Saturday, July 29, 2017

Twisted Fringe

Boulder Turquoise Necklace
While in Tuscon last January, I found a few Boulder Turquoise cabochons.  Boulder Turquoise is also referred to as Ribbon Turquoise. Lapidarists  cut the stone so the turquoise presented in a thin strip through its host stone.  I made two necklaces and a pair of earrings.  the necklace above has gone ton the Artery along with the earrings.  I will keep the second necklace as I really love this stone!  It looks so naturals if this is how you might come across turquoise while digging!  The fringe is twisted.  This is the first time I attempted twisted fringe (which I have always admired and wondered how they did that!).  Twisting the fringe is a bit tedious but the look is well worth it!  The blues and greens in the beadwork complement the turquoise in the cabochon which changes from a deep green to a bright blue.  Lots of fun making these necklaces!  

Monday, July 17, 2017

Art and Sole: Fundraiser for Joshuas House

I took break from beading to create this collage, "Kickin' It" for the Art and Sole Fundraiser in Scaramento.  The funds raised through this auction of artwork will be donated to Joshuas's House, a soon to be built hospice for the homeless.  I had soooo much fun with this project.  I have been a fan of Finnabair for a while and wanted to create a collage/assemblage using various gels and heavy past mediums.  I used my sons shoes and that is his portrait in the collage.  For the portrait I used Golden GAC800 medium to make a photo transfer which was then attached to the canvas using Golden medium as a sort of glue.  I also used  Golden products to stiffen the shoelaces and upper shoe, which was used to create a hat.  There are all kinds of components used in the collage;  vintage keys and watch parts, computer circuits, vintage bottle caps, brass findings, clock hands, and a few small photo transfers.  Anyhow, it was great fun and I looked forward to creating more collages/assemblages in the future.

Thursday, April 13, 2017

Gallery Shows

 Amaterasus' Messenger was display at Blue Line Arts Gallery in Roseville, CA during the month of March.  The show was entitled
"To The Touch" and selected participants presented work that the viewer would want to touch and feel.  In this collar, I surrounded a beautiful and large blue agate with pheasant feathers.  Everything is stitched on metallic grey lambskin, glove quality leather....very luxurious!  The fringe really makes the collar quite luscious; it was a last minute decision to add the fringe.  The collar closure is a vintage brass button that looks great with the piece!

Amaterasu is a Japanese sun goddess who often used pheasants as her messengers, thus the name of this collar.  It was great fun creating a piece of jewelry for a gallery show and really pushed me out of my artistic routine!
This necklace was made for a "Black and White" show which ran through the month of February at the Pence Gallery in Davis, CA.  It was quite difficult to make this piece work.  In the beading world no two whites are alike and so it was a bit of a challenge to finds a group of whites that worked well together!  The necklace has a wonderful Art Deco feel to it.
The square cabochons are Onyx surrounded by longer frosty white bugle beads and and even longer black bugle beads.  The center piece is finished off with a spiral rope of Swarovski white opal bicone crystals and black glass beads.  the closure is a vintage black glass button that works well with the piece.

I am very pleased with the results!