From Graphic Translation to Spatial Generation: Digital Fabrication, Glass Materiality, and Viewer Experience in Contemporary Glass Art

Abstract

Digital technologies are increasingly reshaping contemporary visual art, not only through artificial intelligence and generative systems but also through material-based artistic practices. While existing scholarship has extensively explored computational creativity, digital aesthetics, and AI-generated imagery, less attention has been paid to how digital fabrication transforms artistic practice through its interaction with physical materials and spatial perception. This paper addresses this issue through a practice-based investigation of contemporary glass art. Drawing upon the author’s long-term artistic practice, the study examines two interconnected projects: the Glass Calligraphy Series and the Spatial Cutting Series. The first project explores how traditional Chinese calligraphy is translated into glass through digital drawing, vector-based design, and waterjet fabrication, revealing how artistic agency is redistributed among artist, software, fabrication systems, and material processes. The second project investigates how layered glass structures generate spatial depth, optical relationships, and embodied viewing experiences. The paper argues that digital fabrication should not be understood merely as a technical tool. Instead, it functions as a creative framework that reconfigures artistic agency, activates the material and spatial qualities of glass, and transforms viewer experience. By examining the intersection of computation, material practice, and visual perception, this paper proposes a broader understanding of digital fabrication as an integral component of contemporary visual art. It argues that digital technologies are not external instruments applied to artistic production but active agents in the formation of artistic methods, material relationships, and aesthetic experience.

1. Introduction

1.1. Digital Technologies Beyond AI and Immersive Media

Contemporary art is undergoing a profound transformation driven by the proliferation of digital technologies. Recent scholarship has increasingly examined AI-assisted artistic practices, computational creativity, and immersive technologies, including virtual and augmented reality, as key developments in contemporary visual culture (Boden 2016; McCormack et al. 2014; Grau 2003). These technologies have undoubtedly expanded the boundaries of creativity, offering new modes of image generation, interactive engagement, and simulated environments. However, this focus on the “digital” as a virtual or disembodied phenomenon often obscures another equally significant development: the integration of digital technologies into the physical production of art, particularly through digital fabrication.

As Edmonds et al. (2005) observed in their influential paper The Studio as Laboratory: Combining Creative Practice and Digital Technology Research, digital technologies have become a natural component of artistic production, shaping both the creative process and collaborative practices within art-making environments. This integration is also evident in recent institutional and curricular reforms within Chinese art education, where digital fabrication and computational design are being positioned as core components of interdisciplinary creative practice—a development that mirrors similar trends in art-and-technology pedagogy internationally.

This paper contends that the impact of digital fabrication extends far beyond efficiency and precision. It fundamentally alters the relationship between the artist, the material, and the viewer. By examining the specific case of Computer Numerical Control (CNC) abrasive waterjet cutting in glass art, this study explores how digital processes have evolved from “external tools” to “internal methods” that actively participate in the generation of form, meaning, and spatial experience (Troli 2011).

1.2. Digital Fabrication in Contemporary Glass Practice

Within the field of glass art, digital fabrication technologies—particularly waterjet cutting—have emerged as pivotal tools for innovation. Unlike thermal cutting methods such as laser cutting, waterjet cutting utilizes a high-pressure stream of water mixed with abrasive particles (such as garnet) to erode material. This “cold cutting” process eliminates heat-affected zones, preserving the physical and chemical properties of the glass, which is crucial for brittle, thermally sensitive materials (Xu et al. 2008).

The trajectory of waterjet cutting in glass art, as documented by Cutler (2006), Troli (2011), and others, shows a clear evolution. Initially, it served as a high-precision industrial tool for cutting flat float glass. However, through practice-based doctoral research, artists have expanded its application to include complex structural construction (Cutler 2006), interlocking marquetry techniques (Troli 2011), mold-making for casting (Doolan 2012), and the embedding of non-glass materials like metals and air bubbles (Bialek 2017; J. Mitchell 2017).

This paper positions digital fabrication not just as a method of production, but as a framework for creative inquiry. It argues that the introduction of CAD software, CNC, and waterjet cutting has created a “feedback loop” between virtual modeling and physical material, allowing artists to conceptualize and realize forms that were previously impossible or to reinterpret traditional cultural forms through the lens of computational logic (Sarmiento 2011).

