West Dunbartonshire Arts and Heritage
On the 7th of February 2000, the Glasgow Herald ran an excellent piece detailing the work up to that point of internationally renowned Dumbarton stained glass artist John Kenneth Clark.Clark was born in Dumbarton in 1957 and was a pupil of Knoxland Primary and Dumbarton Academy. Before becoming a professional stained glass artist he studied stained glass and mosaic at Glasgow School of Art from 1976 to 1981. His teacher and mentor there at that time was another leading light in the stained glass world, Alfredo Avella.
Shortly after graduating Clark established a studio in Glasgow and began undertaking commissions for a variety of buildings all over the world, as well as lecturing at Glasgow School of Art between 1982 and 1984.
Examples of Clark’s work can be found from Glasgow Cathedral to Kericho Cathedral in Kenya, The Falkland Islands Memorial Chapel at Pangbourne College near Reading to the Holy Trinity Church in Shanghai.
A local favourite piece can be found in Glasgow’s ever popular Café Gandolfi, the iconic “Flock of Fishes” consisting of two pieces made in 1984 and 1987. Clark moved to Germany in 1990 to be close to the Derix Glasstudios in Taunusstein because there was no longer anyone in the UK manufacturing the kind of handmade glass his work required.
One of Clark’s most striking pieces was a commission for a spectacular glass dome at Queens Park synagogue in Glasgow, undertaken in 1990. The three year project produced 22 vibrant windows depicting Jewish festivals like Yom Kippur and encompassing traditional Jewish symbolism. Clark undertook copious research in arriving at the interpretation of the festivals depicted and begins from pencil sketches and watercolour paintings before embarking on the pain staking technical process of constructing the glass panels, which sometimes require up to eight layers of etchings and multiple firings to arrive at the desired outcome. Although the synagogue closed in 2003 and was converted into the flats, the windows were saved and remounted in Giffnock synagogue.
On the death of a member of the congregation of Riverside Church in Dumbarton, Betty Telford, a sum was bequeathed for the church to commission a new stained glass window. The work was designed and constructed by Clark and is known as the Betty Telford Millennium Gallery memorial window. The window is made from flashed glass, glass comprised of two layers. The colour tone is achieved by the etching the top layer away and the window is finished with traditional glass paint and silver stain. It was unveiled at a special service of dedication on Sunday the 22nd of September 2002 given by the Rev. Robert Watt.
Clark’s expertise in combining an artistic vision with the architectural requirements of the space in which it will reside have seen him give lectures and exhibitions all over the world. He currently still resides in Germany and his artistic interests have also taken him into the field of filmmaking.
Riverside Church, Dumbarton, Millennium window, taken from https://dumbartonriverside.org.uk/…/millennium-window/ AND ABOVE Queen’s Park Synagogue, taken from Glasspainter.com – http://hasigator.com/synindex.html