I guess it's the week for unusual treatments. Susan Waddington paints dogs onto polymer bases and fashions them into pins and pendants. With so many dog afficianados and Susan's skill, I'm sure she does a brisk business.
I'm remembering repeating over and over to customers, "It's not painted, it's a polymer cane." And now Susan comes along and confuses the issue…by golly, it IS painted.
Thanks to Merrie60@aol.com for the link. How did it get to be Friday? Have a great weekend.
There's a big contingent of artists in Japan who are using polymer clay for anime-like characters. The work is finely crafted and very cartoon-like. The whole movement is baffling to my very western mind and I'd love for someone to explain it more fully. It was Kiwis Belgium site that led me to Japan. Visit these sites and prepare to be intrigued.
I was in Israel cruising through Iris Mishly's site which has a huge gallery of work of both Iris and her students. I love her embellished Crocs clogs (see at right).
Iris' site linked me to a stash of Donna Kato and friends work at Flickr.
It was nice to have a Tuesday off to just wander and surf the web. Summertime…and the livin' is easy.
This work of Ruth Anne and Michael Grove, a husband and wife collaborative team from California, reminds me of fireworks. Unfortunately they've left the business, sold their fabulous equipment and moved on to other pursuits.
You can still see their work in the 1995 book entitled "Five Artists-Five Directions" and we are indebted to Ruth Anne and Michael for many of the ideas in vogue today. Their work is also in the permanent collection of the Cooper-Hewitt Museum.
Have a Happy Fourth!
Bouquets to all of you for your support this week. Yes, I got the book (and cancelled my online order) and yes, my ear is healing and I'm feeling fine. Thanks for all your comments and good wishes.
The bouquets come from Florida artists you won't find in many books. Nancy Bundy and Bob Paris have been working at polymer clay for years but driving their motor home from show to show every summer hasn't left them much time for publishing.
Now that they're paring down to two shows a year, Nancy's wonderful flower collages have taken on more dimension and Bob is developing his considerable talents in the wheeling and dealing arts. Bob's a great sport and you shouldn't miss the pictures of him reducing an 18-pound cane (click on the "next" button).
Have a wonderful weekend. Fireworks remind me of the works of Grove and Grove. I'll dig out those pieces for Monday. Stay tuned.
Wow…lots of comments yesterday. Everyone has the book but me! That drives me crazy because I thought I was being so diligent by ordering it early in December. You all tell me that this often happens with Amazon. Who knew?
Since I'm in a rush to get to the bookstore, I'll leave you with a homegrown Sandra McCaw demo. She may kill me for publishing these 10-year-old pictures but they tickle me. I took the photos at an early Shrinemont conference. Note that the gradation was done in a "pre-Skinner" way (see the individually wrapped colors in the next-to-the-last picture). Remember how we used to blend the color for each layer separately? Bless you, Judith Skinner.
The demo shows three blocks of graduated colors. Sandra then began by slicing and swapping slices between the blocks. She reduced and recombined the resulting blocks in various ways. I hope you get the idea. And I hope I'm not in too much trouble with cover-girl Sandra. She's in the middle of a move right now so perhaps she'll miss today's post. I'm off to the bookstore.
Some folks already have their copy of this new Katherine Aimone book from Lark….and it's killing me. Amazon isn't shipping yet (though the ship date says June 7) and my order is languishing in the queue. Lark doesn't even show it on their site.
Those who have advance copies say that it's the best thing to come along for some time with high level projects and a cool gallery of exceptional work. Sandra McCaw agreed to let us publish this picture of her new work which is featured in the book (and on its cover). The delicate translucent petals beg you to touch them.
If you're one of those fortunate early recipients, feed me some tips or pictures. Does anyone know what the delay is about?
Another example of the benefits of treating the back and front of a piece with equal care. I received this link to an Israeli artist from Susan Rose. Adina Plastelina has a section on her site called "Two sides" which shows reversible bracelets.
The rollover pictures rendered a little slowly on my machine. I suppose the electrons take a while to arrive from such a distance. The site is clean and fresh and fun and her story's an interesting one.
Facèré Gallery, one of downtown Seattle's most popular galleries which specializes in art jewelry, will hold a special exhibit of polymer work from August 4-12 in honor of Ravensdale 2006 and the 10th anniversary of the Ravensdale conferences.
Limited to eight artists' work, the show will include outstanding new pieces by instructors Meredith Arnold, Dan Cormier/Tracy Holmes, Jeff Dever, Judy Kuskin (shown here), Barbara McGuire, SL Savarick, Julia Sober and Sarah Shriver. Judy Kuskin has freshened her site with photos of new work. Be sure to revisit it.
San Francisco's Susan Kinzig says, "Everything we see can be abstracted to a shape, a line, or a dot. I find myself forever intrigued by the endless combination of these elements and their relationship to one another."
She adorns her metal jewelry with a wide range of materials including pearls, stones and polymer, regarding each piece as a small kinetic sculpture.
I found Susan's site as I was browsing through older ACC sites. The artists in this August's ACC San Francisco show are now viewable…always a pleasant diversion and a rich source of inspiration. Have a lovely weekend.
