Artistic explorer
music, glass blowing
and photography
What is the connection between:
- a once-upon-a-time folk group called “Little Girl and the Dreadful Snakes,”
- the Royal Ontario Museum,
- a Jordanian princess by name of Sharifa Zein bint Nasser,
- Canada’s “Steel City,”
- a Lake Joseph boathouse piano,
- photographs of California and New Mexico,
- oil filled birds,
- joints and bins, where ice-cubes clink to Latin and jazz sounds, and
- the Mallorytown Pitcher (1839), which has nothing to do with baseball?
Enough clues!?
By now some will recognize the connection is not a “what.” Instead it is a “who,” in the person of Muskoka musician, photographer, and glassblower Jamie Sherman. Just to round things out, he also draws, paints and does some wood-working and jewelry-making!
Sherman is clearly a creative, energetic, highly talented and variously skilled guy. Furthermore, a visit to his home and studio indicates he doesn’t simply dabble in a variety of the arts; rather, he sets out to master them with impressive discipline. Art, to paraphrase someone, is 10 percent inspiration and 90 percent hard, disciplined work. Sherman knows this.
Canada’s Steel City is, of course, Hamilton, where Sherman grew up. There, he was perfectly positioned to learn a great deal about the city’s steel-making industry, since his grandfather was a founder of Dofasco. His father, Frank H. Sherman, in turn, became CEO of the firm and young Jamie was able to tour the mills and observe the super-heated, dramatic process of making steel. He recalls stunning images “of molten steel being poured, with showers of sparks and ribbons of yellow liquid metal”
It seems the artist’s eye was already at work, observing drama and beauty. It was helped along, too, by the fact his father was an accomplished and enthusiastic photographer. He still uses one of his father’s cameras, which must be about 40 years old. In fact, it is his only camera. However, unlike his brother, Jamie Sherman was not drawn into the foundry business. Instead, he chose music and the arts.
This brings us to the Lake Joseph boathouse piano. At the family cottage, on a island near Redwood, Sherman was fascinated by the old piano. Often, while others swam and boated, he learned his way around the keyboard and developed a sense of harmonics and rhythm. Summer life on Lake Joe also led to lasting friendships and nurtured a strong affection for the Muskoka environment, as affection that eventually led him to move here permanently with his family. Music and the natural environment - important and life-long influences!
Pitcher, glass, jazz and photographs are
all part of the artistic melange that is
Jamie Sherman. He’s just as likely to be
found blowing glass as he is playing a
jazzy riff on a guitar.
And
so, on to Little Girl and the Dreadful Snakes. Here, Sherman has little
to say except that he was one of the snakes. One might envision a Massassuaga
Rattler slithering over a keyboard, coiled on a drum head or entangled
in guitar strings. Pity the Little Girl in such company! By now, Sherman
was shedding another skin and had become a full-time musician, playing
piano and drums but moving more and more toward the acoustic guitar.Soon,
the Sherman's moved north to the little town of Apsley on Hwy. 28, adjacent
to the beautiful Canadian Shield country of the Burleigh game Preserve,
well north of Peterborough. This was a land and waterscape reminiscent
of Muskoka and a lot cleaner than either Toronto or Hamilton. At first,
Jamie continued to play folk and bluegrass gigs - mainly in Toronto. But,
the trip to the big town and the wee-small-hours-of-the-morning drive
home began to pall. Indeed, wheeling through the Burleigh Game Preserve
in the dead of night could be dangerous to man and beast alike. The preserve
- lacking enough natural predators - had a superabundance of deer, and
the chance of bouncing off one were pretty high at night. Time for a change
or, at least, a change in emphasis. This took Sherman off to Sheridan
College in Mississauga. Here, perhaps reminiscent of the molten steel
and blast furnaces of Dofasco, he turned to molten glass plucked from
fiery furnaces and became entranced with glass-blowing, especially ancient
and traditional methods of producing glass artifacts.
He stayed at Sheridan just long enough to learn the basics, then impulsively took the plunge and built a studio at Apsley, complete with dirt floor and furnaces, all for $2,300. Having been “probably the worst glass blower at Sheridan” (but the most determined),m his first attempts were not masterpieces. As he puts it, “Everything I made weighed 40 pounds and leaned to the right.” Not for long though.
