A Stroppel Ocean
July 31, 2015
Uncategorized
I was going to share the new Fall Cover here but have a couple of bits of information we would like to confirm before we do. Creating a magazine is all details, details, details and they are never-ending! We’ll have it on here by Monday but if you’re just too curious, we’ll send it out in our newsletter tomorrow morning. (Don’t get our newsletter yet? Sign up here–it’s the box on the left of the page–for twice monthly news, tips, eye candy and other fun chatter.)
In the meantime, who would have thought that a Stroppel cane, often used in very graphical designs, would be so reminiscent of the ocean? This beautiful collar by Mara Devescovi, which is all Stroppel cane, certainly looks like the undulating water of a crystal clean ocean as you might see it on some tropical beach. Who would have thought that random cane morphing would emulate in the way the movement of the water distorts the world beneath it. It really gets one thinking about a summer escape, I must say!
Mara goes by Dev’Art60 on Flickr where her progress in polymer art over the last decade can be followed and lots of great ideas can be found along the way.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or an issue of The Polymer Arts magazine, as well as by supporting our advertising partners.
A Memory of Tidepools
July 29, 2015
Inspirational Art
My absolute favorite part of the west coast of the United States is the tide pools. They are an amazing microcosm of marine life; not to mention the texture of the rocks and lava flows you find them in is uncommonly beautiful. Although this necklace is not the re-creation of a tide pool –the artist Aleksanta mentions still lake water among trees in her description– but for me this is so very reminiscent of the tide pools I’ve visited on the coast of California with their many tiny basins crowded up on one another that have been created by water wearing away the stone in rippling rings that are revealed at low tide as shallow reflective pools.
Don’t you love that about visual art? You can bring whatever you want to it–and you do it without trying to. Aleksanta created these with a lake in mind and it took me to the ocean. It also grabbed my attention because this looks like an example of Pebeo paints, which we will be reviewing with instructions on how to use them in the upcoming Fall issue. Speaking of which, be sure to check in here on Friday as we’ll finally be ready to show off the next cover and let you in on all the exciting stuff we have in store for you next month.
To see what else Aleksanta has done with these paints and her other beautiful explorations, take a look at her LiveMaster store.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or an issue of The Polymer Arts magazine, as well as by supporting our advertising partners.
A Sense of Ocean
July 27, 2015
Inspirational Art
This past weekend I had to take a train trip to San Diego. The skies were clear and the beautiful landscape was filled with brilliant teals and page greens. As I struggled to get some work done rather than stare out the window the whole time, I asked my traveling companions what I should write about on my blogs this week. As they contentedly stared out the windows, they said in unison “Oceans”. So, I feel obliged this week to search out pieces that bring the feel and colors of the ocean inland to us in polymer land.
Although motifs like shells and waves would make for an obvious ocean theme, I prefer the pieces that are not so obviously defined. Subtle moods derived from patterns and soft-edged colors can give one the sense of a bright day by the ocean just like you are certain to see in this pendant by Susy Paredes. A handful of organic forms to accent the watery edges doesn’t hurt either. This unassuming piece may have been inspired by a stream or a lake, really, but we all bring our own experience to a piece, and today, I bring the ocean.
Susy’s work is largely simple and quiet without a lot of detail, certainly nothing extraneous. I do enjoy her pieces with the little organic accents the most. You’ll find quite a few on the second page of her Flickr photostream, as well as on her Etsy site.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or an issue of The Polymer Arts magazine, as well as by supporting our advertising partners.
Goodies, Giveaways and Friesen on the Brain
July 24, 2015
Inspirational Art, Polymer issues, The Polymer Arts magazine news
We sort of kinda interrupt this art blog to tip you off about a chance to grab a bundle of goodies, get some special discounts and have your opinions and wishes heard! Then we’ll talk art.
