7 out of 14 Chickens...

Here is some progress on my chickens. I worked out I will need 14 in all. And they will all need eggs, of course...

I have engraved them as much as I dared, and added some eyes as well.

Silver chickens

I would really love to work on this some more today, but I am busy writing my artist statement instead. It has to be done, and that's that. I need to hand it in on Thursday, and however tempting it is to just use the artist statement generator, I will protest quietly, and persevere...

Berries

Busy busy day, all I have to offer are some photos of berries, spotted in a garden in Stoke Newington earlier. I have no idea what they are, but they are very pretty!

Seaweed is Good for You #3

I have just refreshed my Esty treasury 'Seaweed is Good for You', as most of the items I had put in seem to have disappeared  - I should look at it more often...

So - for the 3rd time - Seaweed is GOOD for you! Have a look at all these lovely seaweedy things!

Click here to go to the treasury on Etsy

Engraving Lesson #3

In this lesson we learned how to sharpen and use round and flat gravers, how to make a spear drill out of a needle, and then different texture fills using 'wiggling', and using a line tool.

We were also shown a cool technique of putting liquid soap over engraving to see what it would look like under enamel. I would probably never have thought of that, and it seems like a really handy tip!

Blue Fairy Liquid over the tutor's sample piece, to show how it would look under enamel

My texture samples. I fell in love with the line tool (makes a few lines simultaneously)
Apparently my lines aren't bold enough though. I will have to improve!

Some Silver Chickens

Have started *at last* to work on some of the pieces I intend to show at New Designers. I won't post them completed before the show, as that will spoil any suspense, but I might post bits and bobs. Like today - I've been  making silver chickens, that will be part of something. There will be lots of them!

Cambridge Gargoyle and River

My sister is in the UK on a visit with her husband and baby. I took them to Cambridge to look around. It's a really gorgeous place, I'll have to explore some more! No idea why I haven't been there more often before, it's only about an hour away from where I live.

Here is a gargoyle from one of the churches, and the river.

Artist Statement Generator

One of many, many things I have to prepare for New Designers in June, apart from a collection of jewellery,  is an artist statement. Some people find this kind of thing very easy - but not me. So I turned to the web for help...
I found an artist statement generator, that you have to check out - it's quite funny!

http://www.artybollocks.com/ 

Engraving Lesson #2

The second engraving lesson just flew past! We were shown how to grind a proper cutting edge on a square graver, then we had to practice....
The teacher makes it look so easy, but then he has had probably over 40 years experience. It is most definitely not easy!

Square graver cut into shape

Square graver - side view

My practice sheet - what a mess :-)

Back to my Bench at Last...

After lots of enamelling, I finally had a chance to return to my workbench and make some pottery shard earrings. In this case - studs made out of a pale blueish grey textured piece of what is most probably Westerwald stoneware.
(I can't identify these precisely but I did spot some very similar textures on Westerwald ceramics at the V&A).

On their way their new owner right now - I hope she likes them!

Blueish Grey Textured Pottery Shard Studs

They are pretty tiny...

Small studs...

And here are some dot earrings that were a request:

pottery shard and sterling silver dot earrings

I'm in a Magazine!

This very blog has been featured in the current edition of Beads & Beyond magazine, thanks so much to Jo of Daisychain Designs! I won't go on about it but I'm very happy!

April 2012 edition of Beads & Beyond magazine

This blog is featured as Blog of the Month :-)

Roman Animal Brooches

Seeing the Roman brooch in Hertford Museum reminded me how much I love them, so I did (another) image search and found some that I had never seen before. They are gorgeous! My favourite though is the seahorse.

Roman Enamelled Frog Brooch

Roman Enamelled Hare Brooch

Roman Enamelled Hare Brooch

Roman Enamelled Seahorse Brooch

Roman Enamelled Owl Brooch

Roman Enamelled Raven Brooch

Hertford

My friend has set up her jewellery studio in Hertford, so I popped in to visit her today. Hertford is the county town of Hertfordshire, and is about 20 minutes drive from me. I've driven through there but never actually stopped to have a look, so today was a perfect opportunity. (Apparently Deep Purple formed there in 1968 - I just read that on Wikipedia).
I visited the museum (tiny but good) and the castle (not very old). There are lots of really nice old buildings though, some of them medieval, and it looks like a nice place to have a studio.

