Bringing it back to the Center
April 11, 2015
Inspirational Art
I was trying to find a piece that kind of brought together all the various approaches that we talked about this week. Finding something that specific is a little tough, but this piece by Slovenian artist, Tina Mežek hits on a number of approaches to create a really dramatic focal on her necklace.
Obviously size is helping to make the focal bead stand out, but also those lines on the gold layer of the frame all move inward, drawing the eye that direction. The red against black is a classic dramatic color combination as well, and that black is so dark, it can work like negative space, especially if worn on dark clothing. So you see, many approaches can be brought together to heighten the drama when that is what you are after.
If this subject has piqued your interest , you can get further ideas by simply keeping an eye on how other people have used contrast, composition, negative space, line, etc. to bring about some really dramatic focal points.
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Outside Inspiration: A Change in Texture
April 10, 2015
Inspirational Art
Some of the most dramatic focal points are the quiet ones. Like the way a room can be buzzing with conversation and movement as people mingle at a party, but the one person who keeps drawing your eye when you look around is the quiet one, not talking, just leaning up against a wall and watching. That quiet stillness is such a contrast to the rest of the environment and without saying a single word, someone or something can manage to grab all available attention.
This beautiful collar necklace by Laura McCabe demonstrates this wonderfully. The intricacy of the beadwork draws you in, but it’s that single red cabochon that holds your attention and seems to laud over the piece. It’s also what makes all the busy bead work visually manageable as it gives the eye a place to rest. Because of its contrasting calm, not to mention its central position, the viewer will constantly be drawn back to it. It’s one strong focal point in a very dramatic piece.
This is one of Laura’s older pieces, so the only thing I have for you to investigate if this particular style appeals to you is the blog I originally found this on, The Secret Life of Jewelry, which is an awesome spot for finding great art jewelry, by the way. Laura’s more recent work takes on a kind of punk aesthetic with a lot of pointy beads and darker colors. It’s very lovely work whether that is your thing or not. You can find her more recent work on her newer website
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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.
Dramatic Open Space
April 9, 2015
Inspirational Art
Dramatic focal points don’t need to be shiny, bright, high contrast, busy or have anything much at all. In fact, negative space – the space between, around, or within elements – can create very elegant and dramatic focal points. Here is one such example by the talented Mathilde Colas.
The necklace uses a ring of combined textures to frame the negative, which is accented with a heavily textured bead. Although the bead sits in the center, the focal point here is the empty space itself. The ring and bead just define it and assist in drawing your eye to it, as well as bouncing your focus around the center composition and back out towards the beads on the rest of the necklace. I couldn’t find a straight-on shot that offered a more dramatic image, but I think you get the idea, right?
Empty space is actually one of the more dramatic focal points you can use because humans do have a thing for empty spaces–we tend to want to know what was there, why it’s empty and what might fill it. Enclosed negative spaces like this are reminiscent of windows looking out on the world, of welcoming open doors, of caves, boxes and tunnels with dark, unseen interiors. Open space is a mystery and an opportunity. Who wouldn’t be intrigued?
Mathilde does drama in bold and curious forms with many little surprises in her combinations and accents. Have fun buzzing around the spaces on her website!
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.
Drawn to the Drama
April 8, 2015
Inspirational Art
Shimmering and shiny or high contrast are not the only way to make a focal point stand out. Texture and lines can bring our focus to the prime point in a piece as quickly as anything else. In this very curious brooch/necklace piece, Russia’s Radada combines pieces of paua (abalone) shell and textured polymer in such a way that it’s hard to distinguish which is shell and which is polymer. But from the lines on the bordering form to the dense texture in the center, all the elements are drawing us to the large center piece.
This focal point is not a well-defined gem or form, but its lack of contrasting definition doesn’t work against it; quite the opposite. I think it will make most, if not all, viewers step in for a closer look. There is a lot going on here, and the more time you spend with it, the more you’ll see. The piece is very dramatic even without any heavy contrast. But, I think that is where the balance comes in. It feel so dramatic, but even more so for its bold form and heavy texture. The colors and the way the textures blend keep it from going overboard.
Radada’s LiveJournal photostream is full of these organic and amorphous forms. And felted bunnies among other curiosities. It’s a bit of a crazy mix, but a fun bit to explore.