Reader’s Wish List Survey
Take a little survey and let us know what you want to see on the blog, as well as in the magazine and in our upcoming projects as we plan for the rest of 2015 into 2016. As a thank you for your time, you’ll find these discounts and a Goodie Giveaway at the end of the survey:
—The Polymer Arts 10% off code for subscriptions and back issues on our website.*
–ILove2Craft.com 10% off code for your entire purchase at ILove2Craft.com (featuring Lisa Pavelka and Christi Friesen products.)*
–A chance to win one of two Goodie Boxes that will include a variety of tools and supplies from Polyform, Staedtler, Jacquard, CF Originals, and more (each valued at $40+).* **
The Fine Print: *Discounts and entering for the Goodie Box giveaways end at midnight PDT on August 2nd, 2015. Your promo codes will pop up on a Thank You page after you submit the survey. **Due to the unpredictability of out of country shipping times and circumstances, we will substitute clays and other sensitive materials with durable items for winners living outside the US.
Okay … now for some art to end our week. Summer colors and summer fun had been the theme, but I have Christi Friesen on the brain so we’re going to try to combine this all with some “Mechanical Botanicals” by CF herself.
Why so much Friesen distraction? For one, both the discount and the goodie box you can get by taking the survey can help you stock up on CF Originals goods (Have you seen the new little Swellegant Sampler kit! So cool … you can try it all! It’s not in the Goody Box, but you can grab it at ILove@Craft.com with that discount code mentioned!)
Also, I spent part of the day working on the latest article she’s whipped up for us at The Polymer Arts magazine … “Embellishments”! Boy, she can pack a lot of tips and tricks into a handful of pages! And the pictures! She is a generous contributor, I tell you. (I know … I need to get the line-up for the Fall issue out to you all, but it’s been an interesting wrangling of content this quarter. Next week, I promise!)
The other reason everything seems to be coming up Christi is that, well Christi came up to see me on her way out of town Wednesday. We stayed up way too late and came up with way too many amazing ideas and even more questions. One of them was about how to categorize work. And even whether we should.
Take a look at these oil cans. They’re decorative. And they’re sculptural. There is polymer, but it’s at least half other materials. So is it polymer art? Mixed-media? Multi-media? For shows, books and even on blogs and in articles, we find ourselves looking for categories and labels and ways to put things into a particular box. But do we need to?
Don’t worry. We didn’t come up with the answer to the universe and everything or the definitive answers to these questions either the other night. We did decide that maybe backing off the labels and categories so we stop mentally boxing things in so often could be a good thing though. So, let’s not say that this is polymer art or mixed media or sculpture or decor. Let’s just say it’s bits of the artist that is here for all of us to enjoy. And most of the time, that should be enough.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or an issue of The Polymer Arts magazine, as well as by supporting our advertising partners.
Where Spring and Summer Collide
July 22, 2015
Inspirational Art
One of the striking things about summer is that point where some of the vegetation on the hills are still green and putting forth great effort to uphold their place in the sun while swathes of other plants have given up and turned brown. Even though I don’t like to see the hills turn brown, that time where the last vestiges of spring and the heat of summer collide is so beautiful in its contrast.
These earrings by Sylvie Peraud is just one such example. Greens turn to yellow as the plant’s energies are sapped, but when seen on a hill with the morning sun hitting it, it’s just radiant. I don’t know if Sylvie was thinking this when creating these, but it reminds me of the places I was running just a couple of weeks ago out here in Southern California.
Writing about these lead me to Sylvie’s blog where she has some really stunning new work you just have to see as well. Jump on over to her blog and check out her wide range of work on her Flickr pages when you take a creative recharge break today or this week. It will be a good mid-year and mid-week place for new inspiration.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or an issue of The Polymer Arts magazine, as well as by supporting our advertising partners.
The Ups and Downs of Summer
July 20, 2015
Inspirational Art
In the northern hemisphere we are in the midst of summer, but Mother Nature is showing her many sides from hot and still to muggy and stormy, from tornadoes to floods to hurricanes. Down in the southern hemisphere, summer days are a distant memory, but nonetheless, summery colors are making a surge on the pages I’ve been visiting.