1.3. Research Questions and Argument

To understand the deep impact of digital fabrication on glass art, this paper addresses three core questions:

• How does digital fabrication reconfigure artistic agency? Specifically, how do interactions among the artist, digital design software, fabrication technologies, and material reshape creative authorship?
• How does digital fabrication reconstruct material identity in glass art? Specifically, how do digital processes establish new relationships between material, form, light, and cultural meaning?
• How does digital fabrication generate new forms of spatial experience? Specifically, how do computational precision, transparency, and digitally constructed negative space reshape embodied perception?

By analyzing the author’s own artistic practice through two distinct but interconnected series—the Glass Calligraphy Series and the Spatial Cutting Series—this paper argues that digital fabrication functions as a generative framework. It is not merely a tool for execution but a system that actively participates in the creation of meaning. Within this framework, glass is reconfigured from a passive substrate into an active participant in spatial construction, and the viewer is transformed from a passive observer into an embodied participant whose movement and viewpoint construct the aesthetic experience.

2. Digital Fabrication as a Creative Framework

2.1. From Production Tool to Creative Framework

The history of art has long been intertwined with technological innovation. The invention of linear perspective transformed the representation of space, while photography challenged painting’s documentary function and accelerated modernist experimentation (Gombrich 1995). In the digital era, computational media have further reshaped artistic production, introducing new relationships between design, materiality, and making (W. J. Mitchell 1992; Manovich 2001). Digital fabrication represents a significant development within this broader technological trajectory. Rather than serving solely as an industrial manufacturing technology, it began to reshape the methodological structure of artistic production itself. Although the creative implications of digital fabrication extend across contemporary craft practice, this section focuses on glass art as a representative case through which the transformation from production tool to creative framework can be critically examined.

Originally developed for industrial manufacturing, digital fabrication technologies such as CAD/CAM and CNC waterjet cutting have been widely applied in aerospace engineering, automotive manufacturing, architecture, and precision engineering, where accuracy, repeatability, and production efficiency are essential. Within these industrial contexts, digital fabrication primarily functioned as a production tool, enabling the precise fabrication of complex components while minimising human error.

However, its adoption within contemporary glass art fundamentally transformed this role. Rather than functioning solely as a production tool, digital fabrication became increasingly embedded within artistic thinking, material experimentation, and creative decision-making, ultimately reshaping the methodological structure of artistic production.

In the context of glass art, this transition is vividly illustrated by the work of Robert Knottenbelt. As one of the earliest artists to adopt CAD/CAM and waterjet cutting in the late 1980s, Knottenbelt demonstrated that digital technology could bridge the gap between industrial precision and artistic expression (Ioannou 2005). His work, such as Totemic Fish Contemplating a Persimmon (1988), utilized waterjet cutting to create intricate components that were then assembled (Figure 1).

Figure 1. Robert Knottenbelt, Totemic Fish Contemplating a Persimmon, 1988. CAD/CAM-designed plate glass, sandblasted, acid-polished, silicon glues, 80 × 40 × 1.2 cm. Held at the National Gallery of Australia. Photo: Terence Bogue. Melbourne, Australia.

Contemporary digital glass practice has therefore moved beyond the use of digital technologies as mere instruments of fabrication or assembly. Instead, they increasingly participate in conceptual development, material exploration, and creative decision-making. As Shillito (2019) and Johnston (2015) argues, digital craft is characterised not by the replacement of craftsmanship with technology but by their integration. Digital design, fabrication technologies, and material practice become mutually dependent components of an iterative creative process. This integration is not linear; it is iterative. The artist continually moves between digital modelling and physical making, establishing an iterative dialogue in which computational logic, machine fabrication, material behaviour, and artistic judgement mutually inform one another. Digital fabrication therefore operates not as a linear production workflow but as an evolving creative framework.

2.2. Artistic Agency in Digital Making

Traditionally, artistic agency in craft has been understood as residing primarily in the individual maker. Creative ideas were realised through direct manual engagement with materials, where embodied knowledge, craftsmanship, and tacit experience formed the basis of artistic production. Within this understanding, tools were regarded as extensions of the artist’s hand, while materials were generally considered media through which artistic intention was expressed.

