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Home Zen Screens

The Windows

The full design consists of four screens, each with a long narrow stained glass panel at its centre representing an element of the garden: including a waterfall, a path and combed gravel. The screens are to be placed at the four sides of a square, in the northwest, the northeast, the southwest and the southeast.

 The Waterfall

 The Water is shown cascading down over rounded, water washed rocks. At each level, the water arcs alternately from right to left then left to right, creating a strong series of curving forms from top to bottom of the panel.  The rocks are smooth like beach or riverbed pebbles.  The whole design is flat and stylized, with its various elements spread out within the vertical plane of the window. The rocks have been cut from a combination of a reamy white glass, together with a grey glass, reamy on both sides, called Danzigger . Green stain has been rubbed into the surface of these pieces to give a stone like texture. The cascading waterfalls are cut in a white waterglass, which produces a rippling effect, reminiscent of water. A pattern of amber streaks beneath the rocks provides a counter pattern to the strong lines of the cascading water. Small brightly coloured round pieces of glass have been set in between the larger pebbles to create a jewel-like effect. With its strong rhythmic delineation, this design could be interpreted in a variety of media.

 The Path

In contrast to the waterfall, the stones in the Path are rougher and more irregular, intended to give a more natural, organic feel to the panel. There is an overlaying rhythmic element to the design similar to the counter-curves of the waterfall. I have attempted to soften the dynamics of these counter-curves by careful arrangement of the stones. This design was intended to be softer and subtler. The intention was to create the effect of the randomly laid stones of a meandering garden path. The colour palette is limited to light tints and there is a restrained use of trace, limited to the white reamy glass used to make the large stone forms.

 The Other Screens

The other screens are based on various Japanese textile patterns, translated into glass

The Structure of the Screens

The screens are made from lacquered yellow pine. Both the design of the screens and the construction methods used are based on traditional designs and techniques used in the making of Japanese ‘shoji”, or paper covered screens.

The shoji screen is peculiar to Japanese architecture. It is yet another aspect of their culture, formed by their experience of the particular environment of the volcanic, earthquake ridden islands that make up Japan. Junichirı Tanizaki, in his essay, In Praise of Shadows, writes of the place of the shoji in a Japanese room:

A Japanese room might be likened to an ink wash painting, the paper-paneled shoji being the place where the ink is thinnest, and the alcove where the ink is darkest ... for me the most exquisite touch is the pale white glow of the shoji in the study bay; I need only pause before it and I forget the passage of time ... Over the years it (the Shoji) came to be regarded as no more than a source of light for the alcove; but most often it serves not so much to illuminate the alcove as to soften the sidelong rays from without, to filter them through the paper panels ... Have you not yourselves sensed a difference in the light that suffuses such a room, a rare tranquility not found in ordinary light?