Nancy Nicholson

Talking Out Your Glass podcast

An artist with 33 years of experience working in stained glass, NancyNicholson combines fine art sensibility with seasoned craftsmanship. Using Boston and New York City architecture as a backdrop of inspiration, in 1989 the artist introduced a successful series of autonomous panels that explored the layering of light, color, and dynamic forms of the urban environment.

Eventually, the cityscape imagery and techniques Nicholson had mastered felt less compelling, signaling a need for change. But before those cues could be acted upon, routine knee surgery followed by back issues left the artist unable to walk for several months, much less work in the glass studio. During recuperation, life sized drawings of her body suspended in space replaced the physical work of glass.

Upon full recovery, when Nicholson returned to the glass studio, she found her psychic landscape altered. The meditation on her body and its aging process, instigated by her injury, retained its urgency. Simultaneously, the cityscapes felt increasingly remote and impersonal, as the drawings made during her convalescence took on more gravitas.

In contrast to our youth-centric culture, which tries to deny or disguise the effects of aging, Nicholson began to bravely explore existential questions about the topic, fueling a new body of work. Focused studies of her body capture energy and movement. Figures are handcarved, sandblasted, painted, and stained on glass to exploit the fragility and transparency of the material while enhancing the elusive qualities of gesture and emotion.

Navigating this artistic metamorphosis for five years now, Nicholson says: “While the impetus for that transition was a physical disability that brought my glass production to a dead stop, the need to change directions was already building. Now, with the figure drawings informing my glasswork, I am working in a way that is far more personal and important to me.”