This conception of artistic agency was further reinforced by the Studio Glass Movement. Emerging in the 1960s, the movement challenged industrial glass production by relocating glassmaking to the artist’s studio and establishing the artist as both designer and maker (Lynggaard 1998; Lynn 2004). The Studio Glass Movement shifted the emphasis from industrial efficiency to individual artistic language, conceptual expression, craftsmanship, and direct engagement with material.

Digital fabrication fundamentally reconfigures this understanding of artistic agency. The artist remains the conceptual initiator, but creative agency is no longer located exclusively in the individual maker. Instead, artistic decisions emerge through interactions among the artist, computational systems, fabrication technologies, and material behaviour. Artistic creation therefore becomes a process of negotiation within a distributed socio-technical network rather than the direct expression of an isolated author.

2.2.1. The Artist as a Conceptual Orchestrator

Although creative agency becomes distributed, the artist remains the conceptual orchestrator of the entire creative process. The artist no longer directly shapes material through manual manipulation. Instead, they establish the conceptual framework, define design parameters, and coordinate interactions among computational systems, fabrication technologies, and material behaviour. Creative authorship therefore shifts from the execution of form to the orchestration of processes. The artist no longer functions solely as a maker, but as the designer of a dynamic system in which multiple agencies collectively contribute to the emergence of the artwork. This understanding is consistent with recent theories of distributed agency, which argue that creative action emerges through interactions among human actors, technologies, and materials rather than through the isolated intentions of an individual maker (Latour 2005; Bennett 2010; Malafouris 2013). Early digital glass practitioners such as Robert Knottenbelt exemplified this transition by demonstrating that artistic decisions increasingly resided in the orchestration of digital design and fabrication processes rather than in manual execution alone. The artist determines not only the visual outcome but also the rules, constraints, and interactions through which the artwork emerges. This shift does not diminish artistic authorship but redefines it, extending the principles established by the Studio Glass Movement into digitally mediated forms of practice.

2.2.2. Software as Computational Agency

Digital design software contributes its own computational agency by mediating between artistic conception and material fabrication. Rather than functioning as a neutral interface between design and fabrication, it introduces a distinct computational logic based on vectors, coordinates, parameters, and algorithmic relationships. Artistic ideas must therefore be reformulated within computational structures before they can be materialised. This process is not simply a technical translation but an active reconfiguration of artistic thinking, through which software shapes how form is conceived, organised, and ultimately realised. The artist determines not only the visual outcome but also the rules, constraints, and interactions through which the artwork emerges.

2.2.3. Machine as Material Mediator

Digital fabrication technologies function as material mediators rather than merely as instruments of execution. Positioned between computational design and physical fabrication, they translate digital information into material form while mediating the relationship between computational logic and material behaviour. Whether realised through CNC machining, laser cutting, robotic fabrication, or additive manufacturing, these technologies actively participate in shaping artistic outcomes by influencing how digital concepts become physical artefacts. Their role extends beyond the reproduction of predefined forms to the co-construction of relationships between artistic intention and material reality.

Within the present study, this mediating role is exemplified through CNC waterjet cutting, whose precision and cold-cutting characteristics enable new forms of spatial construction in cast glass.

2.2.4. Material as Active Agency

Material agency should be understood as extending beyond physical behaviour to include perceptual and conceptual dimensions. Digital fabrication not only transforms how materials are processed but also creates new relationships between material properties, artistic expression, and cultural meaning. Through computational design and digital fabrication, materials are able to assume expressive and conceptual roles that extend beyond their conventional physical functions. Material agency therefore participates not only in the formation of objects but also in the construction of artistic language and meaning.

At the physical level, materials respond according to their own structural and mechanical characteristics during fabrication. Thermal behaviour, structural resistance, surface qualities, optical transmission, and fabrication tolerances continually influence how digital information is translated into physical form. Rather than functioning as predictable substrates, materials actively negotiate with digital fabrication processes, requiring continuous adjustments throughout making.

At the perceptual level, materials shape the viewer’s experience through their optical and sensory qualities. Transparency, reflection, refraction, texture, and spatial depth influence how artworks are perceived, experienced, and interpreted. Digital fabrication therefore does not simply produce objects; it creates new perceptual conditions through which material behaviour becomes an integral component of spatial experience.