Lillian de Vries created this pendant with its interesting visual and tactile texture as inspiration for a summer challenge on Craftliners.com, a blog for the European wholesale company Craftlines, for which Lillian is a designer. The colors are mostly warm but delicate with a scattering of dark speckles falling out of a cooling ceiling of blue. It strikes me as a visual interpretation of a summer memory with its up and down days scattered through the memories of hot afternoons and those thankfully cool mornings.
Lillian plays with all kinds of texture, both visual and tactile, as well as stopping to create miniature and faux foods here and there. If you’re have a gratefully cool morning hiding from the heat, or are down under dreaming of warmer days, make a temperature appropriate beverage and escape into the creative wanderings on her blog and Craftliner’s pages.
Hail Sale and Impressive Dots
July 18, 2015
Inspirational Art
Did you miss us yesterday? Sorry for the absence, but all kinds of wonderful things have been going on; they have just been keeping me buried until I couldn’t remember what day it was. For some reason I thought the last three days were all Thursday. Can you say sleep deprived?Why is this? Well, for one, I was acting as my own administrative assistant, but only because our wonderful admin, Kat, has been off this week introducing her new baby girl to the world. Send lots of love and may the powers-that-be grant them both lots of rest!
The other thing that was overwhelming was the sale of dinged up back issues we started Thursday that was far more popular than we anticipated. I wanted to share it with you, my dear blog readers, and give you a chance to grab some yourself, but we nearly sold out in the first few hours. I had to wait until today to go through our unopened stock and find those inevitably imperfect copies so I had something to offer you. So here it is …
The Print Issue Hail Sale: Okay, hail didn’t damage these copies, mostly shipping, storing and traveling did the damage, but that’s a long name for a sale. These are ones with markings on the cover, rubbed off ink, creased corners and small tears that we won’t sell as new, but I do sell for a discount when out and about. However, they have been piling up, so we decided to make them available to you online at half price! So, these are just $5 (plus shipping). Quantities are very limited, so jump on over to my Etsy page where we’ve listed them. That way, sold out issues will drop off instead of sitting there teasing you when there aren’t any more left.
In my shop we are also selling all regular ‘perfect’ back issues for $8 plus shipping. If you are buying just one, it ends up being the same as buying from our website, but if you buy multiples, you will save by getting reduced shipping. So if you have been wanting to stock up on back issues in print and you don’t mind a few marks on the cover or a creased corner, this would be the time to do that!
And now some weekend art. Because we need pretties to cheer up our weekend. We’ve done all these dot pieces, but not outside polymer, so here are a few pieces by ceramicist Lisa Stevens. Wednesday’s post was also super popular, so I’m thinking a few of you who tried (or plan to try) that dotted tutorial, and these pieces made me think of a short cut way to do similar work–by just impressing with hand tools. You can use acrylic, mica powders or alcohol inks to color the holes or back fill with clay. Or brush on ink tinted liquid polymer to get a similar glazed ceramic look.
Lisa does a lot of these impression type treatments. If you want more pretty and inspiring impressed dot ideas, jump over to her Flickr pages.
Lining Up Your Own Dots
July 15, 2015
Inspirational Art
So, all this talk of lines and dots has you wanting to try out your own dot-line compositions, right? Well, being the cheerleader that I am, I’ve gone out and found a little something that might get you playing with some of those dots and lines regardless of how enthralled you are with the subject. Just try out this easy and rewarding application technique.
Svetlana Belova generously shares her process for creating these lovely pendants on LiveMaster. The types of patterns you can create this way are endless. It really lets you explore the possibilities without committing to a block of mokume or being limited by a stamp or texture sheet. This kind of work is very meditative and can be a fantastic way to relax or get yourself into a creative zone before working on something else.
Svetlana shares her techniques on her blog and sells her work through her LiveMaster shop where you can see other examples of this and other pretty compositions.
