Minnesota’s Amy Christie popped up in a news clipping about her current gallery show. She’s a mixed media artist who uses heavy texture, deep color and sculptural elements in mostly large scale works. Her materials include polymer clay, paint, paper, inks and wire.
Amy’s layered mosaics have a distinctive look and you will be itching to see more. For an idea of the size of her art, try this link. Here’s a bit on Facebook and her blog.
This worktable full of polymer pin variations makes fabulous Friday eye-candy. You can get lost in the textures and colors tucked into the layers of these Ford/Forlano O’Keeffe brooches.
These variations came from a technique the duo developed for their Shell series. “We like the jumpy colors and textures,” says Steve. You can see the pins mounted in their bezels on their Facebook page.
“Borrowing from the familiar forms of fungus, lichen, and mold, I invent and sculpt fictional organisms that graft onto manufactured domestic objects and infest the nooks and crannies of architectural spaces. Challenging notions of synthetic and organic, real and imagined, these sculptures and installations allude that through the passage of time these spaces and objects will become overtaken,” says Texan Jasmyne Grabill of her mixed media sculptures which rely heavily on polymer for their organic appeal.
Jasmyne’s works were featured in the luscious August/September issue of American Craft. In an article called Fungus Among Us, Monica Moses tracks this visual theme and finds fungus-themed works in metal, paper, fiber and food.
As I read the article my mind automatically started listing other examples of this trend that you may already know. Let’s see: Melanie West, Rachel Gourley, Kim Cavender, Ronna Weltman, Laura Tabakman, Wendy Malinow, Kathleen Dustin, Angelika Arendt, Jillian Moore. And that’s just for starters!
Send me your candidates and I’ll compile a list to send to the editor. ACC should know what we’ve been growing in the PCDaily laboratory.
Your online presence is your showcase, your gallery! Pay attention to it. Polymer artists can tell you how enthusiastically I will jump on my soapbox to rant about this subject.
Fellow blogger Susan Lomuto (DailyArtMuse) nags artists too and she offers you an easy solution with her DIY Artist Websites, an online class about how to construct and maintain your own web portfolio.
All you have to do is to look at the spectacular sites of polymer artists Rachel Gourley, Sabine Speisser, and Tory Hughes, all Susan’s students, to see how helpful the class can be.
I’ve taken Susan’s classes and I can tell you that they are jam-packed with surprising resources and time-saving tips. She’s a superb researcher and a terrific teacher. Class starts September 7. Sign up now!
Another spirited necklace! Today’s Paradise Circus is from Nova Scotia’s Jenna Wright. Extrusions are coiled around some spheres then carved. Extruded slices are applied to others.
Jenna’s Etsy shop name is Boxes for Groxes and what we know about her we learn only from her colorful, playful aesthetic.
A little more research revealed that her shop name comes from Dr. Seuss’ Seuss-isms for Success whose whimsy fits nicely with Jenna’s art. Read the whole tongue twister here.
This splash of color from Toronto’s Dorothy Siemens jolts us into a new week. Flat disks of polymer in turquoise, gold and cobalt are interspersed with spheres and a focal lentil covered with mokume gane. A graphic artist, Dorothy leans toward primitive, tribal and bohemian designs with lots of asymmetry.
The color continues on her Flickr site where you’ll see how Dorothy’s knitting skill meshes with her polymer creations. She makes buttons and scarf pins, of course!
Zuzana, from the Czech Republic canes and collages pendants in an increasingly interesting way. The thin buna cord accents running through the polymer bail on the top of this pendant fit right in with the rest of the design.
She nicely attributes her designs to her teachers and then takes flight on her own as you can see from her Flickr photos.
I’ve taken flight too. Checking in from the road and back home soon.
From this angle you can hardly tell what Julie Eakes is up to with her extruded polymer mosaics. If you tip the bowl a delightful secret is revealed.
Read about how cane ends from one face project propelled Julie in a more sculptural direction. Of course she encountered problems she hadn’t planned on and found there was no turning back once she started.
This one-of-a-kind bowl is 9″ in diameter by 3.25″ deep. She plans to go bigger next time.
Ivy Koehn’s swirls may keep you marveling at bicones. I’m on the road and only have time for a quick one today. Go play.
These sorbet colored lentil swirls from Athens’ Klio Tsaliki are the result of lots of experiments with Premo frost, Premo white, alcohol markers and regular markers.
The sweet pale colors are perfect for summer. For other seasons, see what Klio has done using Premo gold.
Watching the swirls of pattern materialize is addictive. If you’re looking for an easy and fun diversion in clay, this might just what you need.
If you’ve never made a bicone-shaped bead, you’re in for a treat. Desiree McCrory’s step-by-step is one of the best explanations. It’s like riding a bike and once you get it, you’ll take off.
