Alberta Einstein

Was Ohio’s Anita Behnen thinking of me when she designed her new line of mixed-media sculptures? White hair, dots?

Turns out she calls her new imp Alberta Einstein and the story is that learning new math has turned her hair white. (Anita’s creatures all have stories.) It’s not about me at all.

PCD shows you the latest…you won’t find this on Anita’s FB because I’m at my first in-person event since, well you know when. I forgot how energizing and exciting and exhausting these events are. That hasn’t changed.

And hats off to the new people who jumped into this group (organized by Ron Lehocky and his group). It’s brave to jump into a group of buddies who have known each other for years. Hats off to Carla Bull, Priscilla Andrews, Paula Kennedy, and Lynn Abernathy who took the first-time plunge into the Kentucky event. Being creative takes courage, jump into a group in your area.

StudioMojo will be chock full of pictures of cool, crazy, new polymer ideas from Texas to Nebraska from brave artists who ventured vaccinated into the heart of Kentucky to get their groove back. Sign up now to get tomorrow’s edition.

Polymer Om

A quick liftoff for the week! This serene polymer doll is from Barcelona’s Elena Kantur.

Elena’s text is hard to translate but the graceful hands and meditative posture of the horned creature make her seem hopeful and calm. We can leave it at that.

The delicacy of Elena’s characters’ hands and faces inspire. See all her sculptures on Instagram and Facebook. Happy Monday!

Performance, polymer mashup

New Orleans artist, Vinsantos puts his hoarder tendencies to good use in his Kreeture series of assemblage dolls.

“I see the art that I create as a mash-up of sculpture, assemblage, fashion design, makeup, and hair artistry.” “I also see it as the reinvention and preservation of beauty. The characters found in Kreeture stem from my years on the underground performance art circuit. I’ve spent many years in the public spotlight either as a live musician, a Drag artist, and more often as a combination of both,” he explains.

Vinsantos shadow box characters can be seen at Tresor Gallery and you can follow him on Facebook.

Thanks to Laura Tabakman who read an article on Vinsantos in Art21 magazine and sent the link along

Sitting Pretty polymer

Canadian Kate Church refers to her work as sculptural puppetry combining the line and form of sculpture with the playful anima of puppetry. Here in the recent Sitting Pretty a dancer drapes herself on a sofa as she waits for her tutu.

Kate used to create figures for Cirque du Soleil which were sold around the world.

Now she creates art and teaches polymer, cloth and wire sculptural workshops that are on the bucket lists of many polymer artists.

Kate’s freshened her website making it easier to access her rich and spritely archives.

Weekend witch watch

LA’s Caroline McFarlane-Watts is an English girl from the Oxfordshire countryside pursuing her dream in films. She helped build a miniature model of Hogsmeade village for Harry Potter and since then has worked in miniature scale sets for a wide range of projects. Her miniature works are sold in over 40 countries.

Caroline’s first experience was as a polymer miniature crazed 8 year old who wanted to win a scholarship to study art. “It took twenty years for this miniature hobby to become a big career move,” she explains.

Lately she’s been fixated on witches – Good Witches Bad Witches. So far she’s created the witches of Scotland, England, Wales, Ireland and France. Germany’s up next.

There’s so much fine work to look at on Caroline’s sites that you’ll thank me for saving this artist for your weekend reading.

You’ll want to travel through her world and admire works in progress on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and her own site.

Painting on polymer

Vermont’s Meta Strick combines bits of wood, wire, beads and yarn on her art dolls. Then she dresses them in polymer. Often they carry inspirational messages. There are mixed media shrines, dolls, sculpture, buttons and more under construction here in Virginia. We’re not limited to jewelry.

Meta (rhymes with pita) is also a painter (see more here). An unexpected gift of Genesis heat-set paints prompted her to try painting on polymer this week. Turn this ragged-edged slab of polymer over and you’ll find a portrait that looks like an ancient relic. Painting on polymer could offer you a diversion next time you’re feeling exasperated with jewelry-making.

Here’s a photo of Lindly Haunani’s progress on her cane from yesterday’s post.