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Featured
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Beads from Fire My name is Cory Lawson and I am a lampworker and metalsmith. In my teenage years I was a performing artist, but my career aspirations were in the sciences so I went to Colorado State University to study there. About the time I left the industrial research world, my sister decided I needed to help her find old rhinestone jewelry for a project she was working on (she’s an artist, too). Whenever we could get together, we would look in “junque” stores for old rhinestone jewelry, and it always seemed to be wadded up with beads. Interesting beads. “Vintage” beads. Beads with history. I began to see that beads were intertwined with the dawn of human awareness. Flesh and blood humans have created them, loved them, and worn them next to their skin since the beginning of humankind. And I discovered that the renaissance in glass bead making, i.e., lampworking, was underway in this country. I embraced it and it swept me away. My inspiration comes from those ancient humans who were part of the fabric of the natural world in a way that almost no one is in these modern times. Their beads had significance to their mythology. Their beads had power. And through their beads the humans had strength. It is this human relationship with beads that compels me. When I make beads, thought is suspended. It is almost like a resonant “Om” humming through me. Nothing else is. There is no beginning or end. Time does not exist. The glass glows and I pour my soul into it. After emerging from this trance-like state, I often have to sit down for a while and breathe a bit. After briefly considering my corporal aches and pains, and the path taken with this most recent bead, I begin again. This cycle will then repeat until I am all used up for the day.
Lampworking is about flow. Hot glass merges, sinks, floats, and swirls, and those actions are delightful. And yes, there is a bit of serendipity in it. In contrast, metal projects require a far more analytical approach. It is like creating a perfectly fitting jigsaw puzzle, and it is deeply satisfying to get it right. I am deeply blessed in this life. My husband and children support me in my passions, and (almost) no one complains that the house is a mess. In my opinion, it is a blessing to pursue your passion, whatever that may be. Beads from Fire
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Fortunately, money from home dried up and I had to find myself a job. I ended up in a biological research lab there, and it was so much fun I continued on that path for the next 20 or so years. The artist in me was sleeping, but very much alive. Looking back on it, I can see that the esthetics of my work was as important to me as its functional aspects. My career as a scientist came to a close in 1997, but a new life began and I found myself a “stay at home” mom. I had a whole lot of new skills to develop and instead of juggling work with home, I juggled kids full time. 
As people over the millennia have always done, I was driven to incorporate my beads into jewelry. My husband had already given away much of his music studio for my lampworking bench, and now he gave up the rest for my new odyssey into metalsmithing. 
