Laziness is costly!

Today was the Second Saturday at the National Transit Studios.  Every month on this day a majority of the artists are in their studios from 12:00-5:00.   The studios are one of Oil City's best kept secrets (even though we try to get the word out there.)  Many times Second Saturday is poorly attended and considering the weather this weekend, we had no reason to expect anything but the usual.  But, surprisingly it was quite busy today.  Many people decided to stop down and see what we were all about.

I had a chance to share information about metal clay with quite a few, talk to a former student who now lives in London where she works as a model, talk to the mother of a former student who is majoring in art at Edinboro University and catch up with a couple who attended a demo I did over a year ago.  I made contacts for possible students and just plain met some very nice people.

It's interesting to hear people's perspective on things.  In yesterdays post I said how messy my studio was.  Well, today a visitor made the comment about how neat my studio was.  Go figure!

Today I also saw how costly being lazy can be.  The price of silver has skyrocketed since I started making metal clay and many of the pieces I made early on carry the price calculated on the price of clay at the time.  Instead of updating the prices, I decided to leave them the same.  (Too much work to go back and do all the recalculating.  Besides, if I had to reprint all the pages of my catalogue, the ink alone would cost me a bundle.  At least that's what I told myself. )  Anyway, I sold a ring today and just for the  fun (?) of it, decided to recalculate the cost to remake the piece at today's prices.  Using the same formula, the same price per hour and the same overhead charge, todays charge would be $12 more due to the increase cost of silver.  (Multiply that by the amount of inventory I have of finished pieces and that's a big chunk of change.)  Maybe I'll find some energy somewhere.

I also fired the slip trailed earrings today and managed to get both firings done.  Before I left the studio today, I polished the pieces and added a patina.  The unfinished pieces looked like there wasn't much there.  But, once the pieces were fired I was quite satisfied.  The slip did show up well.  Just in case, I had drilled a hole at the bottom so I could add a spot of color in the form of a bead.  Oh me of little faith!

Variations on a Photo Polymer Plate

One of the reasons I like working with metal clay is that techniques from other media can be used.   From the art of print making, we get the photo polymer plate.  Photo polymer emulsion is used to create stencils on a silk screen and the plates are used to print letter press, blind embossing, intaglio printing and to create a dry offset plate.  In metal clay, we use the plate to create a "mold" for our clay.

The plate material is UV photosensitive and has to be kept in the dark until ready to be used.  A high contrast negative is printed on a clear transparency sheet and this sheet is placed on the plate, then exposed to UV light and finally washed with plain water.  The unexposed portions of the negative (the black areas) will wash out leaving a recessed area in the shape of the blackened areas.

Metal clay is rolled out onto the PPP plate. The recessed areas of the plate now project from the clay and the opposite areas are now recessed.  The finished plates have to be kept oiled and in a dark area.  The polymer plates can become brittle over time and can break.  Some of the plates come mounted on a metal plate and these don't seem to bend like unmounted plates do.

The PPP plates are a perfect mold for creating the inlay designs with copper and bronze clay so I pulled out my collection of plates and gave a few of them a try.  The photos here show some of the variety of finishes and clays I've used with a PPP plate.

Here is the exposed PPP plate.  This design was based on a necklace I fashioned after an Ojibway Indian Design.  The original necklace was loosely based on the design and this earring design was taken even farther. 

The first earrings made with the plate were silver.  I actually made two pair and colored both pair with enamel.  (Sorry but the picture isn't the best.)

I used silver again when I used the plate for the third time.  This time I just polished them up and added a patina. 

Yesterday, I tried using the copper and bronze inlay technique with the plate.

It's interesting how different a look each pair gets just by using a different metal or a different coloring technique.  

 

The Jury is in on Hadar's copper clay

I love Hadar's copper clay!

Tiny Dancer

I bet you looked at that top piece in the last post and thought "What the heck?"

This piece was made by draping and folding a thin sheet of copper clay as if it were a piece of fabric.  There was no idea in mind when I started (so what else is new) but as I looked at the piece it had a fluid feel to it which reminded me of a dancer.  I added a head at the top, carved into the leg area to add to the movement and finished it off with a pink sapphire.

Working with the clays is like opening a present at Christmas.  The piece changes so much from it's dry leather hard stage to the finished metal piece when it comes out of the kiln.  (Once in a long while, it's a big letdown.  Things happen in the kiln that are not pretty.  That's when I have flashbacks to the robotic sweeper my husband got me one year for Christmas.  Those who know me, know that story.)   Then, it's Christmas again when I take the flex-shaft to it to polish it up.  What a difference!

I hear music when I look at this piece.

Fresh out of the kiln

These aren't the pieces in the previous post, but they are copper and they are fresh out of the kiln.  This is the first time that any of my pieces have shown any kind of color after firing.  Usually they have been a very dull brown color.

Sometimes the colors that appear on copper and bronze are worth saving. In order to do that it is necessary not to polish them or the color will be lost.  Eventually the color will just darken and disappear as the metal tarnishes.  But, as you can see, the color on the large piece is definitely not worth saving. My friend Carol Scheftic ( http://convergentseries.wordpress.com) has been getting some nice colors on her pieces lately and check out the gorgeous bronze pieces at (http://gaillannum.blogspot.com.)

Draping

      One of the reasons I like metal clay so much is because it incorporates a variety of techniques from other mediums.  I became an art teacher because I like to do it all and metal clay still gives me that chance. 

     The technique I was playing with the other day was draping, which comes from the ceramic world.  I had forgotten all about the technique until I saw it in Hadar Jacobson's book.  I use to teach it to my 3-D students where we would roll out the clay into a thin slab and then drape the clay over a form (usually upended bowl.)

     In metal clay, the clay is rolled thin (I made mine 2 cards thick) and then draped over an object or folded back on itself.   The clay sheet can be manipulated as though it were fabric.  

     The left hand piece was a rather large drape.  It's in the greenware stage and will be worked on some more.  The two round pieces are fired and were supposed to be a matching pair of earrings but my brain could just not get them draped the same way.  Doing the drape in reverse (as is needed) for earrings just befuddled my mind more than it usually is.

     I was a little nervous when I opened the kiln.  I figured that the two round pieces would need to be fired again.  They were all copper and were fired with a couple  pieces of copper and bronze combined.  Copper is to be fired at a higher temperature unless it is fired with bronze.  Obviously, as long as there is bronze in the kiln, it must work because they were sintered just fine.  They were also a very pretty color. 

Can't keep a Ginkgo down

A few posts back I was lamenting the fact that the Ginkgo tree along the path I walk to the studio had been trimmed.   And, all the branches (and leaves) were no longer within my reach.  (But some of the path has such low hanging branches that I have to duck to walk through there.  Can't figure out why they weren't trimmed.)

Well, you can't keep a Ginkgo tree down.  There were five little leaves breaking through where a branch had been cut off.  So I was able to get one last leaf today to use with the metal clay.

Since we were working with copper clay today, I now have a copper version of the Ginkgo for a pendant.  (At least in the greenware state.  Will wait and see what happens when it's fired.)