Made from scraps

Alice Sroppel suggests that one use up all scraps by making canes.  The focal bead of this necklace is just that.  I needed a gift for someone and this is what evolved.

Necklace for Eva

Wednesday is my friend Eva's birthday.  I wanted to give her something really special.  So I made her this necklace.  I am really pleased with the way it turned out.  The heart focal and three little beads are all out of polymer clay.  The ribbon is one I cut from Italian silk chiffon, hand-painted and hand-stitched.   I hope she enjoys it!

Hearts and Daisies for Tanya

The latest from my workshop was a birthday gift for Tanya.  The bracelet and pendant were really fun to make.  I think she liked them.  As with most of my recent efforts, I learned a lot in the process of making them.

Lyn Foley wears a Leather Apron!

While catching up on my blog reading, I discovered that Lyn Foley was the Turquoise Color Challenge Winner.  That led me to Lyn's website where I thoroughly enjoyed admiring her artistry.  On her info page there is a lovely slide show that gives the visitor a personalized tour through her studio and the art of making glass beads.  I find her work very inspiring and was particularly thrilled to see her wearing a leather apron!  Just when I thought that Patty Lakinsmith and I were the only ones!

Essential Elements Part I: Lampwork Bead Making by Patty Lakinsmith

Yesterday I did my fourth day of lampwork bead making by going to Michel Dubouchet's.   (See post dated 13 February.)  There waiting for me were the 50+ beads I made on Thursday, 1 April.  I must say I was disappointed in the results initially.  However, when I look at them technically, I did make some progress.  Most of my dissatisfaction stems from the fact that the color of the beads didn't turn out as I had envisioned.  When I got home and studied them, I could see that aside from their color, they really weren't all that bad.  Will post photos later.


This morning I decided to return to Chris Fisher's Moretti Effetre Glass Characteristics Chart and discovered information that explains the results I obtained.  It also confirms that I tend to work way too hot for much of the glass.  I intend to print the chart and take it with me next time.


Friday of this week is my first "real" class in lampwork bead making with Renate Berner at Creative Glass in Volketswil.  I am so pleased that I was able to enroll as I made the request so late.  As things occur in this day and age, the bead artist I spoke about in my last post, Ginette Wyss, studied with Ms Berner.


On the list of materials to take along to the course is a work apron!  Well, what does that mean?  A google search led me to Patty Lakinsmith's Essential Elements post in her blog, Plays with Fire.  

When she writes, "I know, I always feel like a dork wearing this to my classes at Arrow Springs when nobody else sports one. But I get distracted easily, and sometimes will put a cold rod into the flame (pointed at myself - how does this happen?), and end up being the bullseye for a flying hot glass projectile. That, or my mind will start to wander when I'm wrangling a huge blob for a striped cane, and the whole mess drips in my lamp. While I'm not known as a clothes horse, and it wouldn't be the end of the world to get some burn holes in some of my duds, it's the principle that bothers me. I'd just rather not. I know, you're thinking, "what will she be like when she gets to that 'forgetful' age", and well, I'm wondering that too. What was I talking about? Oh yeah, aprons. Right. The leather of the apron gives me a few seconds' worth of reaction time to either 1) scream loudly, 2) jump up and brush the molten bits off, or 3) curse like a sailor when these incidents happen. I feel lucky to have never suffered a serious burn because of my scatter brained tendencies."  I can really see myself in her words!


So, today I am off to see if I can buy a work apron!

Lampwork and Polymer Clay

This evening, after spending the day at Michel's making what I think to be between sixty and a hundred beads, I decided to google "combine lampwork and polymer clay."  Low and behold I discovered a lady from Zürich who does just that.  I find her work very interesting and inspiring.  She can be found at SwissBeads.

Voilà!

Strangely, today I received an email, via Flickr, from the creator of Voilà! which is a new online website devoted to polymer clay artists in Europe.  She said, "Je suis la creatrice de Voila! et j'ai ete fort inspiree par ton collier "La Pie" que j'ai mis en exergue sur Voila!" How's that for an unusual twist to the day? Check out Voilà here.

All the Essentials in one Day

Creative Glass in Volketswil has an active school of glass.  I am lucky enough to have a place in their up-coming class run by Renate Berner entitled All the Essentials in one Day.  I am really looking forward to it!

March Madness

Where I come from in the US, the month of March is overtaken by a sort of dementia centering around basketball tournaments.  Ever since I can remember, the term "March madness" has crept into the vernacular with annual regularity and pervasiveness.  Now I see it even has its own list of references in Wikipedia, where it says the expression could be related to any one of several basketball competitive events.  It can also be connected with an annual spending frenzy in Canadian government whose fiscal year ends 31 March.

March madness has taken on new meaning for me since beginning my present teaching post at Ecolint.  Since my last blog entry, school demands have been great and I have had no time for blogging, beading or jewelry making--with the exception of one day.

On 6 March, Tanya, Lucy and I returned to the workshop of Michel Dubouchet for another day of lampworking.  Though I came away feeling like I made a lot of really ugly beads this time, I can say that I learned a lot:

• I mixed a couple of different colors of class, made my own rod with them and then made three beads.  
• I made a couple of flowers, one of which is actually rather nice, the other, very ugly.
• I learned that when using vermiculite, one must wait long enough before submerging the bead or one will end up with a distorted, pocked bead.
• I got better with dots and manipulating them.
• I got better with dimpled and symmetrical shapes.
• I tried to use metal flakes in several of the beads and not knowing what I was doing, burned the metal and created some very dark, murky looking beads.
• I made some bigger beads.
• I worked with different sized mandrels.
• I got better at encasing.
• For the time being, simple is better.

