New connections and directions

Wiwat Kamolpornwijit on PolymerClayDaily.com

Take a look around and you’ll see more polymer artists switching up their connections and experimenting with wires and tailor-made findings. Virginia’s Wiwat Kamolpornwijit makes wire a feature along with his metallic polymer shapes.

Wiwat’s background in environmental research shines through in many of his pieces. Here in an ACC Baltimore piece he flips his focus, highlighting the connectors that hold the curved polymer segments together.

Otrzan's industrial focus on PolymerClayDaily

Croatia’s Nikolina Otrzan stretches out a roughly textured tube and captures it with two polymer findings that hold the bar in place. Just look at how Nik stacks, cuts and connects her jewelry with an urban, industrial edge.

Here’s her new site with lots of tutorials that detail her methods.

These polymer pieces (and yesterday’s) speak more and boldly with an eye on construction and craftsmanship.

Glamorous polymer

Let’s start the week with some polymer glamor from Russia’s Olga Permyakova

Friday’s PCDaily looked at how Jan Geisen makes shapes work together. Olga hooks her shapes together tightly with rings and wires, sometimes linking an entire framed construction of polymer pieces.

See Olga’s Fall/Winter 2013-14 collection in this Facebook album and find it for sale here.

Homeward bound

One more day one the road! Days in the car make me feel anything but glamorous and if you’re waiting for an email from me, please be patient. We’ll be back soon.

Polymer nidos

Madrid’s Silvia Ortiz de la Torre makes bright colored “nidos” (which translates as nests) out of polymer. Circles of blended colors connected with buna cord form web of rings. Polymer balls hook them together and secure the ends.

The whole nest is so playful that it gets me thinking about how this construction could be used elsewhere. Wouldn’t this make a great mobile? Lately all ideas lead me back to babies. Did I introduce you to my grandson Oliver who got his name and his domain on the same day? Each time you refresh his page, you’ll get a new picture.

Integrating construction and design

This RoseBall polymer necklace from Italy’s Laura Bocchi is an elegant solution to jewelry construction. She embeds ball chain in polymer as a design element and bakes the entire necklace.

Laura has also used guitar strings to achieve the same effect.

I’ll be teaching a polymer sampler class at our new art center this fall (there’s still room!) and my eye is drawn to smart, simple designs as I think about class projects.

Dever at del Mano

My studio is under construction this week (see construction photos here). As long as I’m planning what I want it to look like, it’s a good time to think about readjusting this website as well.

Writing daily has become a comfortable habit but there are days when I fear I sound like an infomercial and I’ll bet you can predict what I’m going to say. Thousands of polymer clay blogs cover our craft. How can PolymerClayDaily continue to be of value to the community?

I’ll be rethinking content this week and I’d love your input. What are you hungry for on the web?

I can’t let your week begin with my whiny rant, however. Here’s a new piece from Jeff Dever who has an August show, Fiber Art Explored II, at LA’s del Mano gallery. These juicy new works should start your week on a high note.