Stephen Bradbourne has received numerous awards, substantial critical attention and acclaim, and is widely acknowledged as one of the leading glass blowers in New Zealand.

He has recently been the recipient of the Cavalier Bremworth Luminous: NZ Art of Glass Award (2007), the Molly Morpeth Canaday Award (2007), the Norsewear Art Award (2007), and the Mazda Artworks Glass Award (2006).

Bradbourne’s work primarily features the murrine technique in well-known blown forms such as cylinders, vases, spheres, bottles and orbs. Tablets of glass are prepared with the patterning in lengths, then sliced and intricately recomposed using the murrine hot glass technique to create a compelling visual rhythm and highlight the three-dimensionality of the work.

Bradbourne has established his own Polynesian-influenced pattern language and is progressively varying the surface by introducing hand-built qualities such as implied stitching/weaving, differing colour planes, and variable volume.

Also included in this exhibition are new works from Bradbourne’s award-winning Puka Leaf series. These descriptive forms portray a complexity of design and delicacy that confirms ‘glass can have a quiet presence and with a simple idea and seemingly easy resolve make a work of immediate power and heightened visual impact’. (1)

1. Louis Le Vaillant, Judge at the 2007 Cavalier Bremworth Luminous NZ Art of Glass Award and Curator of Applied Arts at the Auckland War Memorial Museum, NZSAG Glass News, Summer 2007.