More importantly, digital fabrication enables materials to participate in the construction of artistic meaning. Material agency is therefore also conceptual. Through computational design and digital fabrication technologies, materials are able to assume new cultural and expressive roles rather than merely replacing traditional media. In the Glass Calligraphy Series, transparent cast glass assumes the conceptual role traditionally associated with paper, while coloured glass containing metal oxides functions as the equivalent of ink. This transformation is made possible through digital modelling, vector translation, and CNC waterjet cutting, which reconstruct the material relationship between paper, ink, and writing within glass. Digital fabrication therefore does not simply process materials; it reorganises material identity, allowing materials to become active generators of artistic language, cultural meaning, and spatial experience.

Artistic agency in digital making is therefore neither exclusively human nor exclusively technological. Instead, it emerges through continuous negotiations among the artist, computational systems, fabrication technologies, and material behaviour. Within this distributed network, authorship is no longer understood as the direct execution of form by an individual maker, but as the orchestration of multiple interacting agencies that collectively generate artistic meaning.

2.3. Reconfiguring Glass Materiality Through Digital Fabrication

The unique materiality of glass—its transparency, refractive index, and capacity for optical and spatial layering—plays an active role in shaping both the fabrication process and the viewer’s perceptual experience. Unlike opaque materials such as stone or metal, glass does not simply occupy space; it manipulates space through light. Digital fabrication, particularly waterjet cutting, enhances this material potential in specific ways as described below:

2.3.1. Digital Fabrication and Geometric Complexity

One of the most significant contributions of digital fabrication to contemporary glass practice lies in its capacity to generate geometric complexity. Unlike traditional manual fabrication, CAD modelling and CNC waterjet cutting enable artists to construct highly intricate, repetitive and computationally controlled geometries with exceptional precision.

This capability has been widely demonstrated in contemporary glass practice. Inge Panneels, for example, employs CAD modelling and CNC waterjet cutting to transform digital cartographic data into precisely fabricated glass components. In works such as Terra Mundi (2013) (Figure 2) and Micro Macro (2010) (Figure 3), digital vector drawings derived from geographical mapping are translated into complex modular glass structures that would be extremely difficult to fabricate manually.

Figure 2. Inge Panneels, Terra Mundi: Mercator Revisited, 2013. Waterjet-cut, fused and slumped glass, 12 × 48 × 10 cm. Photo: Kevin Greenfield.

Figure 3. Inge Panneels, Macro Micro, 2010. Waterjet-cut and fused Bullseye glass, diameter 28 cm. Photo: Kevin Greenfield.

Beyond increasing fabrication efficiency, geometric complexity fundamentally alters the optical behaviour of glass. Precisely repeated geometries create multiple optical pathways through which light is transmitted, redirected, and spatially distributed. As light passes through these digitally fabricated geometries, new optical relationships become possible, providing the foundation for the layered transparency and spatial perception discussed in the following sections.

2.3.2. Controlled Negative Space and Internal Spatial Structure

Digital fabrication not only shapes material but also constructs space through the precise organisation of negative space. Unlike traditional glassmaking, where internal space is often determined by the exterior form of the object, CNC fabrication enables voids, openings, and internal spatial relationships to be designed as primary compositional elements. Kelly and Bialek (2021) demonstrate how intentional inclusions and embedded materials activate the interior volume of glass by transforming its internal space into an expressive compositional element. While their research focuses on embedded inclusions within solid glass, the present study extends this understanding through digitally fabricated negative space and layered spatial organisation. Instead of introducing foreign materials into the glass, digital fabrication enables precisely controlled voids and layered spacing to become primary compositional elements, redefining internal space as an actively constructed spatial system.

2.3.3. Layered Transparency and Spatial Depth

Transparency has traditionally been regarded as an intrinsic material property of glass. Digital fabrication, however, transforms transparency from a passive optical characteristic into an active spatial strategy through the precise organisation of multiple glass layers.

Through accurately controlled spacing, repeated glass planes and computational precision, digital fabrication enables transparency to operate across multiple layers simultaneously. Reflection, refraction, overlap, and optical interference emerge through the interaction between multiple transparent glass layers rather than through the thickness of a single object.

