Now this is what you call "statement jewelry"

Years ago I saw the movie "La belle et la bête" (Beauty and the Beast, 1946, directed by Jean Cocteau). Belle (Josette Day) wears the most beautiful, asymmetrical pearl brooch/necklace combo. Even in the black and white film the jewels were sparkly and gorgeous. I tried to make something similar year ago but didn't succeed. Beside the necklace itself, the garment under it is a challenge as it would need to be pretty sturdy to hold the weight.
I recently went looking for the image and thought you bead-lovin' people might like to check it out...

Creativity

1999. Grad school. A paper for advertising class.
I chose to write about creativity because I felt like a lot of people think of creativity and artistic ability as the same thing. They also think there's some magic to it rather than understanding that it's a combination of expertise, open minded exploration, and good old hard work and practice. I dug it out of the computer and posted it here if you have any interest. I have to do a speech for Toastmasters and will probably use this as the basis for it.
read the paper

Handy tip for making a gently curved pendant

File this one under: It may not be news to you but I can't believe it took me this long to figure it out.

One day last spring I searched the big neighborhood garage sale for something with a dome shape to use as a curing surface for pendants. I found an old metal gas cap from a car which was perfect, except that I could only do one at a time. Recently I had a need to cure many pendants but they were not round so a dome wasn't necessary. Just a simple curve was required but every bottle or can I found had a tighter curve than I wanted.

After staring at my messy clay table, it dawned on me that the solution was literally in front of me. I realized my bead rack could be used in a different way. I laid my pendants on 3x5 index cards and rested the cards on the "rails" of the rack, allowing the weight of the clay, the gravity and the heat coax the pendants into a gentle curve.

Some of the test subjects are above...no clear winner yet (and some don't fit the assignment but were all part of the mix of this holiday "playcation" on my day off.

How exciting is this?

Do you see anyone you know on this web page? (Check me at right to see how the hair has changed since last summer!) Do you see any scaly, turtleneck-wearing aquatic creatures you recognize on this page? Cynthia Tinapple's new book, Polymer Clay Global Perspectives -- a treasure trove of inspiration -- hits the stores at the end of July. Check out the artists and place an order here!

I gotta get my rear in gear and get some stock in the etsy store. Don't want to greet new web visitors with Mother Hubbard's cupboard on my shop page!

Here are a few little fellows I made with scraps left over from another project I'll be able to show soon.

 

 

 

Prepare to be amazed!

I wish I could say that I was going to show you some amazing beads of mine, but insted I'm sharing a link to the Pinterest pages of Sherman Tung. I don't know who Sherman is, but he has an eye for exquisite drawings by artists from the middle ages to the modern age.

I am not even sure exquisite is a superlative enough word for the art he has repinned on his pages. I am in awe of the talent. Even with 1,000 years of practice, I would never be half this good. I have two hands and eyes also, but somehow, these people employ theirs in a much more skillful manner!

Be sure to check out his painting pages also. Get a coffee...you'll be there half the morning.

It reminds me of when I showed a beautiful pastel portrait by JF LeSaint to my brother. Joe said, "What did he do that with?" I said, "Pastels. Just like the ones I use." And Joe replied, "Oh no. Clearly, yours and his are not the same." Ha ha, thanks bro.

Fun finishes

I never paint my beads but after the recent workshop where we used a bit of paint, I still had the bottles on the worktable. The other day, after I had made a set of my usual scribed beads using silver powder instead of black, I thought they looked too bland. So I grabbed the gold metallic paint and voila, now they look pretty. To protect the paint I sprayed the beads with PYM II and then machine buffed them lightly. Me like!

The teal clay below is a dark forest green that I mixed with Ultralight. If you mix Ultralight with regular clay and blend it all up, it results in a velvety matte finish. Usually I leave it as is after curing but I lightly machine buffed these and I like the way they turned out. It looks very ceramic-ish to me.

And more of the usuals...