Sachi Yanari-Rizzo, Research Curator
Carmen Lozar creates compelling figurative sculptures in glass. Her family home shaped her love of the medium and storytelling. Early on, she became fascinated by the effect of light on her grandmother’s collection of colorful Fenton and Blenko pieces. Lozar’s mother was a puppeteer. “I used to watch her puppet practices,” the artist recalled, “and everything in our house was a stage and everything was a story.”[1] Her father constructed ship models, which she relates to her fondness for working small.
Lozar studied with glass sculptor William Carlson at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. However, she was drawn to the unused torch in the studio. There were no university or community artists around her with that expertise. She received scholarships to study with Emilio Santini at Corning Museum of Glass and at Pilchuck Glass School, which began her flameworking education.
Lozar completed her MFA at Alfred University in 2003 and is now a faculty member at Illinois Wesleyan University. She has worked with John Miller and José Chardiet. The artist cites Robert Mickelsen and Paul Stankard as important mentors and supporters.
Lozar’s travels to Asia after graduation helped form her approach: “I connected with the Thai spirit houses which relate indirectly to the reliquaries I’ve been making [in 2008]. It echoes the idea of making an offering and remembering precious everyday moments.”[2] Indeed, her works are figurative (human and sometimes animal) and share stories about life and the human condition, whether they are quiet and ordinary, complications, or fanciful.
Simply entitled Sink, Lozar’s work in the collection initially seems humorous and surreal. Plant life grows upwards close to the roofline of a house that looks partially sunken into the ground. A female figure stands on the highest point on the roof, surrounded by three dogs. Her skin tones are mottled, perhaps soiled from dirt.
The artist stated, “I try to balance light and dark content, because life is that kind of balancing act.”[3] In August 2005, the catastrophic Hurricane Katrina devastated communities in Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, and Mississippi. Lozar commented recently, “If I am not mistaken this was made in 2005 at the same time Katrina hit New Orleans. I cannot help but think this piece was at least emotionally related.”[4]
While some studio glass artists are interested in form and light, Sink shows Lozar’s desire to create a narrative that also explores the psychology of the situation. There is no flood water to tie it to this specific event. The work projects the protagonist’s fear and vulnerability that we can surmise through her apprehensive facial expression and cowering pose. The woman is clothed with a blue towel and has bare feet, indicating the unplanned nature of her predicament. Her arms and hands hold her cover in place and protect her body. Overall, Sink’s size is intimate, and the nature of flameworking extends an impression of fragility, but Lozar’s work is large in emotional power.
Typically, Lozar creates her small-scale sculptures through flameworking with a torch. She explained, “This piece is representative of most of my work in that it is situational—a narrative which usually involves a single female figure. This piece is an early work for me and I was just beginning to learn how to make the figure at the torch.”[5]
Lozar uses colorful tubes, sometimes gently blowing, to create her figures’ body and dress forms. She then adds solid, borosilicate rods for appendages, like arms, for instance. Early on, borosilicate offered limited colors, so the artist sandblasted the surface and brushed a range of hues and details with oil paint. The artist says that for her the Carlo Dona tweezers are indispensable for shaping and creating tiny details while flameworking. Although she worked in blowing and casting, Lozar also enjoys the sense of movement working with a torch.
Sink was on display at one of the early International Flameworking Conferences, an annual event hosted by Salem Community College, New Jersey. Lozar was invited to be a presenter in 2005 and Featured Artist in 2008. Sink was purchased by New Jersey collectors Dena and Ralph Lowenbach in 2005.
To see more glass works from the collection of Dena and Ralph Lowenbach, visit the FWMoA Glass Wing through June 15!
[1] Carmen Lozar, interview by Katie Buckingham, “Out of the Vault: Soundtracks” with Carmen Lozar, Museum of Glass, October 14, 2022, https://www.museumofglass.org/as-the-pipe-turns/2022/11/7/out-of-the-vault-soundtracks-with-carmen-lozar.
[2] Shawn Waggoner, “Carmen Lozar’s Flameworked Celebrations of the Everyday,” Glass Art 23, no. 4 (May/June 2008): 10.
[3] Waggoner, 13.
[4] Carmen Lozar, email message to author, November 5, 2025.
[5] Carmen Lozar, email message to author, November 5, 2025.