| Christian Fournié established his workshop under the name of "Verre et Sable", in 1997, in the little village of Beaufort, in order to work on glass in flat sheet form by sand blasting.
Sand blasting on glass is a technique still little understood and rarely found in France. It finds multiple applications ranging from the fields of architectural decoration to contemporary creative art. Christian Fournié's work in his 'atelier' Verre et Sable covers the entire field of these possibilities and therein lies his originality in reconciling the ambiguity of these two extremes, far from the large industrial centres.
Sand blasting has several techniques : - glaze busting - a surface treatment to render the surface mat
- engraving - a deeper treatment leaving definite marks in the glass
- cutting out - even deeper treatment
Extensive use is made of self adhesive stencils applied to the glass to protect the areas required to remain transparent. These stencil designs are created and prepared by Christian in his workshop, using computer assisted technology.
Some examples of his work are illustrated here : - circles engraved on a table top (at top of page)
- Glass table supported on a recovered porcelaine electriacl insulator (below left
- Trophy for the French championships of Kite Flying (below middle)
- Contemporary reproduction of a menhir from the Tarn (below right)
- restoration work on windows from an Orangery, 1890, at Beziers (bottom left)
- Engraving of sunshades for the Law Faculty at Montpellier University (bottom right)
|
