Hammer Time

I do not enjoy hammering.  It makes me think of those arduous days welding in a tight spot, flailing away with my chipping hammer at some stubborn flux that wouldn't come free, but I couldn't get a grinder in there, and it probably was one of those welds that was going to be x-rayed so I couldn't just leave it.... 
But I wasn't welding this week I was "Forming", and I did really like the end products, just not all the hammering it took to get there!  When I use the skills I learned this week it will be in moderate doses, not a solid week at a time.

So, my biggest achievement was my chasing project, pictured above.  I'm a little surprised that I actually finished it.  Yay!  My next one will be a bit less involved.  I'm planning to use it as a box top on a leather box that I will make someday.  We also made synclastic (picture a curved shape that could hold water) and anticlastic (a curved shape that could not hold water) bangles and rings.  The anticlastic shape is more appealing to me, the synclastic too plain, although one of my classmates did a pierced design in hers and it is awesome.  The most sophisticated looking pieces we made were forged bangles, one in copper and one in silver.  Very chic looking if you're a bangle type of person.  And lastly we spent an entire day fold forming.  Lots of interesting shapes possible there, and, although everything we did was in copper and was just unfinished samples, Jeffrey Ellis showed us some finished pieces in silver that looked quite elegant.

Other than the one forged bangle, everything we made this week was copper.  With the application of heat we achieved some very exciting colour effects.  This makes me even more determined to find an ideal protective coating for these to prevent oxidation.  Several have been recommended over the last few weeks with varying levels of satisfaction: beeswax, floor wax, shoe polish, turtle car wax, or a spray on lacquer of some sort.  I had some gorgeous colours show up on my fold formed pieces, as well as on my chasing project that I didn't want to lose, so I purchased some turtle car wax, and have applied it to almost everything.  It didn't alter the oranges, red and pinks I'd achieved, in fact making the pinks even richer, but it did make the gorgeous blues on my chasing project vanish, boohoo.  Now I'll just have to assess the durability.  I've put it on my anticlastic ring that I intend to wear, so that should give me a decent idea if it will last.

Outside of school, the world is slowly melting in places.  The turkeys are venturing onto the bare patches of lawn to look for victuals, and they're talking about it too, in the mornings especially, sounding like something that's strangling.  Last weekend I took a little road trip to find the cottage where our family used to visit my grandparents in the summers when we were children.  It's still there, and looks much the same.  It's oddly reassuring that it hasn't been replaced by a mega-mansion, though why that should matter to me now I'm not sure.  I noticed the property next door is for sale, but couldn't find the listing online.  Just curious to know how the market value of a property that is mostly unchanged for the last 50 (?) + years has no doubt skyrocketed in this: The Muskoka Region.



Stones

Last weekend I took some family on a ski through the sculpture forest.  There was a lot less snow than when I'd first skiied it and I saw sculptures that I'd missed entirely the first time.  The pan-pipe playing goat pictured above is my new favorite.  Everyone should have one of these I think; maybe a small one to carry in your pocket, or a large one to sit outside your front door.

I always pick my favorites. Even when it doesn't matter. Which ikea kitchen do I prefer; which sports car (I don't even want a sports car!)... Our second fabrication week took top spot for the creative freedom we were given. I've decided this week is my favorite for new techniques learned. Stone setting ideas are percolating like mad. I wanted to make MORE samples. MORE. Yes! samples!. I had long believed I was allergic to samples, but this week I may have conquered it once and for all. I made bezels from 1mm thick silver, "crazy thick" I thought, but in fact very do-able and effective for many things. I also set a 1.7mm, 3 point black diamond in a flush setting and made a "beaded" prong setting with .8mm prongs. That's so much smaller than anything I've ever done before. I'm so excited to put these new diverse skills to use.

For my final assignment I made something I think I will submit for the Annual Member's Exhibit at Devon House this year.  I'm only giving you a sneak peak of it because I'm not sure ethically whether I should show something I intend to submit for an exhibit.  But I'm so happy with it!! 



I am sorry not to be in St.John's this weekend. Wesley Harris, silversmith and jeweller extraordinaire, has an exhibit opening at the Gallery at Devon House. To read an interview about his work follow this link to the Canadian Metal Arts guild site: http://www.metalartsguild.ca/ , his is the third (right now) artist profiled on the home page.  Below is information on the Devon House opening.

With the ongoing tragedy in Japan my Metal Clay Heads Team on Etsy has put together a treasury of items in support of relief for the victims of the disaster.  If you'd like to help out AND own a fine item of craft please check out this link: http://www.etsy.com/treasury/4d834c787a4d6d915fa94dc5/metal-clay-heads-disaster-relief

Halfway

I had trouble finding my momentum this week, after such a laid back week during Reading Break.  This was our second week of our split course of Art/Jewellery History and Surface Design.  We covered most of the course material in the first week, so this week wasn't as packed full of projects as I might have liked.  I certainly do enjoy seeing the slides of jewellery from the different eras though, very inspiring. 

