Ann Gardner

Gardner began her career studying at the University of Oregon. In 1974, she received a degree in Ceramics and Fine Arts from Portland State University.[4] As a developing artist, she incorporated painting, ceramics, and drawing into her work. Gardener moved to Seattle in 1979 where she continues to work.

Gardner's early training and work used hand-painted ceramics. In 1985, Dale Chihuly invited her to be an artist-in-residence at the Pilchuck Glass School where she adapted her ceramics experience to working with glass. During her second residency at Pilchuck, Gardener developed techniques that lead her towards the use of largely monochromatic glass tiles (tessera) and mosaics. She is best known for using these techniques to create large-scale architectural installations and sculpture, such as Convergence, Lebeg, and Earth, Fields, Forest, Night, Sun and Water.

Gardner has her work featured in the collections of the Corning Museum of Glass, the Seattle Art Museum, the Tacoma Art Museum, the American Museum of Crafts in New York City, among other places.

Constructed of layered shards of tinted concrete and glass on fiberglass molds, Ann Gardner’s abstract forms challenge the notion of traditionally architectural mosaics. Working as a mosaic artist before she delved into blown glass works, Gardner experiments with ceramic glassblowing molds. She imprints the glass with the texture of clay and her fingertips and produces ceramic vessels encrusted with the patterned surfaces of kitchenware shards. These experiments led to her freestanding, wall-mounted, and hanging sculptures embedded with pieces of glass. Employing natural light and incorporating existing architectural structures, Gardner’s sculptural mosaics transform their surroundings and call attention to the passage of time by highlighting changing light conditions.

SOURCE - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ann_Gardner (Sept 2025) & https://www.artsy.net/artwork/ann-gardner-cluster-nn (Sept 2025)