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 Spark in a Heart
April 7, 2015
Inspirational Art
A focal point can pop without a lot of shimmer or shine. This poor, but beautiful, little heart looks like it’s been through a rough time or two or ten. But, it has this one bright spot on its battered surface–an off-white accent that almost glows against the deep, dark colors of the rest of the heart.
This kind of real world heart is the creation of Greece’s Helen P. of Eleins Kingdom on Etsy. It’s kind of difficult to pull our glance from the one light colored spot here, but there is also a bit of lovely filigree work to pull you to the left side with a network that includes some lighter showings within some canes. But still, that one spot, out in the open landscape of this heart, draws the eye back. Here it is the contrast in color and value situated in a relatively open space that makes this focal jump out. A simple technique, but a very effective one.
Helen has many more of these kinds of hearts, as well as other charming pieces to catch your eye in her Etsy shop.
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.
Popping Focals
April 6, 2015
Inspirational Art
Who doesn’t like a little drama? Well, with half the world just in love with over-the-top reality TV and crazy viral videos, maybe a good deal of people actually prefer a lot of drama. But, rather than going over the top or trying to shock, let’s look at ways to get a big punch out of something singularly simple–focal points. It’s rare to have a piece of art that doesn’t have a focal point, but while some are quite subtle, others are undeniable and sometimes, even hard to look away from. Ideally, subtle or not, you want the focal point to pull a viewer in but have their eye stay to investigate the rest.
So, if you make that focal point pop, you also want to create it in such a way that what you have is a nice place to stop, but nothing so overwhelming as to keep the viewer from exploring the details that surround it. Encouraging the viewer to spend time looking at the work allows them to develop a more particular knowledge of, and maybe a personal connection to, the piece, which makes the viewing more of an experience than just a pleasant glance.
This piece here is a pretty dramatic example. The colors are what snap you to attention, but when you focus, it is on the large rivoli crystal. We do love our shiny stuff, and this one is too huge to miss. However, the rich rainbow colors that are gently wrapped around it begs to be explored as well. Once you’ve taken in the sweeping lines of graduated color, you still want to step back and take it all in. It’s dramatic, but relatively simple, and the combination will hold the viewer for a long, pleasant moment.
This kind of drama can be found throughout the collections by Arbel Shemesh that you can see on Etsy here.
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.
Floral Lines
April 2, 2015
Inspirational Art
Today, I thought we’d just admire the easy way that flowers can be used, like any singular element, as a way to create lines. Lines define and give direction, as well as creating energy by creating visual movement. An arrangement of many small flowers will create those lines just as would a series of beads, crystals, hand tool marks, etc. So instead of bunching flower motifs into, well, a bunch, consider how you can create lines with them to convey the kind of calm or energy you are after in the piece you are making.
Here is a beautiful set of champagne bottles created by Anastaisa of Art-Kisto4ka on Livemaster.ru. I love the way the line of flowers twist back and forth on the first two bottles giving the compositions a flowing energy, which is further picked up and added to by the lines of pearly dots shooting off in little swirls. I included one that outlined a heart as well simply to show how the flowers can create a grounded line that easily defines a shape.
Anastasia makes the most realistic looking flowers. I have to look around to ensure they weren’t real and preserved flowers. The ones on the bottles are excellent, but it’s her larger flowers that will really blow you away. You can see more of her finished work in her shop and on her blog. She also sells her flowers as components in her supply shop on LiveMaster.
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 Sprinkle of Spring
April 1, 2015
Inspirational Art
Spring is not just about the flowers, but also about the vast expanses of green many of us were longing for during the winter. This little field with its scattered few flowers made me smile when I saw it. That really is how the fields are out here right now, densely green with a sprinkle of wildflowers here and there. The simplicity of this piece is the key to the design.
I know very little about the creator except that she lives in Baia Mare, Romania, sells her work under the business name of Handmade Experience and doesn’t like to talk about herself. I prefer not to post work without having a name to go with it, but it is better to be seen without a name attached than not at all.