Dots and Bits and Limiting Labels
July 13, 2015
Inspirational Art
Today, let’s ponder a broad combination of themes from French artist, Ouedd. Here, lines of white dots play the part of contrast to densely gathered leaf forms with rich, graduated colors applied in a polymer embroidery-type manner. I also thought this might be called a type of mosaic, but do dense patterns of parts alone define a mosaic?
Merriam-Webster says mosaics are “a surface decoration made by inlaying small pieces of variously colored material to form pictures or patterns.” This would be a mosaic then, right? But, Google’s dictionary says, “A picture or design made from small pieces of colored tile, glass, or other material set in mortar.” Oh, well, it is not really set in a mortar. So, maybe it’s not mosaic.
I just think it is best to say it is a richly colored pendant whose erratic primary texture has been thoughtfully broken up by orderly white lines.
Of course, it really doesn’t matter what the type of work here is called. When we label something it is, in our mind and in the mind of anyone that ascribes to that application of the label, limited by that label. Take “polymer artist” as an example. If you consider yourself a polymer artist, do you forever limit your creative endeavors to polymer work only?
I do very much appreciate that we need labels in order to help us organize, in our minds, all the information that comes to us and all the people we meet, but it just seems like we could move beyond them with individuals we know, especially ourselves and, as an extension, the work we do. For instance, do you realize that, usually, when someone we just met asks “What you do?”, we usually say “I am …” tacking on the label that our work or career gives us. That is not what we ‘do’; that is what we ‘are’, or more precisely, what we label ourselves as. You could say “I’m a polymer artist”, but is that all you are? Maybe you could say, “I create polymer art … among other things.” Then you are this vast, complex, person of endless possibilities and action. Doesn’t that sound like a truer way of presenting ourselves? And without the label you are free to create whatever you like with whatever you like without worrying that you are falling outside of some boundaries.
I bring this up because I’ve had two conversations recently with people apologizing for not fitting a label they think the rest of the world may have put them under. My thoughts … it doesn’t matter. Do what you need to do and throw the labels out.
To see an example of art that shows off the endless possibilities of polymer and of artists who play with the medium, take a peek at Oeudd’s Flickr pages and her interesting array of work. Then there is Ouedd’s blog that is fun and a bit silly, especially if you don’t speak French and use the Google translator.
This Friday I’d like to leave you with a little something to try out this weekend. I still have a myriad of examples showing the combination of dots and lines, and we may just pull out a few more for next week, but for now, how about we just have some fun? France’s Marie-Charlotte Chaillon shares this versatile tutorial for juxtaposing dots and lines in a piece of jewelry, although it could easily be transferred to home decor or other decorative art. I like that the ‘dots’ here aren’t your basic option. The cane that will make the stacked dots is rather nice on its own for accents or mosaic work. It looks rather like an interesting twist on the pixellated retro cane. The white seems to be key as the gradation gives it a bit of an inner glow. Any color palette that appeals to you would do, but the graphic nature does show off bright contrasts quite nicely.
Marie-Charlotte is pretty generous with the cane-centric tutorials, so if that is where your creative meanderings are on right now, head over to her blog or her Pinterest board specifically dedicated to her tutorials and have yourself a blast!
I had something different planned for today, but this stunning work by Claire Fairweather popped up on the IPCA Facebook group, and I just had to ensure many more of you had the pleasure of enjoying dots in literally a BIG way.
This is a mosaic collage, and unlike most polymer work, it is quite large. Claire’s description gives you the idea:
“Here it is, my first large ‘dot mosaic’ artwork. It is made up of about 6,935 tiles and took over 150 hours to complete. Each tile has been handmade, from polymer clay, and glued in place on the canvas before being grouted with coloured acrylic modelling paste.”
