Voices Behind The Glass

An Inside Look at the Sphere of Light from One of Its Visionary Creators

We’re excited to kick off a new blog series where each month we highlight one of the incredible artists working on the Sphere of Light—a monumental stained glass installation that tells the story of humanity through the universal language of art.

This month, we’re shining the light on Cameron Oscarson, a talented glass artist at Holdman Studios whose work is helping bring this inspiring vision to life. We sat down with Cameron to learn more about his background, creative process, and personal connection to the project.

About the Artist

Q: Can you share a bit about your background and how you got started in stained glass? Tom had barely moved into my neighborhood. I was 13 or 14 years old. He was just starting his business. He was a scout leader of mine, and we got to know each other that way. He knew I was interested in art. After going to school, he asked if I wanted to paint on glass, and it kind of just worked out. I've been at Holdman Studios a little over 20 years.

Q: What inspires your artistic style and approach to working with glass? I would say my style is kind of inspired by my dad in a way. Growing up, he taught me to do art without lines. He’d say, “There’s no lines in nature, Cam.” My goal was always to create lines without actually having lines. Then I started doing stained glass, and my goal was to try to make those lines disappear—but eventually, it evolved into both. I don’t like all of my lead lines to disappear, but I can also say a lot with the lead lines that I use. I feel like just that informal training helped me come into a design method that works for me.

Q: Do you have a favorite technique or process in your work? I like the fact that during my process I’m involved in a lot of different steps throughout. To me, that's gratifying. I don’t like to just stay on one aspect of the job. I like to be a part of the creative process. I like to be a part of the cutting out and painting process, and designing lines. I guess I would say I’m grateful to be a part from beginning to end.

About the Sphere of Light

Q: What does it mean to you to be part of the Sphere of Light project? It means a lot to me as an artist to be able to work on something that is so grand in scale—that’s going to affect people in a positive way. Also, help them enjoy and find joy in art, especially art glass.

Q: How does your style and perspective contribute to the overall story of the Sphere? Just like everybody on the team, we all contribute different thoughts, opinions, views—how we see things. As we do that, the artwork is more like an evolution. We never really start out the same way that we end. I really like how we're able to compromise and come up with imagery that is more meaningful. If it was just me alone, we’d probably have a lot less meaning. My thoughts and ideas are limited to myself. I really like the idea that we're a collaborating team. We can work together in such a way to create art like this.

Q: What challenges have you faced while creating your work for this project? The things I really like about the project are also challenges that we have to overcome. Because we do work as a team, we can’t always make decisions quickly. For me, that’s frustrating because I’m like, “Let’s do this and be done.” So that is also inherently a challenge—working together and coming up with solutions that work for everybody.

Q: Can you walk us through your creative process for the Pillars of Creation panel? This piece in particular—the creative process is quite interesting. We’re using a lot of opalescent glass to create these pillars of creation and these thermal vents. The mixing of water and space is an interesting idea, and we’re using this antique glass to create a lot of the smooth, water-space look. What’s unique about that is we’re able to etch away portions of the color behind—because it’s just a thin layer behind that piece of glass—and we can create all the stars. We’re starting the painting process, and we’ll tie all of that in to really have a dynamic space scene.

The painting is interesting because we really have to apply it and then fire it. A lot of pieces will get fired several times throughout the process. You can see what it’s supposed to look like at the end, but this is kind of the midway point—and you can see how a lot of things are very basic right now. Very basic colors—just figuring out the main color scheme for everything and adding to that as we go.

Personal Connection & Impact

Q: What emotions or messages do you hope people will take away from the Sphere of Light? I really hope that the biggest takeaway people have when they view the SOL is a better understanding of themselves—how they relate to the world and how their actions can affect the people around them. I think it should be a very deep, emotional experience—one where they can have a retrospective viewpoint on life and grow from that.

Q: Has working on the Sphere changed your perspective on art or humanity Definitely. Working on the Sphere has changed my perspective on both art and humanity, just because we’re constantly revisiting issues. You know, we’re artists—we try to figure out what maybe worked in the past and what doesn’t. We’re learning, we’re evolving as artists, and we’re finding better ways to show what we’re trying to show.

Working on a team of artists helps us grow because we’re pushing our limits further than we would on our own—style-wise, content-wise, and in lots of different elements that make us artists. We kind of glean from each other, and that’s fun.

Q: If you could describe the Sphere of Light in three words, what would they be? I would describe the Sphere as emotional, evolving, and really grand—like, huge.

Don’t forget to follow @thesphereoflight on social media to watch these interviews, meet new artists, and get the latest behind-the-scenes updates on this extraordinary project.

Until next time,

• Roots of Humanity