Update: Thanks to Sara Kroger we have a name for our artist–Anca Ursentea. She unearthed this interview with her: www.revista-atelierul.ro/2014/03/22/despre-lut-polimeric-cu-anca-ursentea/
Speaking of things not being seen, I had quite the collection of possible pieces to show this week, but so much was removed from the list for reasons that make me a tad sad. Mostly it’s about the photos. I’ve said this before, and I’ll keep saying it … take good, clear, well-lit photos with simple contrasting backgrounds. Most of the work I decided not to post this week had terribly busy backgrounds that made the art hard to discern. Maybe the flower theme gets people thinking about texture, and they feel this draw to fill the image with busy backgrounds. Some textured backgrounds can be nice and add atmosphere to the image, but most of the time, it just takes the focus away from your work. And if it’s a primarily green piece, don’t shoot on a green background. Also, avoid too much photo manipulation, and don’t use special photo effects. Get a good shot into the camera so you can do a minimal amount when you get to the computer, leaving you with a fresher, truer image of your piece.
I’m just saying … if you would like to get your work into any of the many quality, well-read blogs and websites that report on and re-post images from the web, give them something great to work with. You and your artwork deserve it.
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.
Sudden Color
March 31, 2015
Inspirational Art
Isn’t one of the most breathtaking things in spring really just the blossoming of color after long months of a barely-there tint to the world? It’s a simple and even expected occurrence, the return of brilliant color, but when starved of something for a while, we become so much more appreciative and even excited by it, as if it was our first glimpse all over again.
Simple, but perfectly bright and cheery, is what I thought of this hair slide by Kathy of Flowertown Originals on Etsy. It’s really those jelly roll canes, going from light in the middle to bright color on the outside that makes the composition seem to glow. (See our Summer 2014 article in The Polymer Arts on creating the illusion of light for more on these techniques.) Between the blossoming flowers, the greening of the grasses and the lengthening days, this is just the kind of work that will be very well appreciated this time of year!
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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Would you call yourself a selfish person? I doubt very many of us would think that way about ourselves. Yet, as artists, we often find ourselves “stealing” time away from others or other things to do what we love, reveling in it when we have it. Is that selfish? I mean, it is more about us than anyone else, isn’t it?
Yes, it is about us, and that is as it should be. In the requested comments for last week’s giveaway (scroll down to see the winner and this week’s giveaway), participants mentioned some version of the “me time” aspect of getting to sit down and create more than anything else. I mean, I know we create because it is something we enjoy, regardless of what anyone else thinks, but I just love that so many people acknowledged and celebrated it. We should!
I strongly believe that everyone should have something of their own, something they can turn to in order to express themselves or at least put something out into the world that would not have existed without their desire to create it. The art we create gives us purpose, exercises a uniquely human part of our brains, and helps us to love ourselves. Not to mention that we deserve the joy we get from it!
But, by definition, that is selfish—doing something because it’s what we want. I wish our society would get over the idea that doing something for ourselves is bad. I think not doing things for yourself is self-negligence. Why is that not a commonly understood thing?
This also highlights the bigger, contradictory world that we inhabit. We live in such strange societies where selflessness and humility are expected or requested, and yet we are also pushed to strive for excellence in what we do. How do we reach excellence without focusing on ourselves? And then there is this silliness where we are not supposed to acknowledge when the work we do is good or that we’re proud of it. If we do, others may think we’re being arrogant or grandiose.
So, do we strive to be great and then pretend that we’re mediocre? We talk about contrast being good in art, but this is so not the right kind of contrast!
I’ve long found the dichotomy of these contradictory but societally prescribed behaviors beyond aggravating as well as having the potential to be debilitating. I think that is why it made me so happy to see so many people acknowledging their creative hours as me-time, self-care, and a time of wonderfully selfish joy. Keep it up, I say!
Now, let’s talk about the good kind of contrast in art.
Design Refresh
Let’s look at the beautiful brooch by Lyne Tilt that opened this post. What do you notice first about this? There’s a lot going on in this little space, isn’t there? What are the three things that jump out at you as far as design elements?
I’m going to say color, shape, and texture. Did you come up with the same three? There is also a lot going on with marks and size. So, any combination of those would be spot on.
How about design principles? What do you think is the number one principal used in this design? Sure, we could refer to scale and proportion considering all the different sizes of the layers, or we could talk about focal point or even just key in on the centered composition. But the one thing this has in spades is contrast.
Obviously, there is color contrast in all the major color characteristics—she has a vibrant trio of warm colors contrasting the cool of the blue and cyan; color values range from the dark blue and deep red to the moderate orange to the light yellow and pale polished silver; and, if you check your CMY color wheels, you’ll see that the color of the bottom layer is a blue-cyan whose complementary AND split complementaries are the yellow, orange, and red that you see in the upper layers.
