Detail of Diana's KWJ poodle stem goblet, made during Karen's guest artist appearance at the Glass Museum.

Designing a new sculpture requires a lot of forethought and planning. Karen does a conceptual drawing of the piece, along with notations stating the colors to be used, and who will work on the pieces.

Karen and her crew may use more than 100 colors daily. The sculptures take anywhere from a day and a half, to a week, to complete. All of the colors and details are added while the piece is still hot.

Karen enjoys doing new projects, and each is unique — she does not do any production pieces. Karen feels a piece is not done until it is overdone.

When working with hot glass, it usually takes at least two people — one to sit at a bench and do the actual shaping and sculpting, and another to work the pole. Once a gather of glass has been taken from the furnace, it can be colored.

Stripe added to the Boxer dog's face on the glass stem.

Colored powdered glass is placed in wooden bowls. The clear glass can be rolled in the powdered glass — and alternately heated and rolled several times — to achieve an opaque color. Or a small amount of the colored glass is added to the molten glass to give it a transparent color.

Once the glass has been colored to the artists' needs, they can shape it. Each step of the sculpting process involves the glass being placed into the glory hole for a few seconds before the next step.

The artists also use blow torches to do close work because they offer concentrated heat in specific areas, reaching temperatures up to 6000 degrees.

Arm of the dog being added to the body.

I was privileged to observe Karen when she came to the Museum of Glass as a guest artist, and was lucky enough to be invited onto the hot shop floor.

Karen, her team (husband Jasen Johnsen, assistants Raven Skyriver and Connie Walsworth), and the Museum Hot Shop Team, were all patient with me as I asked questions and took pictures.

Once Karen had decided on projects to work on, everyone had a job to do. The first day I was there, the team made tiny duck decoys to be used on goblet stems with the dog sculptures. The second day, Karen and her crew began making the dog sculptures.

For her boxer sculpture, Karen's assistant, Raven, colored the glass to an opaque brown. First Karen shaped the head and muzzle. Then she applied white to form a blaze on the face. Next she added the black nose and gave the dog his lips, nostrils and long tongue. Sun glasses were added last.

When the head was complete, it was placed in the garage while Karen worked on the body. The boxer's two 'arms' were added first, with one held up for the beer mug Jasen was making. Karen added splashes of water around the base, then gave the boxer a lei, and added a duck decoy under the water.

Detail of Boxer Stem ... Adding Duck Decoy to bottom.

When this was complete, the beer mug was taken from the garage and added to the boxer's hand. Next the head was brought out and attached to his body. Karen made sure his head was turned, so his long tongue was in the beer mug. Ears were added last.

After all was secure, the boxer was placed in the garage.

The Museum crew had been blowing glass for the cups and bases. To complete each sculpture, the base was brought first and the bottom of the dog stem was warmed with a blow torch. Then the base was applied to the bottom of the stem piece. In a matter of seconds, the two pieces were one.

Next, the same process was used to apply the cup to the top of the dog's head. As soon as that joint was secure, the entire piece was heated with the blow torch. Then the completed goblet was knocked loose from the rod, and placed in the annealing box to cool. It was a true pleasure to watch Karen and her team work. They made the entire process look easy. Shaping a molten piece of glass into a detailed sculpture requires great skill and patience.

Completed Goblets [from left]: Pirate hound, Poodle stem, drinking Boxer, swimming Dalmatian.

While Karen is fun-loving, with a wonderful sense of humor, she is very single-minded and passionate while she works.

I hope you have enjoyed learning about Karen's sculptures, as they are sure to bring a smile to your face.

Some Glass Blowing Terms:

Karen Willenbrink-Johnsen working on Boxer, with assistence from gaffer Raven Skyriver.

Gaffer: works the pipe (metal rod the glass is attached to) and makes parts.

Furnace: The furnace is kept at 2400 degrees, to keep glass molten. A supply of clear glass is always waiting in the furnace.

Glory Hole: These furnaces are kept at about 2200 degrees to reheat the glass and keep it at a workable temperature.

Garage: Warming box kept at 900-1000 degrees. Pieces are parked in the garage while waiting to be added to the sculpture. This is hot enough to easily warm the glass up to be worked again, but cool enough for it to hold its shape.

Annealer: Warm box where completed glass pieces are placed to slowly cool. Glass anneals (molecules no longer move) at 900 degrees, and this box is designed to slowly get cooler over a period of time, until it is safe to bring the glass out to room temperature. The length of time need to cool the glass depends on the size and thickness of the glass — bigger pieces require a longer time to anneal and cool. Glass that is not annealed properly is very brittle and will shatter easily.