, trying to make this "Jennifer" design. But, then put it away for a couple years, until I took the class in Colfax. I plan to paint in the features later, and have taken air-brush classes now, and own the tools to move into that realm. (More on that in a minute) ("Jennifer" 21x24, 64 pieces, started 12/00 completed 3/05, Copyright March 2005 Pat Jacobsen) (ALL FURTHER IMAGES AND DESIGNS COPYRIGHT 2005 -2008 By THOMAS P. JACOBSEN)

In all of these "figural" window, I will still have to do some painting on the glass to add the feminine features, which is a skill I have yet to master. (Her hips look funny now, but when the painting is complete, it will look normal. But unless I take the pieces out to paint them and fire them, it will have to be cold-painted.)

I next completed a redhaired mermaid at the ocean bottom, using all Uroburos and Kokomo heavily hand rolled water glasses and ring-mottled glasses for the sea floor, fluid seaweeds, her hair and a fiberous style glass, as well as 3-d fish and seashells, framed like an 1880s' saloon poster. The reason I took this on, was because all I had done was complete the Jennifer projects which didn't really have much going for it, and the "Whim" which was a class project. This window I call "Deepwater" was a challange to myself to see if I could do something other people said I "couldn't." This is my own design, but based upon an old Florida Fruit label, and uses textured glasses, ring-moyttles, heavy-rolled water glass, seedy glass, combed seawater glass, hand-rolled pieces and irridized. I figured, I f I can't do this, then I can't be a very good stained glass artist. So, this was a big challange for me: ("Deepwater" 23x29, 165 pieces, Copyright April 2005 Pat Jacobsen)

When it was done, I couldn't believe it. Since these few windows were so much fun to create and got such positive responses from family and friends, I designed and completed several more. One was a cooperative design with my wife, for my best-friend's 50th birthday. He is a diver and a big fan of dolphins, thus, his window. ("Dolfin '50" 10x14", 35 pieces Copyright May 2005 Pat Jacobsen)

For Christmas I did a rose for my sister Cynthia Rose (Cynthia Rose, 11x14, 44 pieces, Copyright October 2005 Pat Jacobsen).

And, this angel was for my mom, ("Jackie's Angel" 15x16, 32 pieces, Copyright December 2005 Pat Jacobsen)

The last piece I did in 2005 was an Airedale for my friend Sue in Oregon. She is a dear friend of many years and loves Airedale terriers and is one of my long-time label collecting buddies. We went to see her for the holidays and this was her present. (Terrier Naumes" 15x19, 28 pieces, Copyright December 2005 Pat Jacobsen). In December '05, we drove throughout the Northwest, and visited Uroboros, Bullseye, Spectrum, Jax, Neoglassic and many large retail and wholesale outlets, buying scrap, and books and gathering ideas and meeting other artisans. I am fully biten by the glass bug!

STAINED GLASS IN 2006

Then, starting off 2006, I did another nude for my best friend who brought me the girl's picture and wanted to know if I could create it in glass. Unfortunately, I had to use lead lines to imply the curves and a laundry-marker pen for the facial features. This really forced me to decide to pursue training in painting on glass, because without the painting and kiln skills, I will forever be dependant on big lead lines to imply features, and for beautiful, subtle figural work, that simply won't do. ("Sandy's Siren" 20x20, 44 pieces, Copyright February 2006 Pat Jacobsen)

The next window I made was for the Travel Channel's Samantha Brown on a windsurf board. (the streak on her leg is an accidental reflection in the photo only, and I plan to paint in her face later). "Samantha Brown Travels" 21x12, 41 pieces, layered (plated) glass, Copyright March 2006 Pat Jacobsen) I liked the way it turned out, and decided not to send it to her, but keep it myself (it wasn't a commission anyway, so what the heck).

Again, this panel really suffered from not having the figural elements painted in before assembly, although I did "chase the grain" in the glass and implied the muscular curves of the legs and tummy with the lines in the glass itself. Nonetheless, I wasn't the same as if I had painted the glass first. So, I decided to take an airbrush class at a local glass shop in April. We worked for two days with airbrushes on paper and art-board and then I was given a sandblasted mirror that had a relief of a flower and stem, which I was to paint backwards, meaning the highlights first, and the shadowing last, because we were working from the back of the glass. This is how it turned out. The reason for chosing the airbrush as a place to start, was because the shop owner had told me that it was the best way to achieve shading on figural work, and that there was an artist in Oregon who could teach me how to do that.

