May 5, 2007 Press Release
Austin Mosaic Glass Artist Featured At Heights Art Market -
Houston, April 25, 2007 - Julie Rachel Peyton lives and works with
glass on the shores of Lake Travis in Austin, Texas, but the road
leading there was a winding one. Born and raised amid the cotton,
dust, and cowboys of Lubbock, Texas, Peyton later moved to Rhode
Island for high school, lived for a year in Philadelphia, and then
spent nearly a decade in Houston, completing both undergraduate and
graduate degrees at the University of St. Thomas. On May 5, Peyton
will travel to the Houston Heights to take her place as the featured
artist among 40 other fine artists from around the state at the
monthly Yale Street Arts Market on nineteenth street.
"I think I'd call myself a mixed media artist, but with training as a
painter, and now with a serious focus on stained glass mosaic and
repurposed antique windows, I don't really know how to categorize
myself," Peyton says modestly of her work. Peyton says that she
became fascinated with the colors and textures of glass, and learned
traditional stained glass after watching her mother and grandmother at
work, both traditional stained/leaded glass artists. Deciding that
the traditional method couldn't accommodate the complexity she was
after, Peyton developed the technique she works in today; intricate
glass mosaics, with every piece of glass hand-cut, then applied to
antique glass window frames, which she first completely restores.
Peyton prefers working in an abstract, modern style, citing Morris
Louis as a lifelong favorite and influence, but includes many
representational pieces in her repertoire as well. Mitch Cohen,
manager of the Yale Street Arts Market said; "Julie's work is
fascinating to look at especially when you step up close and realize
each tiny piece of glass was hand cut." In addition to the Yale
Street Arts Market, Peyton has pieces hanging in The Living Desert in
Austin, Texas, and the Mogollon Artisans Gallery in Mogollon, New
Mexico.
The Yale Street Arts Market is an open air fine arts market held on
the first Saturday of each month. Located on the parking lot of Wind
Water Gallery at 545 W. 19th St. and Open 10 A.M. to 6 P.M. on May 5,
the market will open evenings at six beginning June 2.
