Written by Deborah Levine, Editor of the American Diversity Report

This is the second installment of a 3-part series on Art Career Make Overs. The series features three women who, later in life, either became artists or found a passionate focus for their art. Each of them has found a successful arts career: Ruth Ann Mitchell, Mary Beth McClure and Judith Britain. Their journeys should inspire others to explore their artistic talents, regardless of age.

Mary Beth McClure’s studio is both incredibly organized and designed for maximum creativity. Her work is mainly in glass. I had no idea there so many different ways of creating with glass. There is Cold Glass which requires cutting and assembly. Warm Glass can be manipulated and shaped. Hot Glass is in a liquid state and creates blown glass artwork. There is inventory of a variety of glass with different properties. She has drawers of odds and ends from experiments that are just waiting to find a home in a new creation. There are several kilns of varying sizes, cutting tools for every occasion, molds and tools to shape, pull and texturize the glass. Examples of her work are on shelves around the room: colorful votives, jewelry, decorative wall hangings, intriguing sun catchers, trays and dishes.

Mary Beth is a soft-spoken woman with slight, delicate hands. She started out making stained glass as a young woman in her twenties. She has kept an example of her early work but her art today is increasing sophisticated. Continually taking classes in new techniques, she is a fount of knowledge about the chemistry of glass art work. She started playing around with “warm glass,” a technique that began in the 1960s. When she started out working with glass, a time she refers to as “the Dark Ages,” there were problems with the glass. Since then, the sixties folks came out with the glass that would work well for this process so that it liquefies and blends together. You can reach into the kiln at a certain temperature and manipulate the glass. Some call this technique “slumped” or “fused.”

Mary Beth has always enjoyed creating with her hands but in her early years, she was a nurse from a small town. “In those days,” she reminds me, “girls became nurses or teachers.” She married and kids came along (5 boys). In her forties, they moved to Colorado and she took the opportunity to return to a glass studio and work part time for a doctor. When they moved to Chattanooga, she had her own studio in their home.

She has some words of advice for other women who want to become artists later in life. “You’re not born with creativity. You acquire it. All people are given the potential but you must work at it and develop it. If a person has the desire to be artistic, go for it. If you’re coming out of a professional job, take some art classes. It’s great to be around fellow artists who help each other in their work from different perspectives.”