back to basics

earlier this year there was a Henri Matisse Cut-Outs exhibit at MoMA. i didn't get to see it but read about it and was inspired enough to get my old art books out and revisit Matisse's work. i do love his cut-outs and as i flipped through i was drawn, once again, to his organic leaf/flower shapes. in honor of this exhibit (yes, a little late) and of mattise's amazing cut-outs, i decided i'd recreate these same shapes in metal. i also thought this was a fantastic way to sharpen my sawing skills. i love doing detailed cutouts but knew my technique could use some improvement. after reading various articles on sawing (i know, sounds terribly boring to most) i decided it was time. rather than sawing out puzzle pieces, i thought these matisse leaves would be far more interesting . . . and after a little cleanup, these lovely little leaves will become some fantastic pieces of jewelry! 

risks?

my diversions are my risks. i find it really hard to not try new techniques or new mediums and this keeps me from doing what I "should be doing." but I wonder what others think, do you find that if you take a diversion from your normal/preferred medium/method of creating is it worthwhile? do you grow from it, or does it hold you back from your 'business?'

i suppose if i am honest, that is not my only risk issue. seth godin's YouTube video on 'Taking Risks and Entrepreneurship' is thought provoking. i know there are easy ways to take some risks to grow my business. these will be a goal of mine for 2014, well, as well as growing a support system to make this all happen. i thank C4 Atlanta Blogathon for already helping me to get out of my comfort zone! 

haiku

okay, so probably not following haiku guidelines very well but it is late, i am on holiday, and i have never been a very poetic person so here is my go at today's haiku challenge which is . . . When you are in the process of creating your work, how do you feel? What is your experience (mentally, physically, spiritually, emotionally)? Write a Haiku to capture and express this often elusive process . . . so here it goes . . .

singular focus
create visions from my mind
continue to grow

clearly i was not an english major but we did see a lovely sunset tonight!
 

blue ocean in santa fe

we arrived in santa fe today, beautiful! quite a variety of landscape and weather.  there won't be a lot of time for blogging this week but I will do my best! here is a lovely site I saw today. 

now onto today's prompts . . . 

my offerings are not unique, plenty of people make jewelry, tables, lamps, etc., but they are my creative voice, my blue ocean. 

photo friday!

inspiration from my travels that inhabits my mind . . .

and these are my companions while I create.

if i had nothing else to do . . .

and i could dream big, i would spend my time up in the mountains. my studio would overlook a lovely lake with forest all around. the studio would be similar to my current setup but better up there as there would be more space and an incredible view. i would spend most of the day creating, taking breaks to hike with the dogs or maybe go for a paddle board or even kayak around the lake.

my fellow artist friends would come up and stay for random periods of time. we would have our own space and freedom but also collaborate and feed off each other. for inspiration we head into town and visit the local shops, antique, and thrift stores. we create and eat yummy holistic foods and enjoy the company. 

and if i am going to dream big and the year were the absolute perfect year, half the year would be spent at a beach cottage on the gulf of mexico. i'd do all the same things as up in the mountains just a little different with walks on the beach rather than hikes, and lots of seafood! 

one last aspect . . .in a perfect world i wouldn't have to sell my work at all, i would have someone who handles that for me. that is a big 'ol dream but if it were a perfect year . . .

i do think i could incorporate this into my life currently. clearly not in the grand scale i am dreaming but i could work on a much smaller scale and for shorter periods of time at a mountain home or a beach cottage. something to start planning! 

my studio

 i love my studio space. it has taken me a long time to get it this far along and it is still evolving, but it makes me happy. just having a space all to my own to create, that i can leave out and not have to put away is huge. if i only have a small amount of time i can jump in and work on a piece right where i left off. i think this is what satisfies me the most . . . though i do get a lovely amount of natural light in the afternoon which is a close runner up. 

i used reticulation to create a piece last year and did lots of test pieces. i am slightly obsessed with the texture of reticulation at the moment so i am pulling out all those scraps of metal and creating pieces from them. most recently i made a ring with a labradorite cabochon using a tiny bit of reticulated metal that i had cut away from another piece. here it is.

one reticulated piece that is still in production is this one. the scrap metal had a nice triangular shape i wanted to play with so i paired it with a nice mexican black garnet drusy to see what i could come up with. i finally decided on using a partial bezel, after much consideration as to how to best showcase (and hold) the stone, but still playing around with the design of the bail. hope to work on that tomorrow! 

my immediate wish for my work is to create an appropriate tool holder for my new fretz stakes! i am itching to use them but haven't been able to complete the holder just yet. fold forming has intrigued me and i hope to incorporate this technique into my work this year. the stakes and hammers are beautiful and feel so nice to use i can almost feel the creativity flowing from them. once i finally get to use them with the stakes held firmly i am sure there will be ecstasy! 

