Polymer Clay Daily

Artists

Potted polymer

Toronto’s Afsaneh Tajvidi designs lovely delicate jewelry and sells her jewel-tone watercolors and prints on Etsy. Every once in a while she gets the urge to play with polymer – usually when she’s inspired by her window sill succulent garden or has a request for a cake topper.

Afi rediscovered a stash of tiny flower pots that she had collected and started making a new miniature cactus collection in colors that delight the eye. Is it the gelato colors that make them so mouthwatering?

Here’s her polymer collection on Flickr, her Facebook page, her Etsy site (with a feature on Afi) and her blog.

Moveable polymer

Nova Scotia’s Kate Church has uploaded a stash of recent work that will keep you thinking about sculpture. The posture and expression of each of Kate’s polymer sculptures imparts emotion, drama, action and joy.

Most of them are made to be adjusted, posed and moved. “Each piece is meant to become an artful muse for those who collect them,” she says.

The 21″ tall Betti and Geranium is one of Kate’s current favorites. Look out, her site is full of treasures! Don’t miss the gallery, her blog, her list of classes and even this student’s class pix.

Distilled polymer

Cat of Prague’s Hamlin Designs distills the essence of her subjects into small smooth sculptures. Using only a lump of polymer Cat packs action and personality into simple shapes that convey energy and attitude.

Each piece is around 2″ long and is hand formed, then sanded and buffed. “Often times, when I have a hunk of clay in my hands, I try to hear/feel what it wants to become,” she says.

Janet Hoy sent the link along because she admired the artist’s economy of line. See Cat’s entire menagerie on her Etsy shop.

Drawn to translucent

Kathrin Neumaier taunts us with more of her tantalizing Pardo translucent creations. This time she shows thin color-blended petals gathered and suspended from earwires. Makes you think of projects to try for spring, doesn’t it?

This hummingbird seems to be attracted to the flowers! It’s a big cane (2 1/2″ tall and 6″ wide) from Jennifer Patterson. She’ll fill in the voids with translucent to reduce the cane.

Here’s her Quilted in Clay fan page with pictures of her booth and other great canes.

Survey #3

This survey asks a few brief questions about monetizing your work. Whether you hope to cover your costs or support a lavish lifestyle, we’d like to hear from you. This is the third of four surveys Judy Belcher and I made for our Synergy3 presentation in the spring. We’re loving all your responses!

Anke Humpert is surveying European polymer artists to bring the Synergy crowd an accurate picture of how polymer is faring there. Read about her data-gathering and take the survey here.

Damm style!

My shoulder aches because of Christine Damm’s sumptuous style. Let me explain.

I’m silhouetting much of the artwork for my upcoming Global Polymer book (August 2013), removing the backgrounds in Photoshop like I do every day for PCD. This weekend I was sailing through the long list of assignments from the publisher until I hit upon Christine Damm’s photos.

The wires, the twists, the textures! Her beauties are dense with details that have to be outlined and carefully cut out on the computer. I’m taking a break, giving my mouse hand a rest and showing off my/her work.

You may enjoy Christine’s most recent post where she talks about her style and how it developed. “When you begin to dedicate substantial time to your artistic work, whatever it is, your style begins to emerge, no matter where your creative experimentation takes you,” she explains. ” Before I began using polymer as my primary medium, I felt that I really didn’t have a style,” she says. There’s no mistaking Christine’s style now and her pieces tell great stories.

Polymer pastiche

Russia’s Tanya Mayorova applies slices of extruded cane with layer overlapping colorful layer to create a bangle that is rough with color and texture. The design circles around one small stone.

As you flip through her Flickr pictures you’ll see that this denseness and a preference for jewel tones combine to make Tanya’s signature style.

Polymer is well-suited to this pastiche approach. Look at how Joan Israel has applied canes onto bottles to achieve a similar dark, rich texturing. Here’s Joan’s latest work.

Sweepstakes

Don’t feel bad about not winning this week’s lottery, you can sign up for the CraftArtEdu Sweepstakes! The odds are better (20 chances to win), the prizes are great and your ticket doesn’t cost a cent.

The key to good gifts

As you start to make polymer mementos and gifts for the holiday season take a look at what you may think of as the lowly keychain.

Zona Manualidades (the photo) and Silvia Bordin (the keys) demonstrate a couple of memorable and fun options.

Baking polymer designs right on the keys makes construction easy and the hardware is minimal. The ball shown here contains tokens or coins.

I’m guessing that the bezel on the photo is polymer which has been filled with clear resin. The cording could have been strung through or baked in.

Think of it, there are few things you handle more often than keys! Make them memorable.

Polymer power

Michigan’s Adriana Allen created what she calls her Flower Doodle earrings using her stamp pressed deeply into polymer. Several colors of paint are washed into the crevices and hollows to create what you’d swear was aged copper.

Adriana has had arthritis since childhood and says, “I never gave into it. I decided to ignore it, which has not been easy since it had paralyzed me at one point in my life and now it is close to claiming my hands. Every piece I create reminds me of this fact, but the disease cannot stop me from doing what I love.”

She doesn’t like to talk about herself but will in this case because, “…I consider it a proof of the strength of mind over body, and the power of creation over everything else.” Adriana tells more of her story in this month’s Polymer Arts Magazine. She sells on Etsy. She’s also on Facebook.

Bottled polymer

The peek-a-boo quality of Donna Greenberg’s polymer covered glass vase catches your eye. Rich colors and patterns with metallic sheen add to the allure.

Organic shapes and rough textures replace the flowers and frills we’ve come to expect on polymer covered items. Donna’s bottles shake up our expectations on this Cyber Monday. Be sure to visit Etsy and other online galleries as you start your holiday shopping. Dan Cormier and Tracy Holmes offer this coupon for discounts on their tools and techniques today.

Here’s Donna on Facebook and her FB fan page for more browsing.

More scribbles

You may have to study Vera Kleist’s attractive scribbles necklace to figure out how she did it. The polished polymer lines are surrounded by deep grooves that she’s enhanced with white grout and called To Be Different. Here’s her Etsy link.

Your scribbles

You readers have been great about sharing data with Judy Belcher and me. More data is better! If you haven’t yet filled them out, here’s Survey 1 and Survey 2 that will tell us how the polymer community is trending. We’ll report back at Synergy3.