Frabel Glass Art Studio

Hans Godo Frabel founded the Frabel Glass Art Studio in 1968 to give expression to his then novel concept of sculptural flame worked glass. At that time crystal glass was not considered a serious art medium and artists were not utilizing the beauty and diversity that the techniques of flame worked glass offers to create unique art pieces.

Before the 1960's glass designers would give their design to a factory glass worker, who would then try to create their design in glass. Harvey Littleton and Hans Godo Frabel were some of the first artists who choose glass as their art medium.

Hans Godo Frabel was born in Jena, East Germany in 1941. He was the third child in a family with five children. The tumultuous political climate in existence after WWII necessitated a family migration to a small city called Wertheim in West Germany, where Frabel's father opened a scientific glass factory with a business partner. After moving a few times, the family ended up in Mainz am Rhein, a much larger city in West Germany, where Frabel's father got a position as a controller at the Jena Glaswerke. At the age of 15, Frabel did not enjoy school very much and his father then directed him into a "Lehrausbildung Program" (a traineeship) as a scientific glassblower at the prestigious Jena Glaswerke in Mainz, West Germany. Within 3 years, Frabel received his "Gehilfenbrief," an apprenticeship diploma, showing that he had mastered the trade of scientific glass blowing.

In 1965 he came to the United States and settled in Atlanta. There he obtained a position at the Georgia Institute of Technology in their scientific glass blowing laboratory. During this time, he continued his art studies at Emory University and Georgia State University.

While working at Georgia Tech, Frabel's creative talents were often sought after by professors and acquaintances alike to create crystal glass sculptures as gifts for friends, partners and business associates. With so many people enjoying the beauty of his glass sculptures, Frabel felt strengthened to continue his quest to become an artist.

In 1968, Frabel decided to set up his own glass studio in Atlanta, Georgia. Over the next 40 years, he would follow in accordance with the European tradition of apprentice and master: As the master artist he would pass his skills on to a handpicked group of apprentices, who after many years of training would become master artists in their own right.

Although Frabel's art received much attention in the United States, his international breakthrough as a glass artist was not until 1979 when his pop art sculpture "Hammer and Nails" was utilized as the feature piece of the New Glass Art Exhibition. For the next several years, the exhibition toured the world visiting museums in numerous major cities. This international exhibition recognized Hans Godo Frabel as one of the founding fathers of modern torch work in the world of art.

Paul Gardner, late curator of Ceramics and Glass at the Smithsonian Museum, attributed the beginning of the modern lampworking studio art movement to leaders like Frabel in The Collectors Encyclopedia of Antiques.

Hans Godo Frabel behind the Torch, 1965

"Frabel's work embodies a host of mixed expressions, which find their voice in the enormous diversity of his art. His rapid exhaustion of any given subject matter and his sudden interest in a new field have given him the reputation of impetuosity in the field of torch worked glass art, which has perfected his unusual precision at the torch. This aptitude for excellence was developed through the rigorous technique of the German master craftsman system, thus earning him the nickname of Machine Hands."