Ambitious? Yes. Worth it? I think so! How I’d love to see this in person to see all the detail. But yes, we have our dots here used in varying sizes to enrich the texture of the mosaic. Line is used in a very subtle way to convey the horizontal arrangement of the landscape. The lines are created by the change in color rather than the arrangement of dots. Still it fits this week’s theme, but more importantly, it’s an impressive piece. Would you dedicate the time and resources to creating such a large piece? In other mediums, that much work going into one piece is not unusual. But, it does show how sincere dedication that we can all enjoy.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or an issue of The Polymer Arts magazine, as well as by supporting our advertising partners.
** Sorry this went up half a day late. We had an error in our scheduled time. But back to regularly scheduled postings …***
We’ve talked about using lines as design elements for direction and energy before and about dots and their use as accents and to create rhythm, but I don’t think we’ve spent much time looking at what happens when you use the two together.
There are many, many beautiful examples of using line and dots as a combined design treatment, but I think these brooches by Ivana Brozova are some truly stunning recent examples I’ve run into. In this case, dots are used to create lines. Or maybe the lines are distorted until they look like strings of dots. Either way, the effect is the same—a strong, rhythmic and directional vibrancy radiating from a center that itself is alive with slow, winding lines in the form of tendrils. It makes for rather mesmerizing work.
Ivana is rather fond of lines and dots used together. You can see more great examples in some of her older work, as well as admire Ivana’s new and rather shiny pieces on her Flickr photostream.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or an issue of The Polymer Arts magazine, as well as by supporting our advertising partners.
Today’s piece is both an outside inspiration and a polymer piece. It’s a little different take on the aged look in that it isn’t so much about that look of disintegration as it is about the way materials meld together over time that have been left out in natural surroundings.
I can’t say what Russia’s Svetlana was thinking of when she created this felted scarf, but this makes me think of the way rocks become embedded in sandstone or maybe how they are exposed by the low tide on a beach. The combined textures of fuzzy felt and smooth polymer along with the little bead accents create a rich landscape that I think must be reminiscent of some place that she has been. It seems an unusual choice for a scarf, but that just adds to the mysterious atmosphere of what she’s done here.
Felting was the one thing I never took to in my years of fiber art work, but then, I was taught mostly the classic thick felting techniques. The more textural and undulating applications and forms that are becoming popular these days feel more broadly appealing. If any of you have a penchant for felting (or are intrigued enough by this to want to try it), the page I found this on is actually a tutorial on how she created the piece. The textures you’ll see just from the in between steps are worth a gander, so hop on over to Svetlana’s Livemaster blog page and maybe drop by her shop as well.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or an issue of The Polymer Arts magazine, as well as by supporting our advertising partners.
The absence of something can be just as intriguing, or even more so, than the addition of something to a piece of jewelry. In these beautiful headpins, we actually have a little of both.
If you find yourself inexplicably drawn to these but not really knowing why, you’re not alone here. There is something unusual about this faux deterioration, but it takes a minute to understand what it is. The corrosion these polymer beads emulate speaks to a passage of time and disuse, but in this case, it is also a reveal. How often are you likely to see a rusted out piece of iron or old steel eaten away only to show brilliant color underneath? Well, it’s quite unlikely you’d see a turquoise blue like this beneath a bit of unused metal, but somehow it feels right. The corroded look shows an eating away of the form, and the unusual blue, added by jewelry artist Alison Sachs, adds to it. So we are drawn by the subtraction of form, the addition of color and the unusual juxtaposition that looks like something mother nature might have created even though it isn’t common.
And these are only headpins. But hey, headpins got a bit of attention as well in the last issue of The Polymer Arts where you could learn to make your own quick and easy headpins. Take those lessons and add interesting polymer bead-like ends as Alison does in your favorite canes, textures or other clay treatments. The old and well-worn look can be seen throughout much of Alison’s work, which you can find on her Etsy page and more or less on her blog. The images were not coming up for me on the blog last time I checked in, but maybe they will soon.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or an issue of The Polymer Arts magazine, as well as by supporting our advertising partners.
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