Surprisingly I found one of my favourite type of enamelled Roman brooches in the museum, and a couple of old spooky faced vintage dolls as well.
I didn't take photos of the rather splendid old toothbrush display... And now I'm regretting that :-)

The images aren't great as there wasn't much light, but I did my best... The beautiful orange house is 15th century, and is now an antiques shop.

Spooky faced old doll, Hertford Museum

Spooky faced old doll, Hertford Museum
I love the painted details around the eyes. The white spot on her forehead is a window reflection.

Enamelled Roman Brooch

Beckwith and Son Antiques

Engraving Lesson #1

Something I have been looking forward to for ages - an engraving course that started last night. Basse-taille enamelling uses lots of engraving to make patterns that will show up underneath the enamel. I have tried a little, but you really have to learn this properly, then practice... for years!

We started from the very beginning - learning how to transfer a design (a lion in this case) from paper to metal. It's done the traditional way with acetate and charcoal dust, a bit messy but fun. We were also shown the first steps of how to shape and sharpen tools - which I think is the main and most difficult part of engraving, but we shall see!

I was sitting at the workbench of a master engraver, in a basement workshop in the depths of Clerkenwell, so I couldn't resist taking a picture of his pile of engraving tools...

My homework is to scribe the lion onto the copper plate.

First steps in transferring the image to metal

Burnishing the design onto the metal. Charcoal dust is messy stuff!

Engraver's tools 

Rorschach Ink Blot Pig

This is the ink blot that was left on my palette after some sketching. It looks just like a pig profile.... Don't you think?

This is the unadulterated blot

A bit of clean up...

And here he is...

I know, I know, probably not the best use of my time, but I couldn't help myself. Anyway, I'm celebrating the return (although it may just be temporary) of my broadband! Yay!

Etched Brass Plates

The reason I haven't been blogging is that I haven't had an internet connection for the last few days. In fact I still don't - I'm writing this from my mum's house. I'm a complete internet addict, so it's been quite difficult! One gets so used to being able to look up everything in seconds...

Anyway, I have still been very busy on the jewellery front. Yesterday afternoon I decided it was time to try out Press and Peel paper for etching some brass plates, to be used in a rolling mill.

I made the design in positive and negative to see the different results. At first I couldn't get the design to transfer from the press-n-peel to the brass by ironing it on, and wasted about half a sheet of transfers trying out various iron settings and times. In the end - it only worked for me by putting the iron straight on the brass for 2 minutes, then quickly placing the press-n-peel on top, pressing and smoothing it out with my hand whilst wearing my kiln gloves. I know, a bit extreme, but I wasn't going to let that stuff get the better of me. I don't give up :-)

I don't think I have it down to a fine art quite yet, but the results were interesting...

Brass plates with the press-n-peel transfer, negative and positive

After etching - the top one is in negative and should make a raised print.

Copper shapes rolled with the negative design brass plate - the one of the left was pressed tighter so the design is higher

Copper shapes rolled with the positive design  plate so the leaves are recessed.

Creative Copper Clay Review

Since the rise and rise of the price of silver, I very rarely use silver clay any more, even though it's fun to work with, and useful for some designs. Instead - I make my test pieces in copper clay, and if they are successful - they can be cast in silver. I have used Art Clay Copper in the past, but decided to try a new brand - Creative Copper Clay, which is made in Turkey. It comes in syringe form as well. There is also Bronze which I have never tried.

It's really easy to use, extremely strong when dry (when you need to work on the pieces by sanding them etc') and it fired nicely in the kiln at 920C for 30 minutes, as suggested on the packet. The pieces came out black, and shed loads of firescale - so much so that I thought the patterns would disappear - but they didn't - they came out very well after pickling. The shrinkage was also minimal - about 5-6%.

The only problem I have had with these pieces is when trying to solder them - they seem to soak up huge quantities of solder, even when I have burnished the place to be soldered. So if you decide to use it - I would stick to pieces with holes in them for jump rings or cold connections. I have not tried torch firing with this brand yet - but I will get back to you on that...

You can buy it at Rashbel, and at £12.46 (plus V.A.T) for 50g you can afford to be a lot more experimental than with Silver PMC - £112 (Plus V.A.T)