Something a Little Different

At the beginning of the semester, I found myself having trouble motivating myself to get into the studio to work. I was beginning to feel the weight of my actions against the environment and questioning whether my work was really worth the damage. Also, as you can probably tell from last weeks post, I was still feeling a little jumpy in the studio. 

Metal is one of those materials where practically anything is possible and for me, it's easy to get lost in that sea of possibilities. So, I decided that my artistic liberation comes from rules and restrictions. I needed guidelines to help me focus. For this piece I only allowed myself to work with tools which will be easily accessible to me after my access to the VCU studio is gone. I wanted to see what I could make using only cold working techniques.

I'm not overly fond of the way this piece turned out. In my opinion, it lacks movement but, it was a lot of fun to make and I learned a lot along the way. I am positive that the techniques used here will find their way into my newer work.

Everything starts with a sketch for me. This one just had to be drawn at 3am on Tuesday morning and was a right bee in my bonnet until it was done. Sometimes you just have to get something out of your system. Just to see. 

I always make a paper model first. Sometimes I might make a copper model instead/ too. This saves me from making any mistakes when using the "good" metal, silver. 

I make sure I'm using my silver economically by carefully choosing where to cut. 

I save my scrap silver to melt down into ingots to make sheet metal and wire. 

The clasp for this necklace is hidden. 

I use a traditional blackwork pattern as the decorative feature instead of setting stones or gems. 

This whole piece is kept together with rivets and stitching. 

Tape covers the embroidery to prevent it from getting dirty during clean-up.

The best part about this necklace is it can be easily taken apart and recycled. There's no pesky solder here to worry about getting into my ingots!

It's a little bit different, isn't it? But I had fun making it and it certainly kept me coming into the studio regularly. I'm now in a good routine and making daily. Which means, more blog posts!