Polymer Clay Daily

Katz gets her head on straight

To mark the end of her fifth decade and the beginning of her sixth, Washington’s Sue Ellen Katz resolved to create a polymer head each day for a year. She’s completed 197 and ends her year in October.

Explaining the exercise she says that, “Each new head will help my own to sit more squarely on top of my shoulders.”

On her 365TalkingHeads blog Sue Ellen adds pensive quotes and captions to each head and she gangs them for a “say cheese” group photo at the end of each month. Repeating an exercise 365 times is bound to bring changes. Don’t you wonder what she’s learned? (Thanks to Ronna Sarvas Weltman for the link.)

Second Haab book giveaway

You readers are anxious to help me lighten the load on my bookshelves. Our randomly picked winner is Connie Nall from Omaha, Nebraska. Congratulations!

Incidentally, I have a second copy of the same book with DVD. I was going to hang onto that one but decided you’d enjoy it more. Take the PCDaily reader survey and enter your email at the end. You’ll automatically be entered in next Friday’s giveaway!

de la Torre’s shifting polymer gestalt

Madrid’s Silvia Ortiz de la Torre is fascinated with shifting colors and patterns, from soap film to fractals. A look at her Flickr page shows you how she translates this fascination into polymer patterns. Polymer was made for artists like Silvia.

I’m mesmerized by these recent pieces. I can’t tell if they’re made from extruded blends or hand-built canes. The colors pop and the patterns play nicely with each other.

Friday Giveaway

My daughter’s visiting and she’s making me tidy my library. The brand new Art of Metal Clay, a beautiful revised and expanded book from Sherri Haab comes complete with a project DVD.

While there are several polymer and mixed media artists in it, this book deserves a good home with a metal clay artist. If metal clay rings your chimes, leave a comment and my daughter will draw a name on Monday. Have a lucky weekend.

Ancient peoples polymer

Christine Damm's Ancient Peoples polymer cuff

Christine Damm’s article on wire and polymer in the summer issue of Belle Armoire Jewelry tempts me to try her loose, eclectic style. I’m on a tribal, primitive jag this week that you can see in her copper and faux jade cuff. The polymer pieces on her Stories They Tell site and Flickr page hint at tales from other times.

Her husband formed the cuff from repurposed copper flashing. The texture is from a Cool Tools plate. (Cool Tools carries mostly metal clay tools and many of them can be used on polymer as well.)

Psaltis’ cool black and white

Psaltis' polymer persian rug canes
Psaltis' polymer bangle
Psaltis' Ancient Modern rings

Perhaps a little black and white polymer from Maria Psaltis will cool off our hot summer. Maria is from Australia where it’s winter.

She does a cool rendition of Ronna Sarvas Weltman’s Ancient Modern rings and then pairs them with her more complex Persian Rug canes for building bangles. See more of her ethnic influences on her Flickr pages. (Ronna has two new DVDs just out.)

Shopping update

Thanks to Kim Korringa, Brenda Urquhart and Jeanette Walters for reporting back about their shopping at the Grove and Grove sidewalk sale. Enjoy shopping vicariously by reading their stories here.

Realtime polymer sculpture from Camille Young

Camille Young's polymer SkyMaid fan pin

Camille Young made this fan art pin out of polymer so enthusiastically that I had to figure out just what a Flapjack SkyMaid was.

SkyMaid is pretty sweet, a super heroine who travels from under the sea to up in the sky with a bit of an edge and an attitude. Go take a look!

Camille offers a straightforward step-by-step of another of her polymer video game-inspired creatures on her Flickr page. Follow along here.

She creates characters in real time in response to viewers suggestions on Fangamers Camilleart Fridays. (You have to skip ahead about 45 minutes in the video to watch Camille sculpt on demand.) Here’s the result.

A blast of bangles

Sylvie Peraud’s prickly polymer bangle was one of the top vote getters in the Crazy Bracelets challenge sponored by France’s LezArtGil group. Scroll down the LezArtGil page to reveal all the wild entries. The theme was inspired by Donna Kato’s signature fluid bangle shapes and her recent workshops.

The second bumpy bangle is from Connecticut’s Helen Wyland-Malchow. She’s a winner in the Progress and Possibilities competition. Click through her noisy Web site to see the full range of her work.

Aaron’s little polymer picnic

Shay Aaron’s tiny polymer July 4 picnic looks like Martha Stewart shrunk to 1/12th size. The blueberries, the star cookies! He’s a master of the miniature.

How can anything so small give me such great pleasure?

Perhaps it’s because the first time I touched polymer was with my daughter as we made food for her dollhouse. She’s flying in for a visit today. If you note changes on the PCDaily blog, you’ll know we’re tinkering. We still play together, only now it’s digital!

Visit Shay’s sites and enjoy all the small pleasures that your weekend brings.

Red, white and boom polymer

Two guys today! Boys and fireworks for the Fourth of July holiday ahead. Both guys subscribe to Picasso’s quote, “Art washes from the soul the dust of everyday life.”

Lance Perry draws his inspiration from children’s stories, nursery rhymes, childhood nostalgia and anything that might create a smile. He builds his sculptures over wire armatures and adds color with acrylics.

Mike Devine's polymer veteran

Mike Devine says of his polymer characters, “I finally found something to quiet my noisy mind and allow me a real escape from then angst and drama of working in NYC.” Mike’s “Miss Forever” was a winner in this year’s Progress and Possibilities competition.