Medium Textured Vase (2018) by Jochen Holz

Jochen Holz is a London-based artist producing lampworked glassware. Holz favours borosilicate glass due to its resistance to heat and suitability for lampworking, a technique in which glass is heated using torches.

Holz is one of few makers practising this method in Britain. Writing about the importance of experimentation in his work. Holz states that 'improvisation means the risk of failure, which energises the process and keeps my practice alive. It's about navigating possibilities and restrictions of the material, identifying 'moves', and staying very much in the present.'

Much of Holz's glassware is produced using a Venetian technique called 'incalmo', in which different parts of a vessel are simultaneously free-blown to the same size and thickness before joining. The pressed glassware collection is similarly free-blown from borosilicate, imprinted with patterns and textures made by spoons, graters and metal grids applied to the material before setting.