The spatial qualities of glass should not be understood as arising solely from its physical transparency or optical properties. Rather, digital fabrication reorganises these material properties into spatial relationships through geometric precision, controlled negative space, and layered transparency. Space therefore emerges not simply as the container of material but as an active condition generated through the interaction of material structure and light. These spatial conditions subsequently shape the viewer’s embodied perception, which will be discussed in Section 4.

3. Glass Calligraphy: Reconstructing Chinese Calligraphy in Glass

Digital Translation and Material Transformation

The Glass Calligraphy Series explores how traditional Chinese calligraphy can be reconstructed as a contemporary glass medium through digital fabrication. Rather than simply reproducing calligraphic forms in another material, the project investigates how computational design, digital fabrication, and glass casting collectively transform the relationship between writing, material, and making. Figure 4 illustrates the conceptual framework developed in this research, demonstrating how handwritten Chinese calligraphy is progressively translated into glass through four interconnected stages: graphic translation, material translation, digital fabrication, and craft realisation. Together, these stages establish a digitally reconstructed glass calligraphy system by translating the traditional relationships between brush, ink, paper, and glass into a new material and technological framework.

Figure 4. Conceptual framework for translating Chinese calligraphy into glass calligraphy through digital fabrication.

Chinese calligraphy is traditionally created through the interaction of brush, ink, and paper. Unlike alphabetic writing, each character is generated through continuous bodily movement in which rhythm, pressure, speed, and brush angle simultaneously determine the final form (Qu 2017). The expressive quality of calligraphy therefore resides not only in the visual appearance of the written character but also in the dynamic process through which it is produced.

The transition from brushwork to digital fabrication introduces a fundamentally different mode of making (Figure 5). Whereas the Chinese brush produces form through the flexibility of animal hair, pressure variation, and direct contact with paper, CNC waterjet cutting generates form through computational geometry, high-pressure water, and abrasive particles. Although these two tools operate according to entirely different physical principles, both construct calligraphic form through the controlled negotiation of force, trajectory, and material resistance. Digital fabrication therefore does not imitate the Chinese brush; rather, it establishes a new technological language through which calligraphic expression can be reconstructed in glass.

Figure 5. Comparison between CNC waterjet cutting and Chinese brush calligraphy. (a) CNC waterjet producing a linear incision on glass through high-pressure water and abrasive particles. (b) Chinese brush producing expressive calligraphic strokes through variations in pressure and brush movement.

As Petrie (2011) argues, digital technologies do not replace hand-making but expand the possibilities of creative glass practice by integrating computational design with material fabrication. Building upon this understanding, the present research employs digital fabrication not simply as a manufacturing technique but as a creative methodology through which Chinese calligraphy is translated into a new material system.

The creative workflow begins with handwritten calligraphy (Figure 6a), which is scanned and reconstructed as vector geometry using digital design software (Figure 6b). During this process, the fluid brushstroke is transformed into editable computational paths defined by control points, curves, and geometric relationships. Rather than functioning as a straightforward digital copy, vectorisation requires the artist to reinterpret the structural logic of each stroke while preserving its visual rhythm and spatial balance. The vector drawing subsequently becomes the basis for CNC waterjet cutting, allowing the calligraphic forms to be fabricated with a level of precision unattainable through manual cutting.

Figure 6. Digital translation of handwritten Chinese calligraphy into editable vector geometry. (a) Original handwritten Chinese calligraphy serving as the graphic source for digital translation. (b) Reconstruction of the calligraphy as editable vector geometry for CNC waterjet fabrication.

Stage 1: Producing coloured glass sheets. The fabrication process consists of three sequential stages that progressively transform handwritten calligraphy into a cast-glass artwork. First, coloured glass sheets are produced by incorporating metal oxides into molten glass (Figure 7). During this process, different metal oxides generate distinct colours while preserving the optical properties required for subsequent fabrication (Shi 2020). These handmade coloured glass sheets provide the material foundation for the later stages of the Glass Calligraphy Series (Figure 8).

Figure 7. The process of metal oxides colouring hot glass and making a coloured sheet. (a) Take an iron ladle of hot glass from the hot-glass furnace. (b) Quickly stir metal oxides (quantify the weight of the metal oxides accurately in preparing stage) and the iron ladle of hot glass together. (c) Pour the glass out of the ladle on the marver. (d) Using hands and an iron rod, squeeze the hot glass, which helps shape the surface of the smooth sheet.