My next step was to research air-brushes, compressors, paints, airbrush artists and websites, and so forth, and then to buy myself the appropriate tools. Since then, I have been studying air-brush books I have collected over the years, and the videos of Peter McGrain, and began learning about Rafael Schnepf's work from people who knew him. In the meantime, I also was given a number of Odyssey System large Tiffany lamp molds by an old friend whose home is filled with lampshades he made himself, and am not only hoping to do these Tiffany shades, but hope to be designing new ones, based on these fiberglass molds. (It's all very exciting. But lampshades will have to wait until I get more large glass projects and painting projects done.)

The next design I created and completed, I call "Delight". The glass in her hair is from England and is hand-rolled art glass from the 1960s, and was all in a scrap bin at a glass shop in Northern Washington that iIvisited a couple months before. ("Delight" 21x36, 108 pieces, Copyright July 2006 Pat Jacobsen) ( I made this one for my own 50th birthday) The design is mine, so please do not use it without permission.

Then, in August 2006, I started a project with Patti Johnson of "P.J.'s Raising Came" glass shop in Auburn, CA. It is a belly dancer photo we found online as a basic concept, with a LOT of big changes in design. It is the 13th project I have done, but my first window using lead came instead of copper foil, (although it did use some foil construction techniques.) Her costume is clear, embossed glass layered over the main layer, and dichroic pieces used as jewels. ("Sheharazade" 22x25, 105 pieces, Copyright August 2006 Pat Jacobsen)

After this project, with the holidays approaching,, I wanted to make windows for my other two sisters. So, for one I made a snoboy and for the other a nativity scene as Christmas gifts. Both of these were from various patter books with only minor modifications and are not really my designs. ("Deborah's Snoboy," 15x17, 42 pieces and "Gretchen's madonna" 14x20, 51 pieces, using drapery glass for the first time.)

At the end of 2006, my second year making stained glass panels, I feel the strongest part of my business will be the designs themselves. I learned some time ago, that many people who get interested in stained glass will do a modest class project, like a duck or a sailboat or a mountain scene or "The Whim." My interest is in original designs, based upon my 30 years in the fruit crate label art business. As Thaddeus told me "the secret to success in stained glass is coming up with your own designs, not just doing the same things over and over that you see in pattern books. The 'artist' part of being a stained glass artist, is creating the designs and choosing the glass in your own unique way and making something meaningful to you." I agree with that idea. So, my hope is to pursue my own designs and keep collecting and archiving glass from everywhere I can, so I have lots of artistic choices. Thus, I have been, for several years, (even before I made any of these panels) been collecting out of print books about stained glass, and buying tools and glass at garage sales, and contacting every Northern California stained glass artist and retailer, in search of scrap glass for my library. That archive of glass has grown to about a half a ton, and covers 80 distinct colors of glass, and hundreds of styles and textures, about 6,000 pieces of glass of varying sizes. I plan to do windows, lampshades and 3-d projects in the future.

The next project was a pair of identical windows which I would utilize painting on glass. This is a new chapter in my career so follow this link to the next page :) Thanks!! <art-glass2.html> This second page explains the project itself, and the serious problem I had with commercial patina and enamel painting on glass!! Everyone who paints on glass should read it!

NEXT PAGE FOR 2007 AND NEW PROJECTS!

If you have a design you want created, please feel free to email me. My sister just commissioned me for some sidelights in her new home, and a Nevada City restaurant wants front windows created. So,f you want a custom design, but live somewhere where high shipping costs preclude you from having me build your windows, I can create a custom design for you and you can have a local craftsman create it for you near where you live. My qualifications for design work come from 30 years of specializing in the graphic art of fruit crate labels and art study. I am also very good at digital rendering and work in advanced Photoshop software teqhniques. If you have an interest in having a window or hanging created, feel free to send me the image, and the size you want, and i can give you an estimate for the project. Thank you!! -- Pat

Thomas P. "Pat" Jacobsen --

P.O. Box 791, Weimar, CA, 95736-0791, U.S.A.

Phone/Fax: 530.637.5923. 8:00 AM - 5:00 PM, weekdays (PST)!!

EMAIL: pjacobsen@fruitcratelabels.com

(Last update: OCTOBER 2007)