goals for today and forever

i should be really good at this by now. i make lists daily. i have lists for daily activities, short-term projects/tasks, ones that will take longer, and even lists within each project. i am very good at organizing. somehow though, i am finding this task of thinking about my long- and short-term goals in relation to a life purpose daunting. there is a lot of emotion that goes into a life purpose and there is so much i want to do. all day i have tried to focus on my long-term goals and then i distract myself. i find myself getting hung up on the words, the achievements, and what i want is to more of a feeling. i am not going to write a typical list for once. it is going to be more free flowing and living. i am going to allow it to be this way until i can whittle away all the unnecessary thoughts, baggage, energy floating around in my head.   

my first goal, and the one that matters the most: to find my own voice and to use it confidently in my art and my life. doing this will ultimately allow all the other goals to happen. confidence.

i want to use this voice to connect with other artists and to be part of a supportive community to experiment and create.  i want to collaborate with others, to be inspired and to inspire. inspiration. 

i want to use the talents i have to help a cause i feel strongly about, animal welfare. this is where i get hung up and my mind goes to so many places. i haven't quite figured out in what capacity this will happen but it will. contribute. 

i want to be a better person in all aspects. i want to be be healthier, more active, more meditative, more forgiving and accepting, and to be an all around good person, doing good to and for others. peace & happiness. 

there is much to sort through and lots to do but this goal exercise has come about at a good time. this short list will be my point of focus as i try to continue with a 40-day meditation i am currently participating in, which if i might add, has been quite difficult! hopefully this list will provide the needed focus. 

favorites

i should mention that i am participating in c4ward March Blogathon created by c4 Atlanta. i find it quite difficult to talk about my own work and to promote myself. i think the humility that was droned into me during all those years of catholic schooling has had a lasting effect! seriously though, my hope is that through rising to the challenge of blogging daily for 15 days (14 for me as i missed the first day!) will help me find my voice and overcome this hurdle. 

today's topic is favorites, specifically a favorite work. i found this quite interesting as i initially jumped to one piece where i mastered a new technique, then another that i thought was technically the most precise piece, and then another that i thought was the most beautifully done. where i have ended up is with this piece which really does not embody any of those things. 

this piece means a lot to me, for a many reasons. first, this was the first real piece i made using metal clay, which was a new medium to me at the time. i was still figuring out how to use the material and it shows. it is also a replication/interpretation of an amulet that i found at a flea market while traveling with great friends in singapore so it reminds me of a wonderful trip. it is also important because i quite often bring home trinkets from my travels and this was the first time i felt like i truly made use of one of them. another reason is that it symbolizes a break from my perfectionist tendencies which has caused many a ruined piece. it is rough and for once, i allowed it to be what it is and didn't try to overwork the piece to be perfect. i love how organic it feels and how it unsettles me a little because it is! now my personal challenge is to embrace this feeling, gather all my other travel trinkets, and get busy! 

diversions . . . future path?

as much as i enjoy creating and working on jewelry i find there are plenty of other things that i want to create, or at least try to create. a couple of the more recent experiments have been working with concrete and re-learning mig welding. 

i have wanted to make some concrete planters for ages so finally decided to start with a smaller concrete project to try it out. i had been shopping for some new bedside lamps but unable to find ones that i liked so decided to make them out of concrete. as it turns out working in concrete is pretty easy and i really liked the outcome. here is one of the lamps. 

the other project i undertook was mig welding. i learned welding ages ago back in art school but really couldn't remember much about it. i happened upon a class being offered by the wonderful ladies mc & allie from lr design lab (https://www.facebook.com/lrdesignlab). they make incredible stuff! they were located in inman park but have sadly moved to portland. good for them but bad for atlanta, and me! the class was great fun and i really loved getting back to working with metal on a larger scale. to get inspired, i looked at lots of metal creations online but it was the scrap wood we had which helped me decide on what to make. all in all it was a great reintroduction back into mig welding and woodworking. here is the final product. 

next up, making my own stump tables that seem to be everywhere these days! 

stacking rings

quite often after creating such an intensive piece i need to take a break and do something simple and easy. one of my favorite things to create, and wear, are stacking rings. all you need is some metal wire in any gauge, any shape, and any metal type and you can create endless possibilities.  

