Travel to Australia via France! Isa07 (no real name) revisits a trip to Australia with this Melbourne necklace. She reproduced the colors as she remembered them. Then she built canes and stacks of mokume gane which she combined into a series.
The playful, carefree juxtaposition of the beads take you on a wonderful trip. Travel sensitizes your eye to the color and patterns of a place. These Australian beads from a French perspective seem right on target.
Adam Thomas Rees’ video of his cane-covered polymer foxes gives you a look at how he creates his sculptures (he fires the bases first) and may make you consider working on a turntable (it looks so efficient).
This Utah artist doesn’t reveal how long it took him to shoot these fast forward videos. You’ll be surprised at how he conditions clay and this episode gives you some idea of the size of his original canes. Additional clips on his YouTube page show other animal sculptures in process.
You may want to set aside some time to dig deeper into these links that were sent in by Iris Mishly.
Rebekah Payne gave up on these polymer earrings. She figured she had nothing to lose and baked the sad, scooped out green beads. Then she let them sit around for a while. She layered them with paint and added dots. They started to look better. She hung crystals in the hollows and topped the beads with some wire wrapping. Rebekah calls them her Happy Returns earrings.
This story of persistence and patience is a good one to start the week. Get the full scoop on her blog and scroll through her Etsy offerings. Don’t you have ugly ducklings waiting to become swans?
These new polymer buttons and barettes based on American crewel needlework patterns are intriguing. The cane work is lovely, the colors and cutout shapes are soothing. She adds texture to simulate fabric.
Do you know who Flickr’s Dixie103 is? Julie is the only name she lists on her “nopeitsnotpainted” page. She doesn’t google well and she’s shy about her personal information. Deb Ross sent the link and had no clues to the artist’s identity.
We end the week enjoying a mystery artist. Have an intriguing weekend.
Virginia dentist, Page McNall rolled out a sheet of ecru polymer and added a few scrap clay pieces made using Maggie Maggio’s watercolor technique.
Then she colored the flat surface with alcohol inks and liquid chalks, textured it and embedded Mykonos ceramic beads for accent. She calls the resulting polymer assemblage Currents.
From this flat sheet, Page cut out pleasing shapes that became brooches and pendants. These two she calls Faux Stone Dentates (tooth-like, of course).
Her soft painterly chalks and inks are deftly applied. Page’s beautiful results may have you heading back to your inks to try again.
Annie Pennington uses colored pencil on polymer on her mixed media Diatom Series commissioned brooch (left) which is set in copper and filled with felted wool. Annie is associate editor for ArtJewelry Magazine and was trained as a metalsmith.
When Janice Abarbanel featured Annie’s work on her blog, I noted that all the captions listed “clay” as one of the materials. A quick email clarified that the material was polymer and Annie happily amended the descriptions in her captions.
“I have just recently begun working with polymer clay again after close to 20 years (and I’m still using the same old clay!). I think it may be time to get some new clay,” she admitted. “I recently stopped by the Racine Art Museum to see Terra Nova before it closed. I’ve been to countless exhibitons and art shows, but that was definitely one of the best exhibits I’ve ever seen,” she added.
Louisville pediatrician Ron Lehocky has made 18,200 polymer hearts which makes him the valentine king. Today is his day. Blow a kiss toward Kentucky.
Not only has Ron raised $10 for each of those hearts which goes to the KIDS Center, he’s also raised the bar on what one person can accomplish. Other polymer artists have helped by sending Ron their scrap clay and old canes (he has enough to carry him through 2020).
Ron started his project as a small fundraising effort in 2005. It’s fun to look back at the PCDaily posts that have charted his climbing numbers.
This year Alabama fans asked Ron to take up the houndstooth challenge, a tribute to coach Bear Bryant who wore a houndstooth hat. After a few trial and error canes, Ron created these as his entry. Here’s another recent photo of his 2012 designs.
Email Ron if you’d like to purchase a heart and spread a little love. Happy V Day.
Just one more! Check out Tejae Floyde’s love note hearts for a Valentine’s Day love story.
Time flies and it’s nearly time to gather up all the hearts in your studio and deliver them.
These lovelies from Israel’s Eti Raz and Massachusetts’ Amy Crawley may inspire you to make a few last-minute valentines.
Eti’s heart is covered with cane slices, layered with a clock face and given patterned wings. Amy’s is inked, textured and stamped. Both of their sites are full of more examples. Love, any way you want to say it.
This Pebble brooch marks the latest collaboration between polymer artist Cynthia Toops and metalsmith Chuck Domitrovich.
Cynthia mixes vertical and horizontal polymer micro mosaics in a beautifully constructed 2.5″ x 2″ x 1/4″ frame that Chuck constructed from sterling silver and brass with a stainless steel pin. Vertical threads of white polymer create the lines on the horizontal mosaic of a pebble.
Keep the size in mind as you zoom in to marvel at the detail. Then turn it over to examine the back with its brass posts that balance the piece, an option for a bail, and spaces for both artists’ signatures. We end the week with an example of remarkable attention to detail and fine collaboration. Have a remarkable weekend.
Estera from Croatia speaks the international language of love…in polymer.
In fact you’ll find her two Etsy sites here and here filled with paint-spattered, mosaic and textured hearts in fresh, inviting colors.
There’s no imitation or struggle to prove herself here, just an exhuberance and innovation that’s pleasant for a Thursday browse.
