NC Qin

Nancy Qin is an Australian artist living and working in Sydney, she was fortunate enough to have a duo art education into both strategies of East and West. Studying the traditional arts at the Central Academy of Fine Arts imbued in her a sense of discipline, but it was glass she was in search of, so she journeyed back to Australia and finished her art education in Sydney College of the Arts.

Cast glass, different from blown or lamp-worked glass which many may be familiar with, has a more somber voice. Unlike its delicate and elegant siblings which work with an instantaneous, quick-handed craftsmanship; Cast glass is an exacting, time-consuming and labour intensive process with a very delayed gratification point. But its mysterious gravitas makes it worthwhile, the result is a beauty with a soft but profound song of its own.

Her current body work is based on pride and ego; Qin explores the tension between the image we think we project and the reality of our experiences donning the armour of pride. Something that is ornamental and fragile rather than strong and solid, something heavy and burdensome rather than functional and light. Qin uses glass to create a phantom of ego we wrap around ourselves for protection, letting its translucency show its lack of substance, and beauty to show how high we elevate its importance privileged to experience both, as they have allowed her to think both freely but with discipline in her life and art.

Qin also won the Vicki Torr Emerging Artist Prize 2020 and her work has been included into the National Glass Collection.