Figure 8. Handmade coloured glass sheets prepared for CNC waterjet fabrication, thickness: 7–10 mm. (a) Blue handmade glass sheet. (b) Turquoise handmade glass sheet.

Stage 2: CNC waterjet fabrication of calligraphic elements. The coloured glass sheets are digitally fabricated into individual calligraphic elements through CNC waterjet cutting (Figure 9). Guided by vector-based computational drawings, the waterjet accurately translates handwritten brushstrokes into precisely cut glass components while preserving their spatial rhythm and structural relationships. Compared with manual cutting, CNC fabrication enables a level of geometric precision and repeatability that is essential for constructing complex calligraphic compositions.

Figure 9. Coloured glass calligraphic elements fabricated by CNC waterjet cutting for the Glass Calligraphy series. (a) Complete set of waterjet-fabricated calligraphic elements prepared for glass casting. (b) Detail showing the precision and edge quality of the fabricated glass components.

Stage 3: Embedding into transparent cast glass. Finally, the waterjet-cut glass elements are embedded within transparent cast glass through hot-glass casting, followed by annealing and polishing to complete the Glass Calligraphy Series (Figure 10 and Figure 11). Transparent cast glass functions as the spatial carrier of the composition, while the coloured glass elements define the visual presence of the calligraphic strokes. Through this process, the digital workflow extends beyond graphic translation to encompass material fabrication, glass casting, and spatial assembly, establishing an integrated creative methodology in which computational design and material transformation become inseparable.

Figure 10. Embedding CNC waterjet-fabricated coloured glass calligraphic elements into transparent cast glass during the hot-glass casting process.

Figure 11. Dian Shi, the Glass Calligraphy Series II, hot-glass pouring cast, waterjet-cut inclusion, 2019. Photographer Dian Shi.

The completed works demonstrate how calligraphic expression is transformed through a sequence of digital and material operations. Handwritten brushstrokes are first translated into vector geometry, then fabricated as coloured glass components, and finally embedded within transparent cast glass. In this process, calligraphy is no longer understood only as an image or written sign, but as a spatial and material structure. The Glass Calligraphy Series therefore retains the visual identity of Chinese calligraphy while establishing a material and technological language specific to contemporary glass practice.

4. Spatial Cutting Series: Digital Fabrication and Spatial Generation

4.1. Layered Construction and Structural Generation

Unlike the Glass Calligraphy Series, in which waterjet-cut coloured glass calligraphic elements are embedded within transparent cast glass through hot-glass casting, the Spatial Cutting Series (Figure 12) generates space through the integration of computational design, digital fabrication, and the precise spatial organisation of multiple transparent glass planes rather than through monolithic sculptural form. Digital fabrication therefore becomes not merely a method of production but a generative system through which spatial relationships are designed, assembled, and continuously transformed.

Figure 12. Dian Shi, Spatial Cutting Series II, laminated waterjet-cut float glass, 2026. Photograph by Dian Shi.

This series employs multiple transparent glass planes that are digitally designed, precisely waterjet-cut, and systematically organised into layered spatial configurations. Their repetitive and symmetrical geometry exploits the precision of digital fabrication to produce hundreds of accurately fabricated panels whose controlled alignment and spacing establish the foundation of the work’s spatial structure (Ebanks 2019).

Building upon this layered organisation, the work employs digitally fabricated wooden and stainless-steel bases with precision-cut slots to accurately position and support each glass panel. Rather than functioning as independent structural elements, the glass panels and supporting bases operate as an integrated assembly system in which digital fabrication governs both the production of individual components and their precise spatial organisation.

In conventional glassmaking, assembling numerous thin glass panels into a stable layered structure would be technically challenging because of the difficulties of manual measurement, alignment, and assembly. Digital fabrication overcomes these limitations by enabling both precise component fabrication and accurate assembly. As a result, the layered glass structure functions as an integrated spatial system that is structurally stable, visually lightweight, and optically dynamic.

