Art Jewelry

BronzClay has arrived

2008-07-23T13:46:00Z

The metal clay community has been buzzing about it for months, and now the new bronze metal clay — or, more accurately BronzClay — is available to the public. The new Rio Grande catalog hit my desk yesterday, and the clay was listed among their new products.

We had the advantage of testing the clay early, prior to its public release... the resulting article was published in our July 2008 issue. Our article covered the basics, but as with any new product, there are still a lot of questions about how it works and how best to use it. As different metal clay artisans get their hands on the material and start playing, those questions will be answered, and new ones will undoubtedly pop up.

Based on our experience, that experimentation phase will be a lot of fun — and based on the lower price point of BronzClay (Rio is charging approximately $20 per 100g package) compared to silver metal clay, I expect to see a lot of artisans pulling out the stops, creatively. I'm eagerly looking forward to seeing the pieces that start appearing. If you work with the new clay, send us a picture, send us feedback, let us know how it's going, and what techniques you've found work — or don't work. It's new to everyone.

Jewelry, cosmetics, and other fascinating finds from The Burnt City of ancient Persia

2008-07-18T14:07:00Z

Although the ancient Persian city of Shahr-e-Sookhteh (The Burnt City) was discovered by archaeologists in the 1970s, I just discovered that it exists this week, thanks to an article I found about jewelry unearthed from the city — what a fascinating place! The site is located in modern-day southeastern Iran, but the city itself existed in four stages from 3200 B.C. to 2100 B.C.

Archaeologists found beautiful jewelry pieces made with materials we still use today: agate, pearls, copper, silver, gold, etc. They also found evidence that suggests that both men and women used cosmetics for adornment. According to the article, "Metal, bone, shell, stone and glass rings, bracelets, armlets, anklets, hair and dress pins, circlets, chokers, ornamental buttons, various ear and fingernail cleaning tools are among the frequent finds..." To see examples of the jewelry, click here to go to the article.

Because I was intrigued, I did a bit more research on the site and found that it's truly a treasure trove of human history. Other highlights from the site include the oldest known backgammon game, with pieces made of agate and turquoise and a board made of ivory; the oldest known pair of dice; an artificial eyeball made of gold and patterned like the sun; evidence of brain surgery; the world's first animation, portrayed on an earthen goblet; insignias made of stone and clay that suggest women had economic responsibility for their households; and more.

It's difficult for me to comprehend that these ancient people made the caliber of jewelry that they did. It's made me want to see even more ancient jewelry, and I think I know just where to look. In Art Jewelry's July 2008 issue, contributor Stephanie Riger (who teaches how to make a fused medallion and chain in "Deja Fusion," page 71) told us about the book she goes to for inspiration: Jewelry, 7,000 Years: An International History and Illustrated Survey from the Collections of the British Museum, edited by Hugh Tait.

Any other recommendations? Thoughts on ancient jewelry? Happy looking!

—Kristin

You can have your gold and eat it too?

2008-07-16T17:46:00Z

I love cooking and baking, and I generally make everything from scratch. I've never followed a recipe that calls for biscuit mix, refrigerated dough in a tube, pasteurized process cheese food, or other "convenience" foods (I never found them convenient or tasty). I don't make brownies from a box, I make homemade pie crust, and I don't think anything with Jell-O in it should ever be called "salad."

But am I a gourmet? No. In fact, I was completely shocked yesterday when I stumbled on edible silver leaf and edible gold leaf and gold flakes. I had no idea that people ate gold and silver, and of course the first image that came to my mind was of wealthy Hollywood actors and actress sprinkling gold on their dinners, as I might sprinkle salt and pepper on mine. My coworker Addie Kidd corrected this image, mentioning that she's eaten both gold and silver before, so apparently those of us who don't have chauffeurs and maids can also partake.

Supposedly, gold and silver leaf and flakes are popular on wedding cakes and other special-occasion desserts. Although the gold and silver are probably beautiful on food, I can't image eating a precious metal. I love how recyclable gold and silver are. When a piece of jewelry becomes worn beyond repair, the metal can always be reclaimed and reused. But let's be honest, once you eat it, no one will be reclaiming it.

I won't be adding gold or silver to my diet anytime soon, but if you're interested, the edible leaf and flakes can be purchased through several online suppliers, including Edible Gold.com and Mister Art.com.

––Katie

Etsy Finds: Wear Audrey Hepburn on your wrist and Sonny and Cher on your ears with these cool pieces of jewelry!

2008-07-09T16:41:00Z

I always enjoy seeing what new things the artists on Etsy are creating. I inevitably find something that's extra clever and creative and deserves some recognition. Today, jewelry influenced by movie and TV stars caught my attention.