But doesn’t a color palette have to have at least one common characteristic between all the colors? Well, ideally, yes, and this does. Here it’s saturation. These are not muted colors. The orange may be slightly tinted (has some white in it) but not enough to feel it’s gone off base from the saturated characteristic that ties them all together.
Now, look at the contrast in the textures. The top and bottom layers might have the same texture, but the rest are vastly different. There are even different materials—metal and clay. But they work together pretty well, don’t they? Why?
The textures work together in part because they are all drastically different—the wide variety is part of the charm of this piece. But, like color, they need something to tie them together.
Did you notice that the textures are applied to the entire layer from one edge to another? Thier differences are connected because the application on each layer is the same. That does seem to be enough to allow them to exist in the same piece and not have it feel completely chaotic.
The shapes, on the other hand, are not completely different but they are not the same either, right? They are all some version of a hand cut circle, but some of them are definitely more oval. I think pulling back on the amount of contrast between the shapes also helps to rein in the potential chaos all this dramatic contrast and color and texture could fall into. The centered composition also adds a bit of calm to the piece.
Let’s take this week to consider the design principle of contrast. Would your pieces benefit from more contrast, or do you need to rein some of that in? Remember, it all depends on your intention. There are no wrong levels of contrast, at least not in art.
Last Week’s Giveaway
Drum roll please…
This last week’s randomly chosen winner is Eloise B! I’ve spoken to her and her clay is already on the way. Congrats Eloise!
This Week’s Giveaway
Thank you to everyone who participated in last week’s giveaway through comments on the post. As mentioned above, it really made me happy to see all the fantastic, positive and self-caring observations. I also hope it gave you a moment to focus on and appreciate what you love so much about creating.
So, let’s do this again.
The Goodies:
- This week I have a selection of Sculpey clays in 2 new Soufflé colors, 3 new Premo colors, and 2 big 8 oz. blocks of clay stash basics—Sculpey III in Pearl and Silver. That’s 26 ounces of fresh clay along with a three-piece set of Sculpey silkscreens.
- Or if outside the US, I have a $25 Tenth Muse certificate, since it would be such a gamble to ship clay outside the US.
How to Win:
- Put a comment in the blog comments* (below), telling me what type of contrast you enjoy creating most in your own work, or the type of contrast you wish you used more of. And, yes, if you want to share pictures, you can do so by including a link. Just don’t put more than one link in or it may spam filter the comment.
- Note: It can take some time for the comment to appear if you’ve not commented before since, due to annoying spamming, I have to approve it .
- Giveaway winners will be chosen by random—it will NOT be based on your answers. I do hope you’ll give it some thought anyway. The answers could be helpful to you as well as interesting for the rest of us.
- And let’s say you can only win once this month so we can spread the love around.
- Get your comments posted by Wednesday March 17th at midnight Pacific time to get in for the raffle.
- I’ll announce the winner here on the blog next weekend!
I’ll put together yet another pack of goodies for a giveaway in next weekend’s post, so stay tuned here!
You can support this blog by buying yourself a little something at Tenth Muse Arts or, if you like…
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We are going to be dropping in on some big names this week and next to see what they are up to and what they have to inspire us with.
First up: Bonnie Bishoff. Her focus on jewelry these last couple years has been a journey through a variety of styles as she moves from working primarily in veneers on furniture with her partner J.M. Syron to smaller and more intimate work. But regardless of the style, her quietly strong and confident sense of color and pattern mark each piece like a signature. These lovely earrings are paired almost solely by color scheme although they do work within a limited set of variations in composition, visual texture and shapes. Each variation relays a slightly different mood, adjusted through the level of contrast in value and hue. The subtlety of this communication is what really brings home how masterful her color work is.
You can see what I mean by looking at the body of her work. You can do so by jumping onto her Instagram page and the website she shares with J.M. Syron.
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Happy Monday, fellow polymer enthusiasts. I’m not sure how this week is going to turn out as I have not had time to put together a full-fledged theme so we’re gonna go with “things that caught my eye” for now.
I’m sure you can understand why this piece by Marion Le Coq aka Fancy Puppet, might have caught my eye. They are fun and refreshing pieces, wonderfully finished and composed. She connects all her elements with repetition of motifs, colors, or other things. For example, the leaf off the apple is reflected in the leaf addition on the back and hanging leaves. The carrot’s colors are reflected in its layered pieces behind it, and its crisscross of lines reflect the crisscross of the plaid.
