Well Gauged

I love creating polymer components, but I have never been that big on the stringing and adding findings and all that. I enjoy making something that didn’t exist before it came into my hands; although a couple store-bought ear wires can be integrated into a design, they are still not wholly mine. So I started making my own ear wires. Much better but not quite as much fun as polymer. Then I saw basic gauge earrings made from polymer on Etsy some years ago and thought … ah ha! No ear wires at all. You create a whole piece, and then it goes into your piercing. Cool. Let’s try that. And that is how gauge earrings ended up becoming my primary form sold through my Etsy shop.

I don’t get much studio time these days so I don’t create and sell gauges, but I occasionally stop and see what other people are doing with them now that polymer clay gauges have caught on. These have been my favorite by far. They are created by a pair of artists, the Ukraine’s Ira and Evgeniy Abramov, who run a shop on Etsy called RybaColnce. The concept is simple but wonderful. The traditional contrast of black and red with the beat of those repeated slices into the clay to reveal the hidden crimson inside covers some of my favorite approaches: contrast, repetition and things hidden. Plus they are both serious (like edgy serious) and fun at the same time. Yes, they might not be the most comfortable pair to put in, but they’d be worth it!

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