Taking Bigfoot Golfing, Retro Image Thingies and other Potential Oddities

Taking Bigfoot Golfing

Well, having been through a mini frenzy of making odd, not really jewellery - not really anything else, type things involving model railway figures etc, I have stopped to take a breath and have a think about what and where it is all going, and if indeed it has to 'go' anywhere anyway. . .

Blue Bear says 'Hi'

As you probably noticed, the background images I have been using are rather wonderful, out of register, retro graphics of the cheap, far eastern variety. These ones date from around the nineteen sixties and are taken from some Japanese made water transfer sets I acquired from an Ebay source. I think they are beautiful in their unpretentious simplicity and depiction of various, often western (some are of cowboys, so the word Western is apt) cultural artifacts as seen through the lens of another culture and Art tradition etc. I don't imagine that they were ever intended to be admired as artworks as such, and probably you think I am nuts to love them so much ;-) Yeah, well. . .

A Bad Guy brooch

I've been trying to see how they want to be used. I tried putting them together with electronic components and upcycled wire grids and the like, which worked OK, but it felt like I was doing the same old thing that I do with my digital abstract images, without getting a feel for how these new images work with other materials. 

They are nice on their own as simple brooches or buttons, or just as image tile drops with a single hole at the top, but I can't help feeling there is something else I can do with them. I'll get there, I just need to give it time and space to emerge. . .

More Bad Guys

Godzilla or somesuch

TrainDeer

Pairing them with little plastic animals from the same source has some promise, as does using the little animals on their own with other bits and pieces. Sort of surreal dioramas or scenes can be constructed with their own weird stories or non-stories. . . hmmm. . .

I'll continue to mull this over, meanwhile making various beads and such. I'll let you know how I get on. .

cheers, 

Jon x

Well, Well. . That Went Well. . .

So after all the hand wringing and anxiety about the showcase thingy, it turned out to be a big success. A bit nuts to be honest, but in a good way ;-) So I shall most likely do another one, but not for a couple of months I don't think. Meanwhile I shall carry on listing a few things on Tuesdays and Thursdays, without expecting much to happen, it being holiday season and all.

As for us, we have no plans for Christmas yet - no idea what to get anybody for presents and no idea what we want them to get us. So no change there ;-) Funny how when you're young, you have a list of wonderful things you desperately want, but when you get older, there really isn't anything much (in anyone's price bracket!) that you want at all. Hence all those 'Gifts' you see everywhere. Things ultimately destined for the back of the cupboard but which at least tick Auntie Emma off the Xmas prezzie list. . . Cynical? Moi?

And of course we have this bleedin election coming up. I shall vote but it will be a waste as 'the other lot' are very safe in this neck of the woods, (whatever a neck of the woods actually is).

It amazes me that with all the headline writers in the world, that nobody has used the phrase 'Brexistential Crisis', not that I have seen anyway. Slackers. I thought of it on day one. God I'm so witty. . . ;-)

Meantime I shall ignore the News and stick to acceptable music radio stations like 6 Music (a UK thing) and occasionally check the BBC World Service, which is a good reminder that there is a World out there full of people with very different concerns to us, but which are just as valid. He said, piously polishing his halo.

Bead and component work wise, just to wind down from the showcase frenzy of a few days ago I have been making a few simple, textured disk beads using one or two of the small, wooden, Indian printing blocks I have accumulated in the last few years.

My simple technique was to squash a small ball of poly clay into one tex block with the flat, reverse side of another one to give me a deeply textured, slightly irregular, disk with a flat back. The inspiration being those old stamped coins from Roman and Saxon times (or before in other parts of the world).

On some of them I pressed the back of a block onto the raised texture to flatten it out slightly and to give it a faint wood grain texture.

After baking, I messed around with alcohol inks, gilder's paste and maybe some discreet sanding and waxing and some rubbing to emphasise the resulting textures. In case you were interested. . .

No domestic drama on the home front since the 'wheelbarrow incident', thankfully. Though the down side of life being relatively uneventful is that it doesn't make for very interesting blog posts. . .

Though, as we appear to be living in 'Interesting Times' right now, uneventful is good.

Until next time, Jon x

Comet

Been a long "Month". . . ;-) The Perrennial Sticky Subject - Pricing - Greed, Guilt and Overthinking

Well, I signed off my last post with the words, 'See you in a month' or something along those lines. Yeah right. . .  ;-)

I kind of lost a bit of enthusiasm and motivation for writing about what I have been doing. I just settled in to making stuff and selling it on Facebook, and repeat. . Things I could have talked about but never felt the urge to do so. I still posted on Instagram, and kept my Etsy shop ticking over but my blog was sidelined.