First, I found these cool seed bead bracelets. I usually don't get into seed beads, but these were too cool to pass by without a second look. Pink Pooch Designs uses seed beads to stitch the likenesses of famous actors and actresses, including Audrey Hepburn (left), Lucille Ball, James Dean, and many more.

Pop Bangles was my other find of the day. This artist prints images of celebrities on photo paper and seals them in plastic. Sonny and Cher (below), Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, and the women of Sex and the City are a few of the stars available in Pop Bangles' earrings.

––Katie

Add eco-friendly art supplies to your workroom

2008-07-02T14:35:00Z

Yesterday I stumbled upon EcoChoices, an Internet store that sells all kinds of environmentally friendly products. They sell everything from bedding and clothing to cooking and cleaning supplies. I was especially happy to see that they have a range of eco-friendly art supplies. They have colorful beeswax modeling wax, hemp sketchbooks, soy crayons, and colored pencils with leads that are colored with natural plant extracts. Although they don't have jewelry-making supplies, you can still find plenty of fun, earth-friendly things to add to your home and studio.

––Katie

Anyone else out there intrigued by the steampunk movement?

2008-06-30T21:45:00Z

This past week I've been getting e-mails from friends and co-workers (including Hazel and Addie!) about artists working in the steampunk genre. I think it's because they know that I'm a sucker for anything that has a quasi-scientific Victorian-era vibe about it. The visual richness that comes from combining futuristic themes with retro steam-age industrial gizmos is probably not for everyone, but apparently there are quite a few folks out there who share my enthusiasm for this aesthetic. From the sets in a Terry Gilliam film (Brazil), to the artwork of Keith LoBue, there's something off-jolly about this sensibility that draws me in. No wonder as kid I was entranced with reruns of the 1960's TV series, The Wild Wild West; that program is cited as one of the influences for steampunk! (Now I can't stop humming the theme song tune.)

How about you? What types of work influence you and make you smile?

For your sun-worshipping pleasure: a look at some traditional Hawaiian jewelry by Philip Rickard

2008-06-27T19:46:00Z

I just came across an article about Hawaiian jeweler Philip Rickard, who wrote the book Hawaiian Heirloom: A Lasting Remembrance after researching the topic for six years. Rickard was recently commissioned to make traditional jewelry pieces for a historical feature movie about Hawaii's Princess Ka'iulani, who reportedly was fond of bracelets. Rickard's research led him to the discovery that one royal bracelet in particular held a message in its traditional Victorian symbols; Rickard calls the message "Queen Lili’uokalani's prayer." Click here to read more about the movie Rickard is involved with and to see news clips of an interview with him, where he shows his replica jewelry pieces.

Does jewelry from other cultures intrigue you? If so, what cultures? Do you buy cultural jewelry? Or do you make your own versions of it? I'd love to hear your stories and see pictures of your work!

—Kristin

Check out these cool metal clay wedding bands adorned with the couple's thumbprints!

2008-06-25T16:32:00Z

This photo was submitted to the Art Jewelry magazine Subscriber Gallery recently, and I love the story and the rings so much, that I had to blog about it. Here's Glassjunkie's story, as well as an image of the great rings she made:

"I was contacted by a couple that had just gotten engaged....After learning about PMC, they thought it would be very meaningful to have rings made for each other with their thumb prints. When they contacted me, I thought the best bet would be for the rings to be made using Metal Clay Findings ring liners for extra strength and durability. I directed them to the web site so they could see what sizing and widths were available to them. After receiving my order I had the couple try on the liners to ensure proper sizing and got to work with my photopolymer plates. Before I knew it the order was complete, and the couple lived happily ever after!"

––Katie

summer by the lake — jewelry, ceramics, and all kinds of art

2008-06-24T21:14:00Z

Wisconsin was hit hard by winter this year — until official stats are all in, we won't know the hard numbers, but 2007/08 is currently hovering at #3 on the all-time worst winters of Wisconsin list. In Madison, they did manage to break the record for number of consecutive days with snowfall measuring an inch or more — 110 days in a row when the good people of Madison didn't see the ground.

No sooner did the snows recede than the rains started... of course, we all knew that if the weather was just a bit colder, all that water would be snow. But it was water, and it resulted in torrential downpours, flooding, and tornadoes. Jewelry and bead aficionados soldiered on; on two out of the three days that the Bead & Button Show's marketplace was open to the public, the public was sequestered on the show floor until the danger to the glass-fronted foyer passed. But the good humor and fortitude shown by the vendors, attendees, and staffers alike was incredible.