In surface design we reticulated silver, with varying degrees of success.  I love that surface texture a lot, but it is time consuming to produce and would take some practice to repeat with consistent results.  We also did depletion gilding this week.  That turns silver a matte white colour, but it scratches SO easily I don't think I'd find an application for it.  Above is my sample for cold mechanical gilding, more commonly known as copper leaf (or gold, silver, aluminum leaf).  I roller printed a real leaf, and then tried to just place the copper leaf in that space.  Very finicky work.  And fragile unless sealed afterwards.  I'm finding I am disappointed with how fragile a lot of the surface treatments are.  They are susceptible to oxidation, scratching, and wear more than I would've thought, considering they are used by many jewellers on finished pieces.  Many surfaces are treated with a wax of one sort or another to seal the surface, but that doesn't last forever. 

We're halfway through the course now, and I'm feeling anxious to be back in my own studio churning out my own work.  At the same time, that comes with scary financial stresses, and means I have to leave a lot of the dreamy equipment I have access to here behind.  The price of silver is scary right now at $36, but our instructor this week says that when she started in the 70s it was $50 an ounce.  Ouch!

Taking a Break

The Haliburton Sculpture Forest is located right next to Haliburton School of the Arts in Glebe Park.  In the summer you can hike the trail that winds amongst the sculptures, but in the winter it is integrated into the Glebe Park Ski Trail System and walkers are not permitted.  Glad I brought my skiis!  The sculptures are given an additional sculptural element when covered in snow.  Some I had to look hard to find them at all, others just seemed to have nestled themselves in scarves of snow for the season.  It will be interesting to walk the trail in the spring after the snow is gone and get a different perspective.  Above is a detail from one of the first sculptures on the trail, Dreaming Stones, by Kevin Lockau.  Below are a selection of my favorites from the rest of the Forest.

Sound Vessel: Forest

by D.Dickson and A.Doolittle

(this sculpture has tall wind chimes inside - very neat)

Beaver: Large Beaver Contemplates Lamp post

(created by the arts students at Haliburton Highlands Secondary School, with support from artists M.A.Barkhouse and M.Belmore)

Moose Scraps

by L.Spa

(his nose is made of horseshoes)

Sleep of the Huntress

by D.Stephens

(she was completely hidden in her blanket of snow, but that didn't make for a very good photo!)

A Walk in the Woods in Haliburton

by M.E.Farrow

Standing Figure

by C.O'Neil

(I skiied right past this one and had to backtrack to find it)

It was with sighs of longing that I read through the newly released course calendar for the Haliburton School of the Arts summer sessions this week.  It's only a three hour drive north from Toronto, so if you're in the neighbourhood this summer, maybe you'd like to check out a creative workshop.  Shoe-making? Chainsaw Carving?  Encaustic Painting?  Millinery?  Most workshops are a week in duration.  http://www.hsta.ca/

Paper Jewels

Marta Scythes talks about paper and ink, charcoal and conte like some people talk about fine wines and cheeses.  You just want to feel as knowledgeable about her working materials as she does.  She taught us Drawing and Rendering this week.  Other students in the class had taken courses from her before and told the rest of us, who may not feel as confident about drawing as we could, that she would have us feeling proud of our accomplishments within the week, and she did.  The course was geared towards portraying gems, pearls, and metals using charcoal, conte, pencil crayons, and watercolours.  The colour theory we learned was immediately relevant to what we were drawing and painting, which helped make it stick in one's mind.  The most important concept she shared was the primary importance of Value in a picture, even more important than Colour.  And, for me, the placement of reflected light, as well as the finished look a a shadow can give an object.  I'd like sometime in the future to find time to take a watercolour course and build on what I've learned this week.  Marta has a beautiful website that shows the broad scope of her work at http://www.bmc.med.utoronto.ca/~marta/ , it's well worth a gander.

This was a short week because of family day falling on Monday, and unfortunately it did feel a bit rushed because of that.  It will take some discipline to practice all that was learned this week so that it doesn't fade from my mind.

I was in the mood for some poetry this week and found myself wandering around a great site: http://www.library.utoronto.ca/canpoetry/index_poet.htm  All Canadian poets, I found a very perceptive poem about cats, as well as one about the importance of the moments in-between all the Things we think we're living for.  I suppose I should be remembering the poets names as well, but they're not on the tip of my tongue just now. 

