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The Learning Connexion’s Sharon Hall has won ‘Best Emerging Artist’ at The Kapiti-Horowhenua Annual Art Review.

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The Kapiti Coast recently played host to its third Kapiti-Horowhenua Annual Art Review. Held at the prestigious Mahara Gallery, the competition attracted 225 entries from 138 artists of all ages and backgrounds and showcased ceramics, mosaics, textiles, multi-media and paintings. The event is gaining in popularity – this year it attracted around 2500 visitors, saw increased sponsorship interest by local businesses and reported a 69% increase in entries from last year.

Amongst those entries and winner of ‘Best Emerging Artist’ was TLC’s own Sharon Hall. A BFA graduate (majoring in 3D) with creative working experience in such industries as the World of Wearable Art and Hoglund Art Glass, Sharon is currently a tutor and coordinator of TLC’s restricted programmes and has worked with glass for the last eight years.

“I am attracted to the glass making process itself,” she says. “There is also something comforting about using a material that has been around for thousands of years.”

Sharon works specifically with ‘cast glass’ and, in particular, the ‘lost wax’ method.

“It’s a fairly laborious process that involves making a wax positive as well as a mould, steaming out the wax and firing it in a kiln. The mould is then cooled slowly and chipped off, so every mould is a ‘one off’. It’s a bit like Christmas at this point, as you kind of unwrap it while brimming with anticipation. I thought this feeling would subside over the years but it hasn’t yet,” she says. “Perhaps when it does I know I need to swap media.”

Once the glass object is unwrapped, the real work begins with the ‘finishing’ stage when the long process of grinding and polishing begins.

“I confess the lengthy process can be frustrating,” says Sharon, “especially as you may get a piece to the final finishing stage and then chip it on the grinder. In saying that it hardens you up to failure and makes success even sweeter – cheesy I know! I’m also conscious that I’m making an object that will potentially be floating around the planet for a while, so I have a responsibility to try my best.”

Sharon likes to work on a specific creative idea over a 12-18 month time period. Her current body of work is investigating ‘luck’ and its connection to success. This has culminated in a series of black and white rabbits. It is from this series that Sharon’s winning entry into the Kapiti-Horowhenua Annual Art Review was drawn. Entitled ‘Altar’, the work comprised three components – two life-sized rabbits sitting before a life-sized antler, all made of glass (pictured). It received lots of positive feedback and, for her efforts, Sharon was judged ‘Best Emerging Artist’ by leading New Zealand arts patron Gillian Deane and Wellington gallery director Mark Hutchins.

Since the awards, Sharon has continued to explore her current theme.

“I have been having fun with the potential relationships that the components can have to each other,” she says. “My work also has a somewhat ‘darker’ side to it as I have worked a lot with animal bones, in particular bird bones. So I was surprised at how much I have enjoyed working with a slightly friendlier image, like the rabbit, without having to compromise on the intention or meaning behind the work,” she adds.

Although balancing art making and full-time work can often leave room for little else, Sharon feels that this current body of work still offers rewarding challenges as the process continues to be refined and ideas evolve.

If you would like to see more of Sharon’s work, visit her website at www.sharonhallglass.com