Soon, along with the greatly talented Ojibwa glass blower, artist and poet Michael Robinson, he was showing his work at the Whetung gallery near Peterborough. And, there were other exhibits, including at the Beckett Gallery in Hamilton. Sherman, by the time he established his studio in Bracebridge (in 1986), had moved from Dreadful Snake to highly respected artist in glass.
What about the Royal Ontario Museum, which now undergoing a great expansion that will lead to more prominent Canadian displays? The museum became aware of Sherman’s work and invited him to make reproductions of one of its exhibits: the superb, blown glass pitcher produced at the Mallorytown glass factory on the St. Lawrence River in 1839. For some years, he reproduced the pitcher and other pieces for the ROM. The pitcher and matching sugar bowl became sought-after items and were presented to distinguished folk, such as the Lieutenant Governor of Ontario and the Governor General of Canada. Many of them were sold from the ROM’s gift shop as well.
Sherman’s very successful work for the museum led to increased exposure. In 1989, for example, the development of the Mallorytown Pitcher was documented by TV Ontario. By now, too, he and his family had relocated to Bracebridge, where he set up a studio/gallery on Crawford Road.Soon, he was producing a variety of blown glass pieces in freer form than the ROM period work and commissions and awards began to flow his way. Among the latter was the ”Art and Protégé Award” from the Toronto Arts Foundation and about 15 awards from the Muskoka Arts and Crafts Inc. - mostly for his work in glass but also for photography. And, that brings us to his photographs of California and New Mexico (and more exotic and distant places). The Sherman's have traveled a good deal and this shows in his well-composed images. These range from architectural shots, to candid photos of people, to large-scale scenics. Again, his wide range of interests shows through in his work.
Accomplished as his photographs are, his work in glass is what tends to bring the world to Sherman’s door, though. Here, the princess Sharifa Zein bint Nasser must be introduced, and the tale of the oil-filled birds. In spring of 2000 - after taking a rest from glass blowing for a couple of years, he went back into his studio in response to a request from the princess for a number of glass gifts. How do you say “no” to a descendant of Mohammed? The result was a number of truly exquisite birds, some with gold and Jordanian sands melted into the glass. Their graceful lines and iridescent coloring are absolutely arresting. In ancient times, such birds were filled with fragrant oils and one simply broke off the delicate tails to gain access to the liquid. One would certainly hesitate to do this to one of Sherman’s beautiful birds, even if it was filled with ambrosia, or water from the fabled Fountain of Youth. To connect the last dot on the introductory quiz, one must go back to the Lake Joe piano, then forward to the Dreadful Snakes writhing around the poor Little Girl, then forward again to Easter weekend 2003, at the delightful restaurant in Orillia, Picasso’s, which is not a “joint” or “bin” - far from it! the food is delectable and the guitar music is really fine. Playing the guitar? You guessed it: Jamie Sherman. No longer a Dreadful Snake folkie, he is laying down tasteful jazz and Latin lines - even a Duke Ellington tune. He does the same sort of thing at the Bracebridge Riverwalk dining room of Club One where, if you ask politely, he might even play a little Bluegrass for you. Sherman is serious about his music. He works at it, and his technique on the guitar is impressive, as is his harmonic sense. His sons, Joshua and Zander, love music too, and have developed into accomplished players. Zander and friend Ryan Smith make up the Duende Duo which performs original acoustic guitar music, while Josh records his own songs in a home studio and plays electric guitar among other instruments. Does this mean that Sherman has come full-circle to concentrate exclusively on his music? Not at all. His glass furnace is blazing away at 2,400 degrees Fahrenheit on a full-time basis and molten glass continues to be blown and shaped, following blow-pipe techniques little changed over 2,000 years. And, his interest in photography remains strong. At the moment, he is working on a major glass commission for Delaney Capital Ltd., which has offices on the 31st floor of BCE Place, so there will soon be a Sherman creation soaring high above Toronto Harbour. Closer to home, he is also anticipating a mid-summer show of his work in Bracebridge. Jamie Sherman is an artist bursting with ideas and creative energy which are expressed in music , glass blowing, photography and painting. Like the delta of a river, his ideas and energy flow though several channels, enriching the larger sea that we call our society.
He stayed at Sheridan just long enough to learn the basics, then impulsively took the plunge and built a studio at Apsley, complete with dirt floor and furnaces, all for $2,300. Having been “probably the worst glass blower at Sheridan” (but the most determined),m his first attempts were not masterpieces. As he puts it, “Everything I made weighed 40 pounds and leaned to the right.” Not for long though.
