The Party is in Full Swing. Come join us!
May 31, 2023
Polymer community news, The Polymer Arts magazine news
What party is this? The latest project from little ol’ me, Sage. The Sage Arts podcast is more than up and running… I have 25 episodes up as of this posting, ready on your favorite podcast player (New to Podcasts? Click here to find out how easy it is to enjoy them!) and a new one coming out every week.
What’s This Podcast All About?
This podcast is all about feeding and exciting your muse. By enlightening or reminding you about important and maybe unconsidered aspects of creating and living as an artist, I hope to help you find more joy and satisfaction in what you do, sharing ways to create with authenticity and fearlessness, while supporting your uniquely defined version of success.
Now what the heck does that all mean? Well, let’s look at what this is and what this is not…
It IS…
… a way to consistently feed your muse
… all about you. Myself, my guests, and my guest co-hosts speak to the issues, curiousity, and hurdles that you as a creative deal with on a regular basis.
… focused on creating a more fulfilling, joyful, and meaningful artistic journey.
… a conversation that goes both ways with lots of opportunities for you to be heard.
It is NOT…
… all about polymer clay or any one medium, as it’s important stuff for all artistic folks.
… focused on “how-to” or the latest tools and materials.
… just interviewing successful artists and talking at you. Rather it is like a coffee house chat or other friendly gather and I include you, the listener, in every way I can.
I created this podcast to supercharge your creativity, motivation, and artistic style through novelty, story, conversation, and community. Everyone has how-tos and ways to increase your sales – valiant and necessary stuff, of course! But what does your muse need? What does your work and your love of your art need to thrive? That’s where I want to help.
I aim to give artists ways to further hone their unique voice, increase their joy and productivity, and create a version of artistic success that is meaningful, satisfying, and anything but ordinary.
Come Join the Conversation
If you have something to share, would like to be a guest (for a chatty interview), or be a guest co-host (you and I banter on a particular subject) drop me an email me via my contact page on the show website: https://thesagearts.com/contact/ or send a voice mail (use the red button on that same site, bottom right corner of any page.)
And join me on social media!
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/thesageartspodcast/
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/TheSageArtsPodcast
And don’t forget to click “FOLLOW” or that little arrow on your favorite Podcast player so you get notices of new episodes. New Episodes come out weekly on Friday evenings, barring natural disasters or other bits of interference, of course. I hope you’ll join me there, on The Sage Arts podcast!
There are new artists and creatives joining every day with tons of great things to say…
“Just what I needed!”
“I just binged-listened … and I can’t wait for more!”
“There is so much validity in your presentation…”
“Looking forward to all the thinking and creating that they prompt.”
Taste test on my RSS website: https://rss.com/podcasts/thesagearts/
Or on the podcast home website: https://thesagearts.com/
Or start with this episode:
Graduated Colored Cups
February 23, 2014
Technique tutorials
Here we see another limited palette using gradients of the same color for the theme. Even though flowers lend themselves to this technique, you certainly don’t have to make a hyacinth flower with it. Of course, we can’t think about gradient colors without thinking of Skinner blends. The gradient used here is made by adding varying amounts of white to the base color, but you could also go in the other direction, and add blacks, which would darken the gradient. You could also try analogous blends, using a limited color palette of colors that are near each other on the color wheel.
The artist who made these grape hyacinth pins is Kellie Mowat. She has tutorials that make use of repetition and a limited color palette, as well as tutorials for lots of other mediums. She also has some tutorials posted on YouTube for all of you visual learners out there.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or issue of The Polymer Arts magazine as well as supporting our advertising partners.
Fading Out
February 22, 2014
Uncategorized
Here color is minimized but what little color is brought in, is subdued and blends into the composition rather than accenting the dominant copper browns. In Tammi Sloan‘s work here, the palette of browns provides a warm, earthy feel that draws you into the narrative sketched on the front. Using this limited color palette gives the piece a maturity that bright colors would not provide. Through this pairing of copper and polymer clay, she has created an effective juxtaposition between hard and soft materials. She created this piece by rolling a sheet of polymer clay and impressing it into the fired metal clay, so that it would come up through the holes.
