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The Faucet is a shadowbox with emerald stained glass water rippling from a copper faucet.
CARROLLWOOD
Bob Marotta creates stained glass art that often makes people stop and say, "Oh, wow!"
The Carrollwood artist displays his colorful, whimsical creations at the Tampa Artist Emporium in Hyde Park and at local art festivals.
He's intrigued by the idea of making stained glass that's not a traditional window but three-dimensional sculpture, he says.
One of his latest works says it all: A 3 1/2 foot shadowbox featuring emerald stained glass water rippling from a copper faucet.
The handmade box is back-lit and mirrored, giving the illusion that there are two faucets with twin rippling streams of water.
"I'm a very visual person. When I walk out the door, I notice the most minute details," says Marotta, who works by day as a computer systems engineer. "I always notice leaves and plants, colors, tones and tints."
Marotta, 60, who grew up in Rochester, N.Y., spent his youth as a "long-haired hippie" who attended Woodstock and other concerts where Janis Joplin and the Rolling Stones performed. After a stint in New Hampshire as an Army medic, he took a job at an arts and crafts co-op owned by friends. In a nearby art supply store, he discovered a stained glass kit and took it home. The kit proved so easy, he began making stained glass windows from scratch.
His love of beautiful glass ran deep.
"Growing up in Rochester, I always enjoyed seeing the stained glass in the old houses," he recalls. "My uncle was an antique dealer, so I spent a lot of weekends at antique shows and I loved glass, especially the old Tiffany glass."
Marotta soon began a side job repairing stained glass windows in old houses. About the same time, he says, he realized he couldn't subsist indefinitely as an artist and took a job at UPS and later Xerox.
"Being a starving artist was a tough, tough thing, and I finally realized I had different financial goals. I needed to work in a real-world business."
A job transfer brought Marotta to Florida in 1983, but he never lost his love of stained glass.
"Wherever I went, wherever I lived, I always had my little worktable and stained glass cutter," he says.
At age 47, Marotta — who had never been married — met the love of his life. He and wife Karen, a retired flight attendant who specializes in holiday decorating (she does a brisk business in North Tampa during the Christmas season), live in Carrollwood.
Marotta set up his stained glass studio in a converted garage space, a light-filled room that accommodates his stained glass tools as well as his billiard table. Over the billiard table, he has hung one of his stained glass lamps. He jokingly calls the room "my man cave" but says that he requires so much light for inspiration that the space is actually bright and airy.
Last fall, he began exploring stained glass as an art form and showed his work at a fall festival in Carrollwood. He displayed some of his new, three-dimensional work as well as a series of his whimsical fish.
This fall and winter, he plans to take his show on the road and display his work at art fairs.
"I enjoy doing weekend art festivals because I'm good at talking to people," says Marotta, who speaks in a deep, flawless voice befitting an old-time radio actor.
He says he plans to further explore his 3-D stained glassmaking and that his next project is a poker-inspired piece that will feature an illuminated stained glass deck of cards as well as a straight flush.
"Right now I'm more interested in creating sculptural art glass pieces," he says. "When I got back into this again, I thought, 'Why restrict myself?' "
To see more of Bob Marotta's stained glass work, check out his Web site at web.tampabay.rr.com/kbm.
Elizabeth Bettendorf can be reached at ebettendorf@hotmail.com.
[Last modified: Sep 10, 2008 04:39 PM]
Comments on this article
by kathy
Sep 10, 2008 4:39 PM
fantistic thats what glass should be .i loved your work.i try to always do something new and different,when i get the time,not often .
by Susan
Sep 7, 2008 10:42 AM
I thought the article was great. Bob and his wife are friends of mine and live nearby. His work area is exactly as described and his talent is incredible. A terrific artist who has elevated the art of stained glass into a different dimension.
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