we recently had a wonderful studio visit with north carolina artist rick beck to get a preview of new work for his upcoming exhibition at the gallery opening virtually september 4th. rick and his wife valerie also an artist have made spruce pine, nc their home with an impressive glass studio in the backyard for many years. we have known and admired rick’s sculpture for as long as we can remember even gifted his famed cast glass screws to each other many moons ago. here is a little run down on rick.
rick beck has an mfa in glass from southern illinois university and a ba in art from hastings college. rick was awarded a visual arts fellowship by the north carolina arts council, followed by a national endowment for the arts regional visual arts fellowship from the southern arts federation in 1995. he has taught at pilchuck glass school in washington and penland school of craft in north carolina among other places. selected permanent collections rick beck’s work is included in are the asheville art museum, columbia museum of art, hickory museum of art, mcdonald’s corporate collection; mint museum, mobile museum of art, north carolina state university, ogden museum of southern art, the palley collection, wustum museum of fine art to name a few.
basically rick has covered all the bases concerning his art career and we are thrilled he is about to embark on his dream of moving to hawaii. we are pumped to have his last exhibition before his big move across the pacific. we adore his rainbow use of color and are especially excited to see his new cast glass dogs. enjoy the preview!
rick beck in his spruce pine studio
“i enjoy the interplay of the visual (visceral) versus the verbal (descriptive/technical). the work should challenge the eye and the mind.””
super excited about the new cast glass dogs
spoons in progress
various polishing tools
beck's cast pieces are one of a kind. he begins by making the figure or shape out of clay. next step is investing it in plaster, then digging out the clay. after editing that by carving and changing the mold, it is put into the annealer. chunks of glass are put into the mold and heated to 1600 degrees then held there for annealing. the time it takes to come down to room temperature depends on the size of the piece, which can be anywhere from a week to two months. once the mold is removed from the annealer, the plaster or silica mold is completely broken away and the piece is carved using diamond tools.
work before the polishing process
wall of spoons from our last solo exhibition for rick
hidell brooks cannot wait to get all the new work in the gallery for Rick Beck’s solo exhibition and to see everything installed soon. all available work by our artists can be viewed on the artist page of our site under the artist's individual tab. click on the artist image to see all work with sizing and pricing. please call the gallery if you have any further questions.