Tammi, who is from Whidbey Island, Washington, has a passion for creating. She moves where inspiration takes her. As she explains it, “It is a moving meditation that brings me to a place of deep peace. When I create, I rarely have a picture in my mind of what it is I am going to create. There is a general idea,
but the finished piece is a melding of that idea, the feelings, and thoughts that are flowing through me at the time.” Take a moment and visit her space and become inspired.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or issue of The Polymer Arts magazine as well as supporting our advertising partners.
Outside Inspiration: A Tale in Silver
February 21, 2014
Inspirational Art
This antiqued silver pendant by artist Samantha Braund uses intricate textures, form, and unique shapes to tell a story with this Spider Conch shell design. Working primarily with silver limits the number of colors used in her, but embellishing with a lot of texture and shapes to invites us in to hear her story or to invent a story of our own.
Because of the way hte varied planes and edges are composed in this piece, emphasis is placed on the center where the shell opens up to us. The form could also be seen as a metaphor for the heart. The colors of the gems used here remind us of the turbulent emotions that flow through our own hearts as we travel along each day meshed in the highs and lows of life.
Samantha is a multi-medium artist with strong roots in graphic design, photography, and precious metal clay jewelry design. This necklace is part of her Spider Conch “Joy to Pebbles” series made with metal clay. For some more examples of her work, and to see her electroformed copper on polymer clay pieces, take a look at her Amadora Designs’ Flickr pages.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or issue of The Polymer Arts magazine as well as supporting our advertising partners. Click on an image below.
Giving Way to Intricate Lines
February 20, 2014
Inspirational Art
With just black and silver and a subdued navy blue, these lentil beads would not easily be carried by the palette alone. However, the textured lines and floral transfers along with the break in the larger lentils create an intricate serenity. The positive and negative space of the large beads and the oval links in the oversized chain add a feeling of Art Deco style, while the size and design elements bring it back into modern art imagery.
This is the work of French artist, Olga Nicolas, who enjoys creating in limited color palettes, embellishing with intricate textures using transfers and foils. There is a richness in the colors chosen and the baroque textural designs on some of the beads give this modern piece some old world charm.
You can see more of Olga’s designs using limited palettes on her Flickr pages. Olga teaches workshops in France and has some online tutorials on YouTube.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or issue of The Polymer Arts magazine as well as supporting our advertising partners.
Limited and Bright
February 19, 2014
Inspirational Art
I thought we’d at least go bright and fun for our mid-week limited color theme. Here we have Sophy Dumoulin working with a limited palette, as she often does, but with all the great patterns and full saturation of the colors, you don’t really think about it being a limited palette, but it is just blue and green, two analogous cool colors, with a few patches of white. The look is playful and the shapes are neatly placed. The pins all have a feeling of restraint, but the approach works. There is comfort in keeping things on the simpler side sometimes.
Sophy’s work can be found online on her blog and she also teaches classes at CraftArtEdu.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or issue of The Polymer Arts magazine as well as supporting our advertising partners. Click on an image below.
Graphically Designed
February 18, 2014
Inspirational Art
Talk about color accenting! This bracelet plays with everything else before that cane of purple even begins to register. The wonderful shape of the beads, the contrast in value (which is all black and white are), the visual and tactile texture and the negative space where the beads cut away instead of butting against each other makes for an intriguing and dynamic bracelet.
Of course, this is a Bettina Welker bracelet, so well engineered and designed. Her graphic design background is really showing it’s best side in this lovely piece.
Of course, Bettina is the queen of bracelets. If you haven’t gotten your copy of her lovely book Polymer Clay Bracelets, you really should, even if you don’t make a lot of bracelets. She has some wonderful tips just on working with polymer and on engineering jewelry, not to mention that the layout and photos are gorgeous.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or issue of The Polymer Arts magazine as well as supporting our advertising partners.