Now, we're seeing blue skies, finally. The long, hard winter (and wet, violent spring) makes days like this past Saturday all the more precious, as people turned out in high numbers to see and buy beautiful artwork in one of Milwaukee's most beautiful location — the festival grounds surrounding the Art Museum. The event was the 2008 Milwaukee Lakefront Festival of the Arts, a yearly gathering of high-end craft. I walked, I gawked, I ate, I sprawled on the (thankfully dry) grass and listened to live music, and yes, I bought. A truly great start to the summer — that's finally here!

(And a special call-out to photographer Perry Heideman, whose site I linked to above, and who has taken such lovely pictures of the Milwaukee Art Museum and the lakefront.)

You have one month left to see Either Side of the Skin — Penland School of Craft's human-body-inspired exhibit

2008-06-20T18:15:00Z

First of all, hurray for the first day of summer!!! And the longest day of the year! That should give us all extra time to get stuff done right? Riiight.

For those of you who plan to enjoy the season by going on vacation near the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, you may want to check out Penland School of Craft's current exhibit, Either Side of the Skin: Work inspired by or responding to the human body. Based on the way painter and writer Connie Bostic describes the exhibit in her review for Mountain Xpress, the exhibit sounds beautiful and thought-provoking. It's a multimedia exhibit, and Bostic points out a couple of notable jewelers: Yuyen Chang and Mary Ann Scherr. The exhibit will close Sunday, July 20, 2008, so make your travel plans now!

Even if you can't make it to the show, it's still interesting to consider what jewelry you would've made to fit the theme of the exhibit. Any ideas? Please share!!

And enjoy the beautiful weather!

—Kristin

Fostering creativity

2008-06-17T19:19:00Z

Mid-June is a special time of year in my family; my Mother's birthday falls within the same week as Father's Day, so we tend to observe both days as a package deal celebrating our parents. So, since it's a special time of year for me, here's a personal story — about creativity, and creative expression, and how to encourage it and help it to grow.

We've all seen commercials for whatever household cleaner is on sale, with the horrified mother finding her children happily drawing on her nice, clean walls, right? But, not to worry! With a quick spritz of whatever cleaner she's selling, she can wipe the wall clean of her child's drawings and all is right with the world.

One afternoon, when I was young — very young (but old enough to know better), my sister (who is older than me, and so who certainly was old enough to know better) and I entertained ourselves by drawing on the nice, white walls of our playroom with crayons. After some time, our Mother interrupted us, and we were horrified... we both had that immediate, sinking feeling of knowing we'd done something terribly wrong, no matter how much of a good idea it had seemed at the time. (We were known for having good ideas that turned out to be less than good, like the time we discovered that we could decorate a lightbulb with crayons — always with the crayons! — as long as the light was plugged in and the bulb was good and hot.)

She took one long, assessing look at the wall, and said quietly, "You don't want to do that." And then turned around and left the room.

There was no point in running. And there was no way we could hide what we'd done, or fix it. It was right there on the wall in Crayola colors. So we waited, silent and shamefaced, until she came back.

And she did come back — with paintbrushes and her own precious stores of oil paints. She sat down between us, and we each had a paintbrush, and we spent the rest of the afternoon decorating that wall.

I grew up, and that playroom became my bedroom and we eventually painted over the childish figures — with a truly regrettable shade of pink, but that's another story, and yet another time when my Mother allowed me to make my own creative choices. But I can still remember what those images looked like... there was a princess, of course, because there was always a princess. And birds, and trees, and a big brown wolf with six legs.

I remember that story whenever I see a commercial like the one I described, where the perfect TV mother wipes away her child's creative impulses in order to preserve her pristine white walls.

Playing with the new Bronze Clay -- the story of BC the snail

2008-06-16T21:59:00Z

Meet BC. He's a snail I made using the new Bronze Clay developed by Bill Struve (research chemist). Bill's also the thoughtful husband of LaceyAnn Struve, who first began working in metal clay in 2006. It was LaceyAnn's interest in metal clay that inspired Bill to develop another medium for LaceyAnn to work with. I had the pleasure of meeting LaceyAnn and Bill at the recent Bead&Button Show. I was at a table at the "Meet the Teachers" event, and had a copy of the July 2008 issue of AJ open to Hazel's article about the new Bronze Clay. Next to the magazine, I had displayed my experiments with the new Bronze Clay. LaceyAnn perused these samples and then pointed at the snail. She asked me, "What's his name?" I told her that he didn't have one yet. She quickly replied, "Call him BC!" And there you have it.

