From community contributor Sam Sheppard: University City High School graduate Annette Sheppard is one of ten contestants on the just released Netflix reality series, Blown Away. The series features professional glass artists from the US and Canada producing original works of art, one to be selected as ‘best of blow’ in each episode, with one artist being eliminated from the competition in each episode.
Filming took place in Toronto in October/November of last year in a warehouse converted into a ‘hot shop’ featuring 10 furnaces. This made for less than ideal conditions at times as temperatures climbed to as much as 130 degrees. Judging was performed by well-known artist and professor at CSU, San Bernardino, Katherine Gray and a variety of guest judges. Grand prize package included an ‘Artist in Residency’ stint at the famous Corning Museum of Glass in Corning N.Y. The show’s website is: https://www.netflix.com/title/80215147
Annette graduated from UC High in 1998. She was a 3-sport varsity athlete and continued her educational and athletic career at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. where she was the 4-year starting catcher on the varsity softball team, making two appearances in the NCAA softball regionals as Ivy League champs in 1999 and 2001.
Annette graduated with a BA degree in Design and Environmental Analysis in 2003. During her final year, on an architecture class field trip to the Corning Museum of Glass, she became fascinated with the medium and began taking classes and acquiring internships and scholarships at Corning, the Penland School of Crafts in NC, and the Pilchuck glass school in WA. In 2008, she began working full-time at Corning in the traveling Hot Glass show, spending time at the Indianapolis Children’s museum, the Museum of Science and industry in Chicago and the Norton Museum of Art in Palm Beach. The last 6 years of her career at Corning was as the team leader of the Hot Glass program on Celebrity Cruise lines, during which she traveled to over 60 countries.
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