Soon, along with the greatly talented Ojibwa glass blower, artist and poet Michael Robinson, he was showing his work at the Whetung gallery near Peterborough. And, there were other exhibits, including at the Beckett Gallery in Hamilton. Sherman, by the time he established his studio in Bracebridge (in 1986), had moved from Dreadful Snake to highly respected artist in glass.
What about the Royal Ontario Museum, which now undergoing a great expansion that will lead to more prominent Canadian displays? The museum became aware of Sherman’s work and invited him to make reproductions of one of its exhibits: the superb, blown glass pitcher produced at the Mallorytown glass factory on the St. Lawrence River in 1839. For some years, he reproduced the pitcher and other pieces for the ROM. The pitcher and matching sugar bowl became sought-after items and were presented to distinguished folk, such as the Lieutenant Governor of Ontario and the Governor General of Canada. Many of them were sold from the ROM’s gift shop as well.
Sherman’s very successful work for the museum led to increased exposure. In 1989, for example, the development of the Mallorytown Pitcher was documented by TV Ontario. By now, too, he and his family had relocated to Bracebridge, where he set up a studio/gallery on Crawford Road.Soon, he was producing a variety of blown glass pieces in freer form than the ROM period work and commissions and awards began to flow his way. Among the latter was the ”Art and Protégé Award” from the Toronto Arts Foundation and about 15 awards from the Muskoka Arts and Crafts Inc. - mostly for his work in glass but also for photography. And, that brings us to his photographs of California and New Mexico (and more exotic and distant places). The Sherman's have traveled a good deal and this shows in his well-composed images. These range from architectural shots, to candid photos of people, to large-scale scenics. Again, his wide range of interests shows through in his work.
Accomplished as his photographs are, his work in glass is what tends to bring the world to Sherman’s door, though. Here, the princess Sharifa Zein bint Nasser must be introduced, and the tale of the oil-filled birds. In spring of 2000 - after taking a rest from glass blowing for a couple of years, he went back into his studio in response to a request from the princess for a number of glass gifts. How do you say “no” to a descendant of Mohammed? The result was a number of truly exquisite birds, some with gold and Jordanian sands melted into the glass. Their graceful lines and iridescent coloring are absolutely arresting. In ancient times, such birds were filled with fragrant oils and one simply broke off the delicate tails to gain access to the liquid. One would certainly hesitate to do this to one of Sherman’s beautiful birds, even if it was filled with ambrosia, or water from the fabled Fountain of Youth. To connect the last dot on the introductory quiz, one must go back to the Lake Joe piano, then forward to the Dreadful Snakes writhing around the poor Little Girl, then forward again to Easter weekend 2003, at the delightful restaurant in Orillia, Picasso’s, which is not a “joint” or “bin” - far from it! the food is delectable and the guitar music is really fine. Playing the guitar? You guessed it: Jamie Sherman. No longer a Dreadful Snake folkie, he is laying down tasteful jazz and Latin lines - even a Duke Ellington tune. He does the same sort of thing at the Bracebridge Riverwalk dining room of Club One where, if you ask politely, he might even play a little Bluegrass for you. Sherman is serious about his music. He works at it, and his technique on the guitar is impressive, as is his harmonic sense. His sons, Joshua and Zander, love music too, and have developed into accomplished players. Zander and friend Ryan Smith make up the Duende Duo which performs original acoustic guitar music, while Josh records his own songs in a home studio and plays electric guitar among other instruments. Does this mean that Sherman has come full-circle to concentrate exclusively on his music? Not at all. His glass furnace is blazing away at 2,400 degrees Fahrenheit on a full-time basis and molten glass continues to be blown and shaped, following blow-pipe techniques little changed over 2,000 years. And, his interest in photography remains strong. At the moment, he is working on a major glass commission for Delaney Capital Ltd., which has offices on the 31st floor of BCE Place, so there will soon be a Sherman creation soaring high above Toronto Harbour. Closer to home, he is also anticipating a mid-summer show of his work in Bracebridge. Jamie Sherman is an artist bursting with ideas and creative energy which are expressed in music , glass blowing, photography and painting. Like the delta of a river, his ideas and energy flow though several channels, enriching the larger sea that we call our society.