Kimberly Thomas: Unexplored Territory - A Detailed Guide
Artist Kimberly Thomas visits the Bay Area Glass Institute in June 2025 to teach her exciting class "Unexplored Territory - A Detailed Guide". Explore a versal world of dynamic action with borosilicate glass, simultaneously expanding your sculptural lexicon. Give it all you got while focusing on improving technical literacy in flameworking and developing your artistic voice. In the flame shop students will investigate, experiment, and turn the fundamentals of flameworking upside down to create complex sculptural forms. We’ll also try some fun stuff with color rod and frit applications. The ingredients for this class are equal parts imagination, intuition, technique, and fun. Let’s make it happen!
Sign up for Unexplored Territory Here!
Kimberly Thomas is a biracial interdisciplinary sculptor and flameworker residing in Detroit, Michigan. She is known for her work’s intentionally flawed and unusual motifs as well as her intricate sculptural inventions. A self-taught glass artist, Thomas earned a BFA in Ceramics from the Rhode Island School of Design and spent six years as a special effects make-up artist before she began flameworking in 2009.
Thomas’s work is often autobiographical and conveys her unique perception of the world. Drawing her influence from concepts, questions, and theories about human nature, she combines realism and fantasy. She imparts her truth into dark, yet entertaining, narratives. Recurring themes in her work include the undesirable facets of life and human nature, freedom from the corruption imposed by society, and expansion of self-knowledge. Thomas challenges viewers to face what makes them uncomfortable in order to invite opportunities for fresh perspectives and personal development.