I’m guessing the plaids and dots are silkscreen but the secret is probably available on her YouTube page where she has dozens of tutorials and review items. She’s also quite busy elsewhere online. You can find her on Instagram, Facebook, Canal blog, and Etsy.
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I recently realized that I don’t think I’ve ever talked about the lowly squiggle. But who doesn’t like a well-done squiggle? I guess it’s hard to take it seriously with such a silly-sounding name but the sound of the word itself describes it so well.
I myself am very fond of squiggles and apply them throughout my work, primarily as accents, but some people take the squiggle to wonderfully elevated levels as the central theme of their piece.
This pin by Petra Nemravová is an excellent example of the squiggle stealing the show. The organization of these wonderfully unruly squiggles brings a regular rhythm to their organic movement. It reins in the rambling energy that this kind of squiggle contains. The bright array of colors, which could also get out of hand, is held in check by a regular graduation from one color to the next, helping to create an energetic but contained feeling.
Petra is such an advocate of bright colors and cheerful compositions. Enjoy a stroll through her colorful world on her Flickr photostream. She is also the genius mind behind the wonderful selections found in the online polymer shop Nemravka, serving the European polymer and craft communities and beyond.
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I decided this week I would like to talk about work that speaks to me. Well, I don’t mean that I want to talk about me so much as use pieces that do speak to me as examples of what it means when a piece of artwork elicits a response from the viewer.
For various reasons, I ended up thinking and talking a lot about how we define art this past week. I have long felt that art should be defined as work that is made with expression and intention, with a goal of eliciting an intellectual or emotional response. Yes, I know a lot of people will say that it is the individual who should determine what art is to them but I would like to suggest that such a statement is not quite the right phrase. Each of us can determine what is good art or what is bad art—to that I absolutely agree. But shouldn’t a label such as “art” have a more specific definition than just whatever someone thinks is art, or just something that is made by hand, as the definition would seem to be nowadays?
I am guilty of this broad use as well so I’m not pointing fingers, I’m just a big proponent of using language to effectively communicate and I think it would be great if the English language had a well-defined use of the word “art” that allowed us to talk about work born of self-expression versus craftwork or artisan work created from skilled hands.
My definition also brings up the question of what does it mean to elicit a response? It is not as confined a concept as it might sound like so I thought I’d try to define that a little this week.
For a piece of work to elicit a response all it has to do is make the viewer stop and feel something, or stop and think. It could be something as simple as making them smile or as complex as questioning societal norms. It can be positive such as emitting a sense of peacefulness or negative such as work with a high shock value geared to make you appalled or angry. If the piece is made with intention, part of that intention will, consciously or unconsciously, be to communicate with the viewer, and if the artist is communicating then they are attempting to elicit a response. Good art accomplishes this. Bad art is too distracting in its failings to communicate or illicit anything of value.
This piece here feels like a very personal piece for Shannon Tabor who commented on her Instagram post of this that “I’m back to my roots in design with ‘Compass’. My Back To Basics study is over and I’m anxious to get all these design ideas out of my head and onto my clay!”
I can feel her excitement for this new work in the composition and surface treatment of this necklace. There is a buzzing kind of energy from the scratches and the asymmetrical placement of elements but there’s also a reservedness in the basic geometric shapes and the subdued and shaded palette. I found that I was drawn to the contrast between that reserved feeling and that feeling of excitement. It reminds me of that point in time right before things really take off in some exciting new venture, which I love, and so that must be what made me stop and spend time with this piece.
So, you see, Shannon may have been working on something specific to what she wanted to explore but the intention in her skilled design choices allowed me to connect with her emotion, or at least my sense of what her emotion must’ve been. That’s eliciting a response. And to me, that’s what makes it art.
See what else Shannon is up to by following her on Instagram or hopping over to her website.
Read MoreHappy Monday to you all. Business first… preorders for the fall issue of The Polymer Arts is available online now. We don’t have a precise publication date but looks like mid-September. I’ll let you know here on the blog, in our newsletter, and on the website when we know. Again, thank you for your patience with me while I work on healing my overworked joints.