 

Wow! What an honor!

On the first day of March, I logged on to the Art Bead Scene blog to see what the March monthly challenge might be.  When, what to my surprise, my February monthly challenge entry had won designer of the week!  Amazing!  I hadn't even posted a photo of the necklace here on my own blog!

With these beads

Hooray!  I finished my necklace using a couple of my first lampwork beads, some fused silver and my first ArtClay Silver charms.  I certainly learned a lot along the way and enjoyed every minute of it.

Here are some details...

The charm on this pendant was inspired by a treasured antique button I have that belonged to my grandmother.

 One of the things I was determined to do was to make a toggle clasp out of the ArtClay Silver.

There are jasper beads from a necklace I bought in the early nineties at an artisan market at La Fusterie.  The silver beads are from a bracelet I bought on a trip to Paris that had come apart and was irreparable.  I have enough materials that I intend to make a pair of earrings and a bracelet......

Baby Steps

Took some photos today of those first lampwork beads (made 13 February at the day-long workshop Tanya, Lucy and I had as part of my birthday celebration) so that my family could see them.  Here they are, such as they are, a record of baby steps.

 

Now, here are the beads of the master, Michel DuBouchet.  He most generously let each of us take home a handful of beads that he had made.  Tanya took them all home with her and annealed them.

It was a wonderful day!  Now I can't wait for the next session on 6 March!

Beading Babes' Day Out, finally arrived!

Today Tanya, Lucy and I had a wonderful time chez Michel in Thonon where he coached us in making lampwork beads.  Our eagerly awaited session was amazing!  Here are a couple of photos of the action.  The beads have all happily gone home with Tanya where they will be annealed in her kiln!  More photos to follow.

Thank you, Tanya, Frank, Lucy and Thomas for a fabulous birthday present!

 

 

Donations for an India evening

One of the students I am supervising for her Personal Project has organised an evening to raise money for crêches in Kodaikanal, India.  As part of the evening, she will be auctioning off art work donated by students and teachers. I decided a while ago that I would contribute some jewelry to her effort.  The Morning Frost necklace from the previous post started it all off.  The pieces that follow are the rest of my effort.  I learned a lot while working on them all and hope they are sold for good prices for the fund-raiser.

 

  

  

  

  

 

Morning Frost

Just under the wire, I completed and photographed my submission to the January Monthly Challenge.  Whew!  I wonder if I met all the criteria to have my photos accepted.  Fingers crossed.  It was an interesting project.  Now to find a nice package for it, suitable for donating it to the auction raising funds for a nursery school in India.....

Scuptural Chakra Ring

Today I finished making a ring whose inspiration came from Beading - the Creative Spirit by Wendy Ellsworth wherein one of the projects involves creating a chakra flower sculpture.  Preferring wearable art to beaded objects that serve as dust collectors, I decided to see what would happen if I put it together in some fashion to make an interchangeable ring as I have a colleague who is passionate about huge funky finger decoration.

I tried to make each layer beautiful in its own right and managed to come up with an "undo-able" wire mechanism to hold it all together.

Here are a few of the multitude of possible variations that could be put together.

Watercolor Pendant

Watercolor Pendant
Originally uploaded by Everlasting Glass Art

Very pretty lampwork bead by Everlasting Glass Art.

Her photo stream at Flickr is worth looking visiting.  She does lovely work.

Jan Atherton November ABS Challenge Entry

Fairy Fellers 1 November ABS Challenge Entry
Originally uploaded by JanAtherton

Amazing seed bead work!

It's worth exploring her photo stream to see other examples of how beautiful seed bead work can be both on its own and as a complement to lampwork beads.

Coupe Boules de Neige, 1903 by Camille Naudot (1882-1938)

The Musée d'Orsay has a wonderful repository of images and commentary on their website.  This lovely bowl makes me wonder what I might be able to achieve with translucent polymer clay canes.  Hmmm....

Art Bead Scene January Monthly Challenge

Among the several beading-related blogs I discovered in my research, I find Art Bead Scene really interesting.  The main contributors seem to have created an eclectic, germane and quality resource that is entertaining, enlightening and inspirational.  It appears to be a very active on-line community which engages in creative activities of various kinds.  In a lot of ways it reminds me of Ravelry, the fiber arts social networking website.  (More about Ravelry here:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ravelry.)

As with Ravelry, Art Bead Scene members often participate in creative activities which they share via their blog.  One of their regular events is a Monthly Challenge that epitomizes their objective (celebrating art beads, inspiring those who use them) by proposing a theme and inviting artists (jewelry-makers, fiber artists, collage artists, etc.) to submit work that includes at least one art bead and fits within that theme.

The January Monthly Challenge is Claude Monet's painting La Pie (seen above).  The thought of creating a project inspired by another piece of art fascinates me.  I'm going to put the idea into my think-tank and see what happens!

Twisted Rope Lariat Necklace and Earrings

Having decided there were certain skills that would serve me well if learned, I embarked on this ambitious project. The necklace is based on what I believe is called a Dutch spiral. I decided that I wanted lots of possibilities for wearing it and thought a lariat version would allow for that.

These earrings on are based on a flat spiral stitch. They are bright and colorful.






Since the previous earrings are too imposing to wear with the necklace, I came up with the idea of these mandala / star earrings which have a lighter, more airy nature.