Integrating findings

Washington’s Dede Leupold hammers leftover bits of silver into soft shapes that harmonize with her canes for an elegant effect and easy assembly. Baked into the clay the silver also provides a sturdy finding.

Dede gravitates to canework and she has come up with a folding mirror to carry in your toolbox so that you can accurately predict how a pattern repeats. It’s a handy device to have when you’re building a cane that’s full of confusing color and geometry. Enjoy Dede’s spring colors on Facebook and in an Etsy shop for jewelry and one for buttons.

Polymer kiss

Here’s a refreshingly easy mid-week interlude from Agi Kiss in Budapest, Hungary. These gypsy-like earrings are smartly shaped, then stamped with an exotic image and darkly stained to reveal the detail. Altogether simple and sexy design.

Don’t let the simplicity of her design fool you though, Agi also takes on complex beaded projects, mixing beads and polymer in heavily encrusted pieces.

She markets the simpler pieces on her Etsy shop and in her Hungarian online shop. Agi shows more work that’s bead embroidered on her blog and on Facebook.

April in Polymer

If you’re dreaming about April in Paris, you’ll love Laure Bonnet in Rennes. Her playful polymer bouquets are sold in trendy galleries all over France like this one (Dumauvobleu, Mathilde Colas and others sell there).

Laure’s dark-edged disks and ruffled petals are wired together in a riot of colors and shapes to form bright baubles for fashion divas. There’s more at this site which represents several galleries and in her photo galleries.

Winners

The five winners from Monday’s From Polymer To Art magazine giveaway are: Lanette Holland, Leila Bidler, Bonnie Kreger, Valda Belyeu and Glo Weimern. Marjon and Saskia will be in touch with you. Congratulations!

Raw polymer

Anarina Anar puts raw energy into her rough and vibrant pieces. You can feel the Greek sun and the heat in the colors.Texture and dimension add a tactile quality to the pattern on her striped bracelet.

Anarina also shows a hemisphere necklace on her Flickr page. I thought readers might mutiny at the sight of another one of these designs that have captivated me so you can see it here if you’re a fan of the trend.

Polymer links

Nikki Blanchard and a number of other polymer artists started their new year right by sending me links to their sites. Why be shy and hide your work? You’ll be surprised at how much more confident you’ll feel just by throwing your electronic hat in the ring.

New links are like belated holiday presents for me. You’ll be making my research easier. It’s a win-win.

Nikki gave up her glass studio after 18 years and found a home in polymer so she’ll bring lots of relevant skills to her new medium. I like the placement of the findings in these earrings. Her photos show that she’s off to an promising start. Have a great weekend!

Polymer every week

You can sense both the relief and the pride in the end-of-year posts from polymer artists who persisted through one of the 52-week challenges. These Rocky Path earrings are from JuLee Wolfe who chronicles her challenge on Pinterest. Here’s more of her work on Flickr.

Hats off to those who completed the difficult task of producing and uploading new artwork each week in 2012. You can see how their skills got better and how concepts were refined and rethought as the work progressed. They are an inspiration to the rest of us as we launch into a new year with high hopes of improving our art.

Here’s the earring group’s page. A new Brooch-A-Day group is forming here. Let me know if you know of other challenges starting up.

Understated polymer

These holiday polymer earrings from Michigan’s Sandra DeYoung-Niese may calm you in a hectic week.

Sandra created her own mold from a real evergreen branch. It’s a subtle holiday image with just a touch of red and a dusting of snow.

Wander slowly through her understated Etsy items and her Flickr site where the soothing vibe continues. Breathe!

Simple gifts

As long as we’re talking gifts, we’d better think about the kids. These poseable pieces from Australia’s HollyJayne are so cute and simple (she has a 2-year-old son). Of course Holly’s mastered the devilish details that can make simple spectacular.

Holly shows the pieces and parts on her Facebook page and she sells them on Etsy. See all her creatures on Flickr.

Speaking of simple, don’t you just love these little striped Christmas trees from Ukraine’s Masha Shupova? These are just the thing for that sylish, minimalist friend. Here’s her Etsy gallery.

Fall faux soutache

Fall colors are popping up. The faux soutache earrings created by Magdalena on this Polish site bring Halloween to mind….but a very sophisticated Halloween. What a perfect use for extruded clay.

I’m on the road this weekend with no time for research. Any Polish speakers out there who can tell us more about Magdalena?

Spirals or circles?

The Austrian coils or the Swiss circles? I couldn’t decide which ones to feature so you can choose for yourself. The designs are each made from extruded polymer but with entirely different approaches.

The coils are from Austria’s Eva Ehmeier (she’s the model). Graduated colors are extruded (or rolled) into thin strands which are curled and built right on the earwires. Choose your favorite among the neon colors here. Eva developed this design when she allowed herself some playtime in the studio.

E. Mischler from Switzerland gives a monochromatic twist to Bettina Welker’s retro cane that creates a snakeskin or mosaic look. Smooth lentil beads are suspended below coordinated solid color beads. This artist/pharmacist admits that clay has been her addiction since 2007 when she discovered that polymer brought balance to her life.

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