James Denison-Pender

Stipple Engraver on Glass
Stipple engraving on glass is one of the most attractive art-forms to have re-emerged in the 20th century. It originated in Holland in the 18th.century, and reached its peak around 1740-1770. By 1810 it had disappeared, but it was rediscovered in the 1930s in Great Britain, where it is now enjoying a revival. Stippling offers a minuteness of detail and a subtlety of tone not available to other techniques. Pictures are made up of tones created by tiny dots scratched on the surface of the glass with a diamond or tungsten carbide point. The more dots applied the lighter the tone achieved, the lightest tone being where the whole surface has been removed. The half tones depend on the dots being separated by minute areas of clear glass. Full lead crystal is needed for this to be achieved without the surface breaking up. Because the whole process is done by hand, without machinery or acid, it can take a month or more to engrave a single goblet.

James Denison-Pender was born in London in 1942. He took up engraving as a hobby, entirely self-taught, in 1967. A prolonged convalescence after an illness enabled him to develop his skill to a professional level and in 1972 he left the computer industry to make engraving his full-time career. He joined the Guild of Glass Engravers in 1975, and was elected a Fellow in 1980. He exhibits regularly with the Guild, and more recently with the Scottish Glass Society, which he joined in 1996. His many other exhibitions include Sheppard & Cooper and Asprey in London, Portraits Inc. in New York, The 1980 Newbury Spring Festival, Falle Fine Arts in Jersey and Whytock & Reid in Edinburgh. A frequent visitor to Africa, and more recently India, he exhibited at the 1st World Wilderness Congress in Johannesburg in 1977, and with the African Wildlife Foundation in Washington DC. He lived in Cumbria from 1974 to 1993, when he moved to Scotland.