BC was my exercise to learn about how this new clay behaved. Addie and I spent days in the workroom playing with the clay. I began by sculpting a snail body with wet clay. Then I impressed clay into a polymer clay mold I had made from my extensive seashell collection. I wanted to see how much detail could be picked up. After letting both components dry completely, I pasted the clay shell to the body using homemade paste (distilled water and some lump Bronze Clay). I set the assembly aside to dry completely.

Of course, I had to test how easily I could carve into the dry clay, so I made some refinements to the snail body using a craft knife. The clay carved like butter. Then I fired the assembly according to the Bronze Clay firing specifications (the details are in the July 2008 issue of AJ).

BC shrank during firing (refining the details even more), and picked up a beautiful color. But when we tested the strength of the shell's bond to the body, BC's shell popped off! No worries. This was an opportunity to test whether homemade lavender oil paste would work to bond fired Broze Clay to another piece of fired Bronze Clay. So, I mixed up a batch of oil paste by adding lavender oil to my homemade Bronze paste. I then used the oil paste to reattach BC's shell. I also used the paste as if it were slip to give BC's body some fluid curves. After the assembly was completely dry, Addie and I fired BC again. This time, his shell held fast.

I can't wait to get my hands on more of the new Bronze Clay, which makes its official debut in about a month at the upcoming PMC Conference at Purdue University. Let me know if you're attending the conference. I'll be there representing the magazine, attending lectures and demos, and hopefully talking with lots of AJ readers! Oh, and I'll bring BC too. Cheers, Jill

Have you seen the July 2008 issue of Art Jewelry? Take our survey of the issue.

2008-06-11T18:35:00Z

If you've had a chance to look through the July 2008 issue of Art Jewelry (it's the one with the colorful anodized titanium bracelet by Noel Yovovich on the cover), please take our survey. Reader feedback is very important to us. We want to know what your favorite project was in the issue (and why), if you didn't like one of the projects (why not?), and what you'd like to see changed. The survey is anonymous, so go ahead, tell us what you really think!

––Katie

If you'll be at the Bead&Button Show to check out the great deals on tools and gems, stop by the silent auction to bid on an item, and vote for your favorite entry in the Bead Dreams Display

2008-06-04T19:52:00Z

The Bead&Button Show started this week, and Art Jewelry's editors have been in and out of the office all week, working on stories for the magazine, attending workshops, and teaching workshops. I'm not a beader, but there are plenty of things for non-beaders to see and do at the show.

I'm looking forward to working at the Bead Artists Against Breast Cancer Silent Auction booth. We auction off finished jewelry (made of metal clay, wire, glass, beads, and more), kits, books, and other fun jewelry-related items. If you're going to be at the show and are interested in participating in the silent auction, please check out the silent auction guidelines. The money raised is donated to the Medical College of Wisconsin Breast Cancer Research Foundation. If you're at the show on Friday or Saturday, please come and visit me (and bid on some cool stuff).

You'll also want to check out the entries in the Bead Dreams contest, which is run by our sister publication Bead&Button. Even those of us who don't bead enjoy seeing the creative things people have done with beads. There's also a section in the contest for polymer clay pieces. Each year, ribbons are awarded to the winners of the Bead Dreams contest. But they also give an award to the People's Choice winner. If you're at the show on Friday or Saturday, please vote for your favorite contest entry. You'll find the ballots near the Bead Dreams display in the 3rd floor lobby area. Votes must be in by 4 p.m. on Saturday.

See you at the show!

––Katie

How to care for your jewelry this summer (hint: watch out for saltwater and chlorine)

2008-05-30T18:34:00Z

For some of you in warmer climes, it may already feel like summer. But here in Wisconsin, it's unseasonably cold. We've had a depressing lack of 60–70-degree days in the last three months. So when I came across a blog post from Spectrum Art & Jewelry, a gallery located in Wilmington, N.C., about caring for jewelry in summertime, I was happily caught off guard. Not just because the thought of feeling warm without donning a sweater is still a distant daydream, but because the information in their post was news to me. Being one of the resident editorial people on staff (rather than a resident jewelry maker), I didn't know that saltwater and chlorine can affect certain metals. To learn more, click here to read Spectrum Art & Jewelry's blog post. They also provide some practical tips on how to vacation (or not) with your jewelry. I, for one, will be more careful with my jewelry when I finally FINALLY get to take a dip in a pool.

Have any of you ever had a bad experience with common summer chemicals reacting with jewelry? Saltwater, chlorine, sunscreen, etc.? I'd love to know if there's something else I should be keeping in mind!

—Kristin