We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Bobbi Van Ert a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Alright, Bobbi thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.
I first started dabbling with glass art in high school art class. I was always more involved primarily in art courses for electives, as well as spent a lot of years in art club, even acting as art club president for a couple years. When the pandemic came along, things involving my career, as well as a personal health crisis, made me have a need to pour back into my happiness. While I have always had some sort of art project going on, I knew I wanted to do something more. I struggled with the trendy art forms, such as resin, in terms of their environmental effect. I knew I didn’t want to be a part of something detrimental to the earth. Stained glass is a neat option because it is recyclable and reusable in so many ways. Sustainability can many times be overlooked in the arts. Especially when it comes to fads that come and go. Stained glass as a trade dates back centuries. It can withstand the test of time, or be turned into something new. If I could go back, I would’ve kept my skills up from high school and not taken a few years off. That would’ve taken some of the time out of restarting. It is a learning curve, but a rewarding process. Each new pattern or idea boasts a new challenge. Investing in better tools really can up your game and bring vast improvements. It is rewarding to finally get an upgrade in the studio and see the increase in skill real time! In a world with so much machine made trash around us, it’s so rewarding to truly build something with your bare hands.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
I got into the industry with the help of a long family line of artistic talent, and the drive to create. My mother is a very talented professional painter and owns her own art studio in our city of Wisconsin Rapids. As I began helping her in her studio, I knew I needed to create in my own way, separate from the painting much of my family was doing. I got my first set of glass cutting tools, some glass, and a soldering kit for Christmas 2019 and dabbled from there. By the next year I was putting products in my mom’s studio, and putting as much content online as I could come up with. Eventually, the need for an online storefront grew greater, and I started an Etsy storefront. In December 2022, I created a design inspired by Harry Potter- an antique key with stained glass dragonfly wings attached. I salvaged the key from an old necklace and soldered the wings on. I fell in love, and posted them to my Etsy, as well as my Facebook art page, and several niche Facebook groups with topics like Harry Potter and dragonflies. I made a ton of them and waited hoping for orders. They went over so well! I had people picking them up in store, dropping them off locally, and shipping- even internationally. I shipped these keys everywhere; Australia, England, Canada, and all over the US. It felt amazing to know my art is being appreciated all over the place! I still make these keys and sell the locally and online. I wish I had kept count of how many I have made now! I am still creating glass art and you can still find me in my moms’ shop- Evergreen Market, The Studio, on Etsy as Ravens Skull Creations, and on Facebook and Instagram, as well as Tiktok as Raven Skull Creations. I am currently featured in two local art shows, we do several vender events a year, as well as host workshops in The Studio. I make a variety of stained glass items, mostly sun-catchers of sorts on hand. I do custom pieces, custom windows, whatever you can think up, I like to find a way to create it.
Have you ever had to pivot?
I would say picking up this as a trade was a major pivot in my life. I was at a point in my career in healthcare that was no longer healthy. I decided to cut back on hours and put my heart and soul into my art. I had been dealing with a lot health wise and stained glass became my therapy. It is how I worked through quite a few hard time now, over the 5 years I’ve been taking it seriously. I don’t think I ever want it to become my only job, or for the process to ever become “work” or mundane. It’s a long process to create something in Tiffany style. The pride you take with every step is what makes or breaks the end result. Then again, sometimes glass just breaks anyways.
For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?
It’s such a deep connection of channeled energy for me. You put so much effort into something, you literally put your energy into it, your intention for it to be appreciated by those it’s meant for. When you meet someone who wants to buy one of your pieces, and they can instantly connect to it in the same way, it’s just truly amazing. Just like how we can stroll a museum and connect to art from centuries ago, somehow we still find the us and the today in it, even when from entirely different places or times. The human connection that art can bring is something truly magical.
Contact Info:
- Website: http://www.etsy.com/shop/RavensSkullCreations
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ravenskullcreations?igsh=cmU5c281cmYxZnA4&utm_source=qr
- Facebook: https://m.facebook.com/100064800007947/
- Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@ravenskullcreations?_t=8qKTSBpdSu7&_r=1