4.2. Transparency, Digitally Constructed Negative Space and Optical Relations

The theoretical propositions established in Section 2.3 provide the analytical framework for the following analysis of the Spatial Cutting Series. Rather than functioning as abstract concepts, the three propositions—geometric precision as the condition for optical interference, controlled negative space as an active mechanism of spatial generation, and layered transparency as the basis for spatial depth—are materially realised through the layered glass structures produced by CNC waterjet cutting. Accordingly, this section examines how these three interconnected principles interact to generate optical depth, spatial relations, and ultimately a dynamic spatial system.

The most significant aesthetic contribution of the Spatial Cutting Series is its redefinition of visual depth and optical relations. In a solid glass sculpture, depth is experienced through the thickness of the material. In this series, depth is generated through layering.

The removal of material through CNC waterjet cutting generates a series of precisely controlled voids within the layered glass structure. Rather than functioning as empty spaces, these cut-out areas become optically active negative spaces. Combined with the transparency of glass, they establish multiple visual pathways through the work, producing layered depth and continuously changing spatial relationships as the viewer moves around the installation.

The interaction between transparent material and digitally constructed negative space produces shifting patterns of overlap, refraction, reflection, and visual interference. Consequently, spatial perception emerges through the dynamic relationship between solid material and controlled voids rather than through solid form alone. Here, digital fabrication enables material removal to become a strategy for spatial generation rather than merely a process of fabrication.

The Individual transparent panes act as “optical planes.” When viewed from the front (Figure 12), the viewer looks through dozens of layers of glass. Each layer refracts the light slightly differently. The complex patterns cut into each layer (resembling mandalas, sunbursts, or cellular structures) overlap and interfere with one another. This creates a sense of “optical interference”—a visual shimmering or moiré effect that makes the image appear to float or move.

This effect is impossible to achieve without the geometric precision of digital cutting. If the layers were misaligned by even a fraction of a millimeter, the optical interference would collapse into blur. The waterjet cut ensures that the “registration” (alignment) is perfect, allowing the delicate interplay of light and shadow to occur across the entire structure.

Furthermore, the edges of the glass are illuminated by the light traveling through the planes. The cut edges (the “green” or “cyan” edges typical of float glass) become a prominent visual element, forming a translucent wire frame that defines the structure against the darkness (Figure 12). This interplay between the transparent faces of the glass and the illuminated edges creates a distinct spatial language.

4.3. Embodied Viewer Experience

The Spatial Cutting Series fundamentally shifts the role of the viewer. Rather than being perceived from a single fixed viewpoint, these layered glass structures require viewers to move around the work in order to experience its continually changing spatial configurations. This embodied mode of engagement aligns with Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology of perception, which argues that perception is constituted through the body’s active relationship with space rather than detached visual observation (Merleau-Ponty 1962). The artwork is therefore not experienced as a stable object with a fixed appearance; instead, its spatial qualities emerge progressively through bodily movement and changing viewpoints.

This phenomenological understanding is further developed by Noë’s (2004) theory of enactive perception, which proposes that perception is an activity achieved through sensorimotor exploration rather than passive visual reception. Within the Spatial Cutting Series, transparency, layered glass planes, and digitally constructed negative spaces reveal different optical relationships as the viewer walks around the installation. What is perceived is therefore not a single image but a continuously changing spatial event generated through the interaction between bodily movement, light, and material.

Figure 13 illustrates how changes in viewing position continuously reconfigure the perceptual experience of the work. When viewed from the front (Figure 13b,c), the layered glass planes visually compress into a dense optical field, producing a coherent geometric image with pronounced optical depth. By contrast, the oblique view (Figure 13a) reveals the rotational organisation of the layered glass planes and exposes the internal spacing between individual sheets. Rather than presenting a fixed visual image, the work generates multiple spatial configurations that emerge through the viewer’s movement.

Figure 13. Reconfiguration of spatial perception through viewer movement in Spatial Cutting Series II. (a) Oblique top view revealing the rotational organisation of the layered glass planes around the central axis and the resulting spatial configuration. (b) Frontal view revealing the optical depth and transparency generated through the superimposition of the layered glass planes. (c) Alternative frontal viewpoint demonstrating how a shift in viewing position reconfigures spatial relationships, light transmission, reflection, and visual perception.