Okay, one more piece of wall art, this time by the inventive Angela Barenholtz. I know it seems like we’ve been talking about wall art for a couple weeks but this will probably be the last for a bit. I picked this one for a couple reasons having little to do with wall art.
For one, it’s a really fun piece with its variety in color, visual texture, and even the long shapes that make up this “polymer quilt.” Creating with a large variety of primary elements makes for energy-infused and eye-catching work. But, the trick is that everything still needs to work together and have some kind of relationship. In this case, the relationship is in the consistency of the type of pieces inserted into this quilt—long and evenly cut strips of visual texture arranged in a square composition. With this much consistency, you can go nuts with the variety of color, texture, and pattern.
Each one of these could actually sit on its own—like it could be a pendant or brooch if small enough, or even a pair of earrings. Giving yourself a canvas of a certain size and shape releases you from having to be overly concerned about the bounds of individual elements and construction of the work, particularly if you’re creating jewelry, and you get to play with what you place on that canvas. I imagine a lot of you might find that attractive, being we are so in love with our surface treatments, canes, and textures. How many times have you fallen in love with just the sheet of clay you were working on before it became anything? Creating a simple surface to work with can allow you to present those fantastic results in a fun and easy manner.
Angela is all about surface design and variety. You can see that by looking at her Flickr photostream. She also generously shares her techniques in her published tutorials which you can find on Etsy.
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Guest Blog Post by Teresa Pandora Salgado
Van Gogh admitted to the world, “I am always doing what I cannot do yet, in order to learn how to do it.” Me too, Vincent.
One of the most infuriatingly fabulous things I cannot do is make cane like Jon Stuart Anderson. Jon creates canes in a cunning palette that leans in close and whispers, “Go ahead…take your time…look at me.” And I surely do. And the world does too.
I love the way Jon cruises nimbly past the pedestrian cane crossing. He jaywalks that trodden path without ever touching the ground. Obvious contrast? He doesn’t need it, no matter how much the cane is reduced. Nor does he require new colors. Jon keeps it fresh with precision, composition, and balance. Neat trick.
Jon Anderson is known for his millefiori animals: elephants, turtles, bulls, and birds. You’ll notice the creatures have a flesh and blood sense about them, a beating heart beneath their rich robes. So you look and you look and then, just when you think you know him, Jon takes you to another fork in the road. To the left, skulls, vessels, lights. And to the right, guitars. Ohhh, the guitars.
So, go ahead. Look. Be inspired. Aspire.
See Jon’s work at his website here.
Teresa Pandora Salgado is a polymer clay artist, designer & instructor from Los Angeles, California. She has made 87 YouTube tutorials which have garnered over 2 million hits from viewers in 151 countries. In addition to teaching live workshops on millefiori complex caning across the U.S., Teresa helms the online store, Tiny Pandora Crafting Boutique, which featuresMilll her specialized tools and kits.
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In perusing #the100dayproject on Instagram these past couple weeks, I’ve noticed that veneers are quite the thing to be experimenting with right now. Whether you call polymer sheets you work with surface design, surface treatments, or polymer veneers, it does feel like the clay surface is having a renaissance of exploration.
One of the first of these explorations that I’ve noticed in recent weeks was this piece by Lindly Haunani, which she posted on Facebook. Of course, the queen of color is going to have a showstopper based on her color choices alone, but the subtle texture and the composition of the layout of the veneers, for all the energy of the color and lines, has such a satisfying sense of calm and rightness. There is that obvious sense of intention and deftness of skill that brings refinement to such unquestionably masterful work, even in a piece the artist claims is exploration.
Explore more of Lindly’s work on her website and Facebook page.
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Another great contribution to the Spring issue was in our artists’ gallery. All of our artists are unique in their approach but it is Isabelle, known online as Bellou, whose designs are really standing out.
Isabelle creates bold, contemporary adornments that are polished to a glass-like shine. Her work often has a centered focal point but the balance of the components are set in asymmetric arrangements or are all shaped differently with different treatments. However, in all the disparity there is a common element that brings it together.
This is one of the pieces she sent us that we couldn’t work into the gallery pages. On the one side, there are wide, solid pieces, dense with texture, but on the other side, the space is opened with a series of cut-out shapes that have the same mica shift texture as the other side. The rest of the center piece brings in a grounding energy to the movement of lines and shapes that play across the necklace.
To see more of Bellou’s work, take a look at her shop pages here.
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