The Advantages of a Limited Palette
February 17, 2014
Inspirational Art
So last week, we looked at work that used every color in the rainbow, or close to it and looked at how to use a lot of color without looking chaotic. This week, we are going to look at minimizing color using limited palettes where color is an accent. I know … I hear that collective sigh, knowing that brilliantly colored pieces will not be showing up here this week, but I promise, you can be stunned by pieces that use very little. Wait and see.
Yes, many of us are polymer fans in large part because of all the color we can play with but the versatility in form, texture and application is really unmatched by any other medium, far more so than the color aspect. So if you limit or take away color as a primary design element, what do you work with? Well, you are forced to pay close attention to everything else. It is pretty easy to let color support the design and impact of a piece, so if color is your design ‘crutch’ (and I don’t mean that in a negative way … color is important and is quite valid as a focus) try moving away from it and explore form, texture, line, composition, repetition, negative space, etc. It’s a great exercise that, when you return to wider ranging color palettes, will take your pieces from rather pretty to simply amazing!
Eva Thissen‘s brooch here has an incredible impact, not only with little color but with brown–of all single colors to choose–as the dominant hue. And yet, it’s absolutely stunning. The texture and detail make the piece visually rich so that the small dots of subdued color are seen as accents rather than color supporting the design.
Enjoy perusing Eva’s Flickr pages and her enchanting pieces for to get further ideas about putting color in the background while using texture and composition to carry a piece.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or issue of The Polymer Arts magazine as well as supporting our advertising partners.
Retro Rainbow
February 16, 2014
Inspirational Art
Sorry we’re late getting this out today. I think our computers are burning out from all the work this week and were just not cooperating earlier today. But in any case, here is a little last bit of rainbow color and a neat little idea you might be tempted to try next time you are in the studio.
Apparently its going to be Extruded Sunday this month. We had random extruded colored frame beads last week. This week, let’s take a look at a version on the pixalated retro cane in a full rainbow of colors. I’ll see if I can keep up the tread next week or not.
This tutorial is on the blog of Amber Elledge also known as Starless Clay. Since we’re so late in the day, I’m going to let her tutorial do the talking, pictorially speaking. Just go to her blog post for all steps of her Rainbow Daisy Pen tutorial.
Amber’s love of rainbow colors can also be spied in her Etsy shop if you would like to see more!
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or issue of The Polymer Arts magazine as well as supporting our advertising partners.
Sherbert and Spring
February 15, 2014
Inspirational Art
Winding down our color week, I thought we go out a bit on the soft side. As we demonstrated on Thursday, you can use a lot of color without it being bright or loud. Here is a sherbet colored necklace by Leah of Léa aime les fleurs, with all the colors of Spring. With the cold and snow so many have been experiencing, I thought a bit of Spring would be nice on a Saturday afternoon.
The airy nature of the way this is strung adds to the overall “light” feeling in visual weight and color and, I would assume actual weight as well. I thought the scattered nature of the design also fits the Spring theme as I always think of the arrival of Spring as that sudden pop of color coming up randomly in my flower beds and across the fields in the foothills where I trail run. I am so looking forward to it!
If you like Leah’s loose work and colors, she posts about her work on Canal Blog and sells in La Boutique.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or issue of The Polymer Arts magazine as well as supporting our advertising partners.
Outside Inspiration: Stitching Color
February 14, 2014
Inspirational Art
I first saw this piece you see here on a tiny Pinterest pin and thought “Wow. That’s some serious polymer clay work.” Only it’s not polymer. It’s a quilt! But wow … wouldn’t that make a gorgeous polymer wall piece?
The quilt is by the very gifted Carol Taylor. She balances a full spectrum of saturated color with consistent, yet rambling patterns in many of her quilts. I just keep trying to imagine just how stunning they must be in person!
Her patterns, layout and colors would all be quite inspiring for any polymer artist by I think they would make caners in particular just gush. Treat yourself to a stroll through her online gallery today.
And a very happy Valentine’s Day from myself and Cleo (she’s the cat in my lap making typing more of a challenge than it should be today.) Big furry hugs to all our readers!
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or issue of The Polymer Arts magazine as well as supporting our advertising partners.