Movement and Perception: As the viewer moves around the work (Figure 13), the alignment of the layers shifts. What appears as an opaque, textured surface from one angle may become a transparent window from another. The pattern might disappear or align with the background. This kinetic perception turns the artwork into an event that unfolds over time and space, rather than a static object. For example, when the work is viewed from the front, the layered glass planes visually compress into a dense optical field, producing the impression of an almost opaque geometric surface. As the viewer gradually moves laterally, previously overlapping layers begin to separate, allowing light to penetrate deeper into the structure and revealing transparent openings that were invisible from the frontal viewpoint. The spatial image is therefore continuously reconstructed through movement rather than remaining optically fixed.

Physical Space and Installation: The series is often installed in darkened environments with specific lighting (usually edge-lighting or backlighting). The dark background acts as a void, allowing the glass planes to float spatially. The viewer is not just looking at a glass object; they are standing within a field of light and optical interference.

Material Consciousness: The lightness and fragility of the thin glass sheets create a sense of tension and vulnerability. The viewer becomes aware of the material’s properties—its rigidity and its brittleness—through the spatial arrangement. The precision of the digital cut creates an almost “industrial” aesthetic, yet the fragility of the glass reintroduces a sense of craft and human risk.

This shift from optical experience to embodied experience is central to the argument of this paper. Digital fabrication, through its manipulation of materials and optics, creates an environment where the viewer is no longer a disengaged observer but an active participant in the construction of the visual field. The aesthetic experience therefore does not reside solely within the physical object itself but emerges through the continuous interaction between the moving body, transparent material, digitally fabricated structure, and light. In this sense, digital fabrication constructs not only the artwork but also the perceptual conditions through which the artwork comes into being.

5. Conclusions

This paper has examined how digital fabrication transforms contemporary glass art through two interconnected practice-based projects: Glass Calligraphy Series and the Spatial Cutting Series. Moving beyond the conventional understanding of digital fabrication as a manufacturing technology, the research has argued that it functions as a creative framework capable of reconfiguring artistic agency, reconstructing glass materiality, and generating new forms of spatial experience. By integrating theoretical discussion with practice-based investigation, the study demonstrates that digital fabrication is not an external tool applied to artistic production but an active participant in the formation of artistic methods, material relationships, and aesthetic experience.

The findings respond directly to the three research questions proposed in the Introduction. First, digital fabrication fundamentally reconfigures artistic agency. Rather than locating authorship exclusively within the individual artist, creative agency emerges through continuous interactions among the artist, computational design software, CNC waterjet cutting technologies, and material behaviour. Within this distributed network, the artist acts as a conceptual orchestrator who establishes the creative framework while negotiating the possibilities and constraints introduced by digital systems and material processes. Second, digital fabrication reconstructs the material identity of glass. In the Glass Calligraphy Series, digital translation transforms the traditional relationships between brush, ink, paper, and writing into a new material system based on coloured and transparent cast glass. In the Spatial Cutting Series, glass is further reconfigured from a solid sculptural material into a layered spatial system in which transparency, controlled negative space, and optical interactions become active generators of form and meaning. Third, digital fabrication transforms viewer experience from passive visual observation into embodied spatial engagement. Rather than presenting a fixed image, the layered structures generate continuously changing spatial relationships through the interaction of light, transparency, material, and viewer movement, demonstrating that spatial perception is actively constructed rather than statically received.

Beyond these practice-based findings, this research contributes to current discussions of contemporary digital craft and New Arts and Science by proposing a broader theoretical understanding of digital fabrication as a creative framework. Existing studies have frequently emphasised digital fabrication as a production technology that improves efficiency, precision, or manufacturing capability. By contrast, this study argues that its significance lies in its ability to reorganise artistic methodology itself. Computational design, digital fabrication, material behaviour, and embodied perception are shown to operate as an integrated creative system in which artistic thinking, making, and viewing become inseparable. Although this research is grounded in contemporary glass practice, the conceptual framework developed here may also provide useful perspectives for other material-based artistic disciplines employing digital fabrication technologies.

Ultimately, this research demonstrates a broader transition from graphic translation to spatial generation. Through digital fabrication, artistic practice moves beyond the reproduction of visual forms towards the generation of new material relationships, spatial structures, and embodied modes of perception. In this sense, digital fabrication represents not simply a production technology but a creative framework for contemporary glass art and digital craft.