Peter Ogle (Copy) - The Village Common of RI

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Village Voices is the online showcase of creativity by the members and volunteers of The Village Common of Rhode Island. We welcome submissions in all media: 2- and 3-dimensional art, creative writing, transformative ideas, crafting, and art collections. As important is the personal stories that accompany each submission.

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Peter Ogle

Statement

Pete

Biography

I am a Structural Design Engineer who helped design helicopters and other aircraft in the aerospace industry. The first 20+ years were with Sikorsky Aircraft, leading the design of several main and tail rotor systems: everything that you see rotating on the top and tail of a Sikorsky helicopter. The rotor blades, hub, and controls are all highly loaded, critical structures that are in constant motion. Achieving a high degree of reliability and maintainability for the Blackhawk and Seahawk family of helicopters was an objective that I believe we achieved.

Sikorsky Seahawk helicopter’s rotor head

This photo shows the Seahawk rotor head. It is a very dense package of titanium, elastomeric bearings, and composite materials, along with electric actuators to permit the rotor blades to be folded for storage aboard small ships.

Eventually, I was part of a joint venture between Sikorsky / UTC and Dow Chemical, focused on building graphite composite structures for other aircraft companies, such as Lockheed and Boeing, for the F-22.

Artist Statement

I have always liked art, and in particular, impressionist paintings. But I certainly never considered myself an artist. My involvement in mosaics started when I replaced some glass tabletops with ones I made from small stone tiles. Not happy with just a simple pattern of 1” x 1” and 2” x 2” stones, I cut some up and shaped them to look like sand dollars and scallop shells — very simple mosaics.

Peter in his workshop

Of course, as an engineer, I tooled up for these projects with an ever-increasing collection of wet tile saws, Dremel tools, and diamond burs for precise cutting and shaping.

Theodora, Basilica San Vitale, Ravenna

A hiking vacation in Italy provided the opportunity for a week-long immersion in a mosaic school in Ravenna, Italy. This class taught me how mosaics have been made for the past 2000 years. I learned that the little pieces of stone and glass are called tesserae. My small class met in a working studio — great fun! We made field trips to see mosaics from the Byzantine period, which were inspiring. They challenged me to move into more sophisticated designs, using more tools and with modern materials.

Glass fish set in a mosaic table

Our natural environment, with its colors and shapes, has been my primary inspiration. I am not a great sketch artist. But when I was inspired by a specific subject, such as koi fish, birds, or butterflies, the internet provided a vast selection of photos to work from: just select and stretch to the appropriate size. Working over a large light table, I outline key features of a design on a sheet of tracing paper. Generally, I cover that with a sheet of thin, transparent plastic for protection.

Glass dragonfly in tile surround

I focused on producing mosaics or stained glass, or combined them in a single piece. Each material has its own tactile form and its own mechanics of production. The challenge with tile lies in sourcing material of the appropriate color and texture. And then, how to arrange/align dozens of pieces to render the details of the subject. The desire for a greater range of colors took me from stone to stained glass, and eventually to painting and fusing glass. I like to show motion in my subjects, and glass, with its reflective and transparent properties, may suggest movement that is not so easily achieved with stone.

Nantucket basket mosaic, in process

With mosaics and stained glass, I am doing a lot of fine cutting and fitting of hundreds, if not thousands, of little pieces, tesserae. I want to see the color and surface texture of the pieces, so I assemble the project like a jigsaw puzzle, face up. The pieces also need to stay put and not slip around. Mosaics are generally assembled either by direct placement or by a double-reverse method. There are various ways to accomplish this, but over time, I used two: When doing a double reverse approach, I used clear contact paper over my sketch to temporarily hold the tesserae in position. But later, when I had more experience and confidence, I used the direct placement method, where you shape, assemble, and attach the pieces directly to the finished support surface.

Intricate cuts of glass thistle

With the direct method, I draw the design onto the support surface. The tesserae are cut and glued directly in place, perhaps a dozen at a time. A slow-drying water-soluble glue provides enough tack to keep the pieces from slipping around too much. Generally, I use water-soluble glue so that if I need to move things, a little water will soften things up and permit repositioning. Then I use standard tile grout to fill in between the pieces.

Blue Heron in stained glass

I assembled the stained-glass windows using the standard copper foil wrapped-edge method. The pieces are subsequently soldered together. With a collection of various diamond saws, I can cut more complex shapes than can usually be done with glass. I paint (stain) and fire the glass to achieve more realistic images and brighter colors without the need to use many small tesserae. Stained-glass painting is a highly technical process requiring considerable training, which I never received. I barely touched the surface of this skill. I resourced only one good book on glass painting, and it is out of print.

One thing I learned early on doing mosaics is that it is difficult to sell a tabletop without a suitable table base. The same being true for wall hangings, I needed to provide a frame strong enough to carry the weight. This required learning how to form, weld, and finish cold-rolled steel into a wide variety of shapes — a fun, but noisy and messy process.

Koi table in custom metalwork

Over the 15 years that I worked as an artist, I produced about 150 pieces. They included lazy susans, tables, mirrors, stained glass windows, and a few lampshades. I showed my work at various art co-ops and shows, as well as for four years at the Providence Fine Furnishing Show. These opportunities allowed me to showcase and sell my work, and I took a few commissions. Creating detailed mosaics, as I prefer, is very time-consuming. One needs to derive satisfaction from a creation, rather than expect significant financial reward. Meeting with customers and other artists was an additional benefit facilitated by my extroverted wife, Sue.