I'll end this post here so I can get in to the studio and work some more on my chasing project.  Why oh why I was so ambitious with that design I'm just not sure.  But I keep tapping away at it in the continued hope (delusion?) that it will be done in time for our second week of Forming.  (Note to self: bite off more than you can chew only when no one else is around to see you choke...)  No choking this week though, it's Reading Week, yay, I'm off to visit dear old friends and family, perhaps I'll fit in a post about the Sculpture Forest next weekend, since I won't have jewellery tales to tell. 





Creative Freedom!

Group Critique

Well this has been the best week yet!  I really appreciated Susan Butz's teaching style.  (http://www.windyridgestudio.ca/)  She introduced a technique each day and then we were able to take it in our own direction to create a piece of jewellery.  Wonderful!  I believe our whole class found it rewarding this week to have that creative freedom.  There were certainly some amazing pieces made by everyone.  I'm including a few images of my classmates' work this post.  It was great to explore my own ideas, but also exciting to see what direction others had taken with the same technique.  Monday we did samples, Tuesday we did a sweat soldered project, Wednesday a riveted project, Thursday a finding that would be the focal point on a piece of jewellery, and Friday we finished up and had a critique.  Below are some examples of the week's efforts.

 

 

Godzilla and Cityscape pendant

Dapper Octopus brooch

by Ashley Neville

Riveted Horse brooch

by Brittney Howe

Steampunk Airship

by Tomas Hiseler

And my three pieces:

a box clasp that will eventually be a pendant, featuring a kingfisher overlooking some fish,

a riveted flower brooch,

and a sweat soldered ring

I felt inspired to stretch myself a little outside my comfort zone with the box clasp.  The design came together quite well in the end, and I certainly learned some things in making it.  And while I've thought of the importance of functionality with regards to patinas, kinetic components and the placement of gems and other elements before, this week I've had to consider the practicality of different surface finishes with regards to wear and tear.  I do love the contrast of a sandblasted finish alongside a glossy one, but in fact the sandblasted areas must be protected from getting scratched, and, as seems to (mysteriously) be the case with copper, getting wet.  That perplexes me still, but I'm test driving the brooch to see how the elements will impact it's appearance.  I'd love to show a more detailed image of the box clasp, but Susan Butz still has it for grading purposes.  Often a matte finish seems the better choice when a piece might suffer occasional abrasion of one sort or another, but it does appear that sandblasted surfaces don't disguise marks easily.  Time will tell.

Friday was an especially great day this week for a few reasons.  We were served a free lunch (someone knows the way to a busy student's heart!).  The meal was in fact part of an aboriginal showcase of sorts that was hosted by the college.  There was a drum circle, and dancers in regalia, info booths, and more. Unfortunately I did have a box clasp I was trying desperately to get finished so was unable to linger and see all the performances.  The meal was delicious though; bison stew, wild rice casserole, a bean casserole under a cornbread crust, salmon, blueberries and strawberries, and cheese bannock/tea buns.  And to cap off the day I traveled down to the Big City to spend the holiday weekend with family.  Shared a most enjoyable glass of wine at the end of a great week!  Here's to many more!

Becoming a Smith

Torque

This week was exciting and challenging. Our instructor was Jeffrey Ellis (http://www.silversmith.ca/), a very skilled and patient silversmith. He introduced us to chasing and repousee. I have tackled a large and detailed project that I'll need to work very hard on in order to have it far enough along when we do our second week of study with him. We also learned about peening, making several hammers that we then used to create a tube, a spiculum, and finally a torque, which we then shaped into a necklace (above). And I finally have the basic knowledge required to sink flat metal into bowl shapes. It seems like it wouldn't take much to form a bowl shape, but from experience I can certainly say that now I know the right steps, it's a logical process to master rather than an argument with a piece of resistant flat metal like it has been in the past! It was nice to finish this week with tool making skills as well, in addition to hammers we also made some chasing tools to suit our individual needs. A very rewarding week punctuated with a lovely lunch and studio tour at Jeffrey and Susan (from week one and two)'s house. Splendid!

I've been collecting pictures of the proliferous and varied shelf fungi on my ski trips. Some of them are huge! And in winter they certainly function as shelves too. In the one photo I've positioned a dime in the tree bark so you can see the scale. Still not seeing alot of birds although I did hear one and I don't know what it is. It sounded like if you were rubbing your finger back and forth on a squeaky clean surface really quickly. I did see a tumult (my label. Read: flock) of turkeys but they retreated over a snowy embankment as I approached, so there's only a few in the picture.

I had a grand time snowshoeing and lunching with some classmates this weekend and so once again this post won't make it to my blog until Monday when I can access the computer lab at school to add the photos. I had been spending time at the school on Saturdays during open studio time, but it's great to be making memories here outside the classroom as well.