this time i played with sterling silver and brass and varied my gauge. i measured and cut the wire, then annealed it so that i could easily shape it around a ring mandrel (you can also use a dowel). after shaping it i filed each end flat, slightly flattened the spot where they met, and then with pliers i pushed the ends past each other then back together to get a nice tight seam. after that i soldered each seam, quenched, then pickled them to clean off the flux and oxides. i gave each a ring a slightly different finish . . . one a nice brushed finish, another i polished, and others i created different textures using an assortment of hammers. 

my favorite aspect of stacking rings is how you can wear as many or as few as you like and you can change up the combination to create a different look to suit your mood for that day.  

what do you think of stackable rings?  

labradorite pendant . . . it's taken a while . . .

the summer has been so busy! i have had lots of projects going on this summer (some jewelry and some other creative endeavors) and have not found the time to update my site, so it's time to catch up! first up . . . a labradorite pendant that was commissioned from a friend for their wife's birthday. 

this was a great, but tough project as i was given free rein in design and it is so hard to narrow down all the ideas! the main direction i was given was the type of stone, type of metal, and that it should be a statement piece.  

before i could start designing, the first task was to find the desired stone, a labradorite, which is a feldspar mineral originally found in labrador, canada. i had a few small labradorite cabochons but for a statement piece i went shopping. i ended up with these stones to choose from. 

after speaking with my client we went with the largest stone and i began designing! this is truly the hardest part as the possibilities are endless. i have dabbed in many different techniques and two that i love, granulation and reticulation, kept coming to mind. i have not had the opportunity to utilize either technique at this scale but they seemed perfect for this piece so i went for it. here is a sketch of the design i ended up choosing. 

my next step was to acquire the appropriate metal for each process. i decided to reticulate the backplate of the pendant which will give a nice, organic texture to the metal. reticulation is fantastic as no two pieces ever turn out exactly the same. the process of reticulating the metal works with the different melting points of each metal within an alloy. you also need a bit of a thicker piece of sheet metal to allow enough material to accommodate the buckling and rippling of the metal. as such i made the backplate out of 18 gauge sterling silver. i wanted the edges of the piece to have an organic feel so i decided to saw the final shape out of the sheet metal before reticulating to allow the rippling to buckle the edges a little. After reticulating the backplate i refined the edges to get a pleasing shape.

now on to the bezel! i used fine silver for the bezel wire and fitted it to the stone and then the backplate. reticulated metal can be a bit brittle so i gently made sure the backplate was as flat as possible but also modified the bottom of the bezel wire so that i could get a good connection and thus a strong bond for the stone setting. 

after the bezel was soldered to the backplate it was time to add the granulation. granulation is an ancient process where granules are attached without solder and appear to be sitting on top of the surface. i created a ton of fine silver granules by balling up fine silver wire on my charcoal block. since these are fine silver and i essentially depleted the sterling backplate's top layer of copper, i had to copperplate each granule and the backplate along with adding some organic material/carbon to allow a lower melting point, thus a fusing, at the point of contact of each element, basically an eutectic reaction when heated. after several tries to get all the granules attached to create the desired look this is where the piece stood. 

the final thing to think of before adding a patina was how was it going to hang on a chain. i dabbled with having it on the top and part of the design, or on the back and hidden. i chose to make the bail out of a piece of scrap reticulated silver so that it would have the same texture as the front of the piece. i had experimented on lots of pieces before reticulating the actual backplate so i used one of those and sawed and shaped it to a nice curve. given the size and weight of the piece factored into where and how i attached the bail and ultimately it seemed to work best on the back. here is where i ended up placing it and how i designed it. 

my next step was to patina the silver to give a nice aged look, but also adding some darkness allowed me to remove it in some locations to give the piece more depth. i used liver of sulphur to add the patina and then brass brushed until i achieved the correct amount of contrast. 

finally it was time to set the stone. after each step, especially any soldering, i have been test fitting the stone to make sure the bezel still fit the stone. i set the stone and then used a burnisher to polish the bezel and some of the granules to add a nice sheen.  

last, but not least, was to make the chain. i dabbled with different thicknesses of the wire, the size of the link, and its shape. there are so many options but i decided to go with an oval link made with 21 gauge round sterling silver wire. i wound the annealed metal around a dowel, sawed the stack apart, and then soldered each link to the other. after they were soldered i reshaped them with some round nose pliers. i also like to incorporate a chain that has two different length options so i made an s-hook with two different loops of round sterling silver wire of 18 gauge. 

and here is the final pendant with the chain. hopefully soon i will get some product pictures up on my gallery page!  

getting started . . .

​i am still learning this craft, and as such, i am constantly trying new techniques, materials, and tools. i hope to share that experimentation by posting updates and pictures of projects i am working on. so check back regularly for updates and feel free to chime in if you have any comments, advice, or similar experiences!