Maryland’s Linda Loew cleaned the pan pastel residue from her sponges directly onto a slab of light clay.
Here’s the result of her abstract clean-up paired with other extraneous bits and turned into painterly earrings and pendant.
Sometimes our scraps scream to be saved.
Australia’s Heidi Helyard’s smooth droplets of bright colors poke up through perfect holes in a heavily textured white circle of clay.
A fantastic volcanic eruption? The mischievous imaginings of a happy child bubbling up? A clever girl fooling around?
Heidi’s simple pendant doesn’t rely on her clay skills. It leans on whimsy and spirit and fun.
Vancouver’s Joan Tayler makes butterflies that will bring help when you need it. Her slim black polymer whistles are given wings and used as pendants or zipper pulls.
Blow on the bottom and help will arrive, predators will run away or people will just wonder why you’re making such a fuss.
In any event, they’re fun and great to hang on book bags.
Joan teaches you how to make your own in this tutorial or you can buy a plain whistle and decorate it yourself.
Houston’s Sally Kirk (BlossomandClay) pours her heart into jewelry for herself that honors her late father.
Her father’s EKG from 1989 provides the graphic for transfer to the earrings and pendant she wore to receive her master’s degree in August…a year to the day after her father’s death.
She memorialized the day with jewelry that she’ll always treasure and wear knowing that he’s proud of her.
Argentina’s Turkana (turkanajoyeria) uses translucent clay in her extruded cane (the retro cane developed by Bettina Welker).
Turkana’s designs have a carefree looseness in contemporary colors that appeal on an uptight Monday morning. Let’s let the light in.
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This is William Wallace’s (HighlandCreative) version of the gremlin that terrorized Bart Simpson. It’s complete with a swinging tongue and a menacing grin. Very wearable if you’re in that kind of mood.
Wallace is on a quest to create the ultimate Tiki necklace. Check his Instagram and you’ll see that he’s well on his way.
Virginia’s Angie Wiggins gets lost in the swirl of a bead. She puts blends and cane scraps on a base bead and does a bit of rock and roll to make a swirled bicone bead. It’s hard to explain but fun to master. (See a video here.)
Angie enjoys putting her own spin on this pendant. Tiny dots in companion colors track the swirls. She has a background in embroidery and loves to add her signature surface embellishments. Now it’s definitely her swirl.
Maine’s Bonnie Bishoff adds a flutter to her Birch Tassel pendants. But her method doesn’t rely on cumbersome links or laborious wireworking.
The steel cable she bakes into polymer is lightweight and the dangles move like leaves in the breeze.
The polymer pattern here is Bonnie’s modern interpretation of birch. The tassel ends in circles of translucent clay mixed with metallic leaf.
Shop Bonnie’s page and see all the ways she incorporates cable into her jewelry.
Florida’s Sherri Kellberg (BedazzleMe) performs her own brand of alchemy with polymer and resin and specks of metallic leaf.
It’s easy to sink down into the layers. How does she do it? Got me. If her multi-layers and glassy resin toppings ring your chimes, study her dreamy pendants and try her tutorials or take a guess and do it your way.
This quirky, abstract pendant from Massachusetts’ Kathryn Corbin is both decorative and efficient when you have no pockets and a house littered with reading glasses always out of reach.
Kathryn solved her problem in an arty way. Bits of pattern, some rough texture, and colors that go with everything ending in a loop for hanging readers. Why be boring? We’re artists!
Kathryn loves to experiment in the studio and she sent this and pix of other juicy projects along to prove it.
We were chatting about the IPCA global interactive exhibit in February. The deadline for submission is January 15 which gives you plenty of time. Lots of categories and awards! Not an IPCA member? Join here.
