JamFactory is thrilled to announce that the winner of the 2018 FUSE Glass Prize is internationally renowned Adelaide-based glass artist Jessica Loughlin.

This biennial non-acquisitive prize for Australian and New Zealand glass artists is Australasia’s richest prize for glass. It provides a platform for artists to push themselves and their work to new limits and focuses public attention on the importance of glass as a medium for contemporary artistic expression.

The works of twelve established and six emerging artists were selected as finalists by the 2018 judging panel. 2018 Judges are Clare Belfrage (Glass Artist and 2016 FUSE Glass Prize Winner), Kim Paton (Director, Objectspace, New Zealand) Lisa Slade (Assistant Director, Artistic Programs at the Art Gallery of South Australia) and Brian Parkes (JamFactory Chief Executive Officer).

At a special event in Adelaide on 17 May the non-acquisitive $20,000 cash prize was awarded to Jessica Loughlin. Loughlin has exhibited widely in the US, UK, Germany, Italy and Australia and her work is held in public collections around the world including National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane, Corning Museum of Glass, NY, USA and Victoria & Albert Museum, London, UK. The judges noted that the work was confident and completely resolved with every edge and surface considered. The sophisticated and poetic way in which the work captures and alters the colour of light – echoing natural atmospheric phenomena – is the result of Loughlin¹s deep understanding of glass as a sculptural material.

An additional prize of $2,500 cash and a professional development residency at JamFactory was awarded to Ursula Halpin (the emerging artist category winner). The judges were impressed with the formal and conceptual ambition of this work. The references to domestic crafts, the fragility of the individual components and the play of light and shadow created by the installation stimulated great discussion during the judging process.

The biennial FUSE Glass Prize  prize for Australian and New Zealand glass artists is proudly presented by JamFactory and supported by generous donors; Jim and Helen Carreker, Diana Laidlaw AM, Ian Wall OAM and Pamela Wall OAM and Sue and Alan Young AM