Chopped polymer painting

Angela Bahrenholtz chops her clay into polymer pointillist masterpieces

Israel’s Angela Bahrenholz shows us another way to paint. Her Frida Kahlo painting measures 6 3/4″ by 9″ and is made entirely of chopped polymer.

No glue, no paint, just polymer. She doesn’t say if she’s using a food processor or chopping by hand to achieve her polymer pointillism.

Either way, her compositions are exciting. You will find her versions of masterpieces Flickr and Etsy.

Angela has developed a number of scrap techniques and tutorials if you’re looking for more ways to use your polymer in innovative ways.

Virtual collaboration

Nancy Nearing's slinky bracelet brings ideas together in a new way on PolymerClayDaily.com

Neighbor Nancy Nearing shared this spiral bracelet with our coffee group and it brought smiles all around.

Nancy’s bracelet is a combination of what she learned from Kim Korringa’s scrap tutorial and Maggie Maggio’s flattened split rings (see videos here and here). The piece started with Nancy’s scraps.

The mod look of this virtual collaboration takes the ideas in a different direction. Mixing and matching ideas keeps our community evolving.

Finding the beach in your clay

Caroline Casswell frames a series of remarkable scenes on PolymerClayDaily.com

UK’s Caroline Casswell rips and tears her polymer to produce a series of remarkable seascapes. She layers and textures the ragged edges and smooth skies.

Caroline’s landscape tiles make us look at our clay with fresh eyes. The cropped images here look even better after Caroline mats and frames her tiles. See her whole series on Instagram.

Serene beads

Eriko Page launches the week with the calming effect of her patterned beads on PolymerClayDaily.com

There’s a serenity in these beads from California’s Eriko Page on Instagram and on Facebook.

Her dark, limited palette beads on a single leather cord calm us on a Monday morning. You may want to drink in the feeling emanating from Eriko’s cane-covered black rounds before you head into your week.

European polymer in Atlantic City

Leslie Blackford characters upcycle baubles in Atlantic City on PolymerClayDaily.com

Head to Atlantic City for a taste of Europe this spring.

You can learn from Germany’s Bettina Welker, France’s Sylvie Peraud and Spain’s Fabiola Perez Ajates plus our own Donna Kato and Leslie Blackford from June 12-15 at the Clay Back East event.

Here you see how Leslie turns old baubles into fantastic characters as she convinces students that they can become sculptors.

Travel the world in Atlantic City.

This weekend on StudioMojo we’ll be looking at new and free tutorials – gems hiding in plain sight. And after a few years of teaching inmates, they’re teaching me a thing or two. Join us for the rest of the story.

Which came first?

Christi Uliczny layers lavish colors and leaves clues on her Instagram on PolymerClayDaily.com

Don’t you love the mysteries you encounter as you deconstruct a polymer piece like this one from Michigan’s Christi Uliczny (cabinefeverclay)?

“Which came first?” we ask ourselves. Interestingly light colored polymer textured ovals with baked in metal eyes were first. Then what? Color? When did the crackle go on? And then more layers of colors?

It’s dizzying to walk it backward when there are so many layers interacting with each other. You need skill and serendipity to create faux ceramics like Christi’s. She offers more clues to her favorite tools on her Instagram.

Polymer terrazzo

Kathy Koontz shows how to make faux terrazzo polymer on PolymerClayDaily.com

All the trends point to a resurgence of terrazzo (the chips of colors you see embedded in commercial flooring and old linoleum).

South Carolina’s Kathy Koontz (flowertown_originals ) shows her way of bringing the trend to polymer. She grinds and grates baked scraps then rolls the small grated pieces into a solid color of unbaked clay. Voila! Terrazzo polymer style.

She shows her process on Instagram. Who says polymer can’t be trendy?

Mokume gane escape

Mesmerizing pinks and very 2019 colors (with the sound of cheering college football crowds in my background) make me daydream about Australian classes.

If you need to escape sports games I recommend spending some time on Dani Rapinett’s The Whimsical Bead’ site. The site flows seamlessly among various media. They offer an array of workshops and it’s fun to wander around. Try Instagram if you want a quick overview.

Is this an updated variation on my Leslie Blackford’s Garlic Gane video? No matter, it’s soothing and just what I need.

Forced blooms

Odile Marchais and Nikolina Otrzan team up for early spring flowers on PolymerClayDaily.com

France’s Odile Marchais uses techniques she learned from Croatia’s Nikolina Otrzan to make these stylized springy brooches. Nik teaches a surprisingly simple way to fill unusual shapes with air, keeping them light yet strong.

The childlike design of spring Odile’s flowers reminds us of the spring flowers we’re forcing to bloom at this time of year.

Nikolina Otrzan gathers her inchies into a brooch on PolymerClayDaily.com

In Nikolina’s most recent post, she shows how to make use of those “inchies” that lots of us have collected from various classes and events. She picks out a few favorites and gathers them into a great looking pin.

Wearable chips of polymer

Fiona Herbst's wafer-thin cane slices make a necklace of chips on PolymerClayDaily.com

The wonky, potato chip curls of wafer-thin beads make your eyes ricochet around these necklaces from Ireland’s Fiona Herbst. Flat white spacer beads keep the chips from stacking too closely.

Would you guess that she cut slices of one big wrapped cane that was rolled so that its size tapered on either end?

Wait, that’s a lot of chips, isn’t it? Maybe I’ll just admire Fiona’s or wait for them to come up in her Etsy store.

At the first of the year when we’re trying to stay focused It’s hard not to get thrown off-track by some fabulous looking piece. See how we deal with diversions over at StudioMojo this weekend. We found a bunch of treats as we cleaned up after the holidays.

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