Firefest 2026
Supported in part by the North Carolina Arts Council | Community Sponsors by First Bank of Biscoe & Spruce Pine Batch
Firefest is a two-day celebration of incredible glass, ceramic, and metal art here at Starworks! April 3 & 4, 2026 the public is invited to attend fiery demonstrations, hands on workshops, tours, and artist talks with internationally recognized artists.
General Admission is $10 per day | Kids 12 and under receive general admission access at no cost
General Admission includes access to Exhibitions, Live Demonstrations, Artist Talks, Campus Tours, Music, Food Trucks & Onsite Vendors
Hands-on workshops are not included with General Admission and require separate registration and payment. Workshop spots are limited and registration is available below.
Thank you to our sponsors Spruce Pine Batch Company & First Bank
Interested in becoming a sponsor of this year’s event?
featured artists
Bruce Dehnert
Bruce Dehnert received a BA in Literature from the University of Montana and an MFA in Ceramics from Alfred University. His teaching career spans institutions around the world, including Hunter College and Parsons School of Art and Design; The School of Art in New Zealand; Universiti Malaysia Sarawak on the island of Borneo; and the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. In addition, he has led workshops internationally in Japan, India, China, Canada, New Zealand, and throughout the United States.
Dehnert is the recipient of a New Jersey Artist Fellowship Award, along with numerous other honors, including three Fletcher Challenge International Ceramics Awards, the Settlor Prize in Sculpture, and a Carnegie Premier Award for Works on Paper. A finalist in the Robert Wood Johnson International Figurative Competition, his work is held in prominent collections worldwide, including The Crocker Museum in California, the Liling Museum of Ceramic Art in China, The New Dowse Museum in New Zealand, and The White House in Washington, DC. He most recently presented a solo exhibition, Architectonic, at The Hunterdon Art Museum.
An accomplished writer, Dehnert has published extensively in leading journals such as Metalsmith Magazine, Studio Potter, Ceramics Monthly, and Ceramics: Art and Perception. He co-authored the best-selling book Simon Leach’s Pottery Handbook, published by Abrams Publishing of New York City, and contributed a review of Vince Montague’s recent memoir, Crooked Pot, for the book’s back cover. He has also served as an advisor to the Jingdezhen Ceramics Biennale in China and currently sits on the Board of Directors for The Art School in Demarest, New Jersey.
A Fellow of the International Academy of Ceramics (IAC), Bruce is currently Head of Ceramics at Sugar Maples Center for Creative Art at the Catskill Mountain Foundation in New York.
Dan Friday
Dan Friday is a member of the Lummi Nation and a Skagit Valley based artist. He has spent the last 30 years creating works primarily in glass with themes and images often drawn from his Coast Salish heritage. Dan has taught at the University of Washington, Evergreen State College, Pilchuck Glass School, Penland School of Craft, Chrysler Museum, and the Haystack Craft Center. Dan was also a contestant on the Netfilx show Blown Away.
In 2017 Dan started the Native Youth outreach Program at the Pilchuck Glass School. He has had residencies at the Museum of Glass in Tacoma, WA, the Burke Museum in Seattle Wa, the Corning Museum NY, Pendland Craft School NC, Chrysler Museum Norfolk Va, Torunga Wai Wai Gisborne New Zealand, Te Atinga Wai Kato New Zealand, and the Dream Community in Tai Pei, Taiwan.
Friday has been awarded the BIMA Award From Bainbridge Museum of Art, Bill Holm Grant, the People’s choice award from the Bellevue Art Museum, The James Earl Fraser Award from the Prix De West at the National Western Museum, an Artist Trust Fellowship, and the Discovery Fellowship through (SWAIA) the Southwestern Association for Indian Arts.
His work can be seen on Fridayglass.com, and in museums and private collections around the world.
Elsa Hoffman
photo credit: Alex Maness
elise and phoebe's quilt, 2021
plasma cut steel, photo credit: Elsa Hoffman
Elsa Hoffman is a sculptor and furniture maker in Mebane, North Carolina, USA. She studied studio art at Oberlin College and assisted sculptor Patrick Dougherty for a decade. Using a handheld plasma cutter as a drawing tool, direct sculpting concrete onto steel armatures, and translating cut metal designs into textile patterns, Hoffman's practice explores the gestural qualities of metal and concrete.
Her work has been acquired by the Gregg Museum of Art and Design, the University of North Carolina (installed in Lilongwe, Malawi, Africa), the Raleigh Municipal Art Collection, Sarah P. Duke Gardens, and the Julian and Josie Robertson Collection in New York City. She has completed residencies at The Steel Yard in Providence, Rhode Island and the Haystack Mountain School of Crafts in Deer Isle, Maine.
Hoffman has developed a process to integrate her intricate cut metal designs with the solidity and earthiness of concrete, brick, and other aggregate salvaged from old dumping sites and architectural ruins. Using furniture as a loose structure for making, she is interested in how sculptural forms, containing site-specific materials, can relate to the body and be used in functional everyday settings.
Guest Artists
Sana Musasama
Sana Musasama is a New York–born clay artist, educator, and humanitarian. She earned her BA from the City College of New York in 1973 and her MFA from Alfred University in 1988. In 2018, she received the Outstanding Achievement Award from the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts in recognition of her decades of teaching and humanitarian work with survivors of sex trafficking in Cambodia.
Musasama’s practice centers on the lives and stories of girls and women she has encountered through years of global travel and volunteer work. Since 2007, she has worked in Cambodia, where she co-founded the Apron Project, a sustainable entrepreneurial initiative supporting girls and young women reintegrating into society after being forced into the commercial sex industry. Her sculptural work in clay—often incorporating mixed media such as cloth, dirt, and glass—seeks to balance social commentary with warmth, bringing awareness to the human condition beyond familiar comfort zones.
Magnum Mangkang
Magnum Mangkang has been a working artist for over 25 years. Starting his career as an apprentice glassblower at the world renowned Frabel Studios in Atlanta. Magnum now resides in Asheville NC and works out of his home studio. Specializing in the Technique of flameworking, Magnum creates functional and sculptural works that are inspired by the natural world. He sometimes uses classic shapes and forms as a canvas to bring the woods into the delicate world of glass.
Also featuring demos, workshops, and/or work from:
Starworks Glass - Joe Grant, Megan Lange, Clayton Benefiel, Sarah Band, Peter Tietbohl
Starworks Ceramics - Takuro Shibata, Ryan Osbourne, Nina Rominger
Starworks Metal - Mac Metz, Dan Metz
Enjoy local food trucks
Las Cebollitas
Friday, April 3, 11am-8:30pm
House of Odell & Luella
Saturday, April 4, 11am-8pm
Bayou in the Pines
Saturday, April 4, 11am-8pm
Starworks Cafe & Taproom will be serving up an amazing variety of carolina craft beers, in addition to wine, ciders, sodas, snacks, and so much more!
This project is supported in part by the North Carolina Arts Council, a division of the Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.
