Wired hearts

Staci Smith is a Pennsylvania mixed media artist who sometimes throws polymer into the mix. Her tray of hearts ready for the oven looked so full of possibility that it pulled me right into the studio to make a few valentines of my own. Her rough and random wires add playful touches.

Staci’s new to PCDaily and you’ll enjoy her metal clay and sea glass work as you search for her polymer pieces. Look here and here.

Identifying birds

Seems that the birds I attributed to Leslie Blackford on Wednesday were made by her students. All the more reason to take a class with Leslie! The bird featured in the post was made by Barb Kunkle.

Love beads in polymer

Wendy Malinow’s Etsy site is already stocked with hearts for the coming season. Romantic, gruesome, wooden, beating, funny, anatomical…her polymer valentines run the gamut.

These entwined faux birch branches form a lovely pendant perfect for anyone with an outdoorsy, Portland sensibility. (Are you watching Portlandia?) Her bleeding thorn heart might appeal to more prickly sweethearts.

Wendy grew up in a household knee-deep in art projects. You won’t be surprised that one of her earliest art encounters was with “love beads” and she continues to share her fascination.

Is polymer your prozac?

Don’t you love to watch other people working when you’re not? I’m basking in the southern sun this week and have enjoyed seeing people like Berlin’s Conni Filip get a head start on the next holiday.

Some of her futuristic heart designs are magnets and some are money pockets with secret slots for gift giving. Below are the baked bases (I’m guessing Ultralight) that she then carves and paints.

Since I’m sucking up wifi at fast food joints this week, I’ve had to scurry through links and sites. Folks have been stuffing Pinterest.com full of their fabulous polymer finds.

If polymer is your prozac, spend a little holiday mental health time with Kathy Weaver or me or Anke Humpert or a number of other polymer enthusiasts on Pinterest.

Polymer lemonade!

Kentucky’s Ron Lehocky happily received a bin full of other artists’ scrap clay recently. He’s begun turning those discarded canes, experiments and leftovers – our “lemons” into “lemonade” for the KIDS project.

Take a look at what Ron can do with failures and leftovers! In some of the photographs he’s inserted the original cane to illustrate the transformation.

Ron first separated the donated clay into two piles -definitely scrap and scrap with potential for reworking. All will end up as part of the project, either on the surface or inside the heart pins. Transforming canes is an enjoyable challenge for Ron as he cranks out heart number 15,945!

At $10 each, it’s easy to calculate how much he’s raised for the childrens’ center. Ron wants to pass along a big thank you. Read previous posts about the project here and contact Ron here. He would love feedback from anyone who recognizes their scrap.

Picking polymer winners

Elaborate hats, roses and horses are all part of the tradition at this weekend’s Kentucky Derby race. Ron Lehocky’s polymer heart pins may become part of the tradition too.

The Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft is now among the galleries that carry the pins and the new Women Creative Gallery also sells them. If you’d like to support the project, write Ron with your color preferences and he’ll make a selection for you.

Ron has created and sold over 15,000 hearts with all proceeds going directly to the KIDS Center for Pediatric Therapies. We’ve followed this amazing project for six years and you can read more here.

Ron’s project is a “sure thing.”

Tuck in a love note

Berlin’s Conni Filip tucked gift Euros into thin slots in polymer hearts designed especially for a friend’s wedding. She suggests that the hearts could later be filled with the couple’s personal love notes.

Conni’s site is full of sculpted, painted, wild ideas from an unleashed creative spirit. It’s a perfect place to start your week.

With this year’s bumper crop of polymer hearts, I couldn’t possibly bring you all the great ones you created. Here’s one last look at just a few more.

Your recent emails about why you work with polymer have been touching and heartwarming. Please keep tucking your stories in the PCD comments.


Amy Wallace	Valeriani Solaris	Iris Mishly

Cindy Gimbrone	Kristen Winter	Georgeanne Galante

Designs that share the love

If it’s nearly Valentines Day, we must pay a visit to Tejae Floyde and her gallery of polymer hearts of all varieties…nested, pocket, winged, encased and more. “My passion is sculpting hearts with meaningful messages woven into the design, for others to share with those they love,” she says.

Tejae’s a heart expert and you can find instructions for her methods online at CraftEdu and in a number of publications including my dog-eared copy of the October 2008 Polymer Cafe magazine.

How to take heart


Sophie Arzalier	Tricia Dalziel	Cindy Gimbrone

You must see how Sophie Arzalier grows her tattoo-inspired love heart into an elaborate polymer cane. In the same vein, she’s created a Rosie the Riveter cane that shows equal detail with a less romantic sentiment.

Tricia Dalziel’s Sacred Heart is one of a series of 20 sculptures in her Verses Of The Heart series created as part of a personal healing process.

Cindy Gimbrone aimed for a shabby chic effect with her polymer Heart Mandala. She explains that, “The heart represents metaphorically our emotions, our feelings. Pairing the symbol of the heart with a mandala means to me the universe is in each one of us, it is in our hearts. So, I give you the universe in this heart.”

Tory Hughes takes a contemporary approach with this blue heart brooch that’s been embossed, painted and sanded. You’ll find it on her newly tweaked and refined web site.

Secrets of the heart

“I am a hopeful romantic who is absurdly optimistic,” says Florida’s Heather Wynn.

Her hand-stamped and aged polymer pendants can be found incorporated into friends’ assemblages and reveal themselves like secret messages. (See them in Lorelei Eurto’s jewelry here and in Heather Power’s here.) Here’s her Etsy shop.

Correction

The swirl heart pendant in Monday’s post was mistakenly attributed to Fairy-Cakes. A closer read shows that Fairy-Cakes purchased the bead from UK’s Mel Parrett who sells them on Ebay. Thanks to Terri for pointing out the problem and to Mel for stepping forward.

Follow your heart

Polymer hearts are simple icons that are easy to make. Broken, mended, sugary, romantic, bleeding, tattooed…they come in many varieties. Being easy to make doesn’t have to mean boring. Here are a few hearts with heart.

Louise Fischer Cozzi sells translucent, thin, minimalist pendants that benefit the Heart Association on her Etsy site. The edges are carefully painted gold. Easy? Yes. Classy? Certainly.

Fairy-Cakes goes for a light-hearted pop art version with a colorful controlled swirl on her DeviantArt page.

Donna Greenberg’s chunky, sparkly mosaics speak of fashion and flair more than love and she has a new line of them. She calls these her bursting hearts. (Thanks to Sarah Connor for the link.) What does your heart look like?

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