So, six months later, I am making the effort to post again.

Why? Well. . .

I am overthinking myself into a semi-catatonic state about pricing and the seeming necessity to justify same. And I need to work out what is bothering me and why. . . And I need to bore you with it too.

The trouble is that when I make one of my larger, assemblage style pieces, and feel that said piece is extra pretty damn special I want the price to reflect that, but don't feel I can get away with charging the price I feel like charging. Often I end up not putting the piece up for sale to avoid having to worry about how much to charge etc. . . Then it just sits there looking at me. . . ;-)

It feels like I am literally asking too much of my buyers. It doesn't feel 'right'. That it's somehow mercenary and demeaning to link financial value to my subjective opinion of a piece. I'm an artist, I should be above that worldly commercial stuff ;-)
But then again that is a pretty silly, naive, and unrealistic angle to take on what is a commercial decision. It betrays contradictory emotions about money and creativity. I make stuff in order to sell it, or at least with that possibility very much under consideration, I enjoy the process of selling and get a kick out of making, not huge, but certainly useful amounts of money every week, so why do I feel it is somehow wrong to want to ask for more when I deem it appropriate?





Is it lack of confidence? Because I might be wrong, and the piece in question is actually a load of rubbish and not special at all.
In which case nobody will buy it of course. .

Who do I think I am? Do I have an over inflated idea of what my creative efforts are worth?
Same answer as above.

Not wanting to appear greedy is definitely one reason. But then who is judging?
If something is considered too expensive nobody will buy it. Duh. . .

Another reason is that I seem to closely identify with the commercial consideration of the buyer. After all, they have to sell whatever they make using my work, at a profit, and I worry that they will be left with an expensive piece of jewellery that nobody will buy due to the price they have to charge, which will be all my fault! ;-)
In which event, of course, they will curse my name forever and never buy from me again.

So I feel somehow responsible for other people's actions and decisions, which is also silly, naive and unrealistic. . . though possibly faintly endearing, or just annoying. It annoys me!

So where are we? In a tangled mess, that's where. .

As you will no doubt have worked out ages ago, the obvious course of action this hand wringing and overthinking is pointing to is to shut the heck up, get over myself, charge whatever I feel is right and take the consequences.

Sorted. . .

Thank you for indulging my tortuous mental processes, it's been useful for me anyways ;-)

See you next time, could be sooner than you think. . Less than six months anyway.

Jon x

Having a Bit of a Turn, Going For The Throat, Getting it in the Neck, Hanging by a Thread, etc etc. . .

In a moment of inspiration, I actually thought of something for my wife to get me for Christmas just passed. I find that just one of the many downsides of being all grown up (technically at least) is that you struggle to find anything you actually want for Christmas. Anything within a reasonable price bracket anyway. Grown ups are so boring. . .

Talking of which, I actually asked my kids to get me some slippers this year, sheesh, what happened to me??

But contrary to expectation, this festive season found me prepared.
"I'll have one of those cheap Chinese micro-lathes" I said. "Please."
And that's what I got ;-)

I've only had a bit of a play with it so far, but it's pretty good. All I want to do with it is cut groovy grooves in polymer clay, or wooden beads, which is relatively undemanding. I tried it on some wooden beads I picked up in a charity shop a while ago, and once I had stopped the bead from slipping too much it worked OK. (I need something called a 'drive centre', I'm looking into it but for now I am using a countersink from my power drill which works up to a point. .)

I seem to have gone all vibrant, colour wise. . . hmmm. .

I made some experimental, randomly grooved beads, which I then painted with alcohol inks and varnished. I like how they came out even though they soaked up the varnish somewhat. I will make some plain poly clay tube beads to experiment on next. As well as scouring the charity shops for more wooden beads to mess up of course.

A double grid, ancient lino, plastic sleeving and early JBD experimental poly clay claws. Kind of Industrial Gothic

The other thing I have been slowly venturing towards is making actual necklaces using my eccentric grid based pendant focal things. Rather than selling them on for other people to have all the the fun, I have been considering how I would hang them myself, in a way that is a bit more arty and considered than just sticking them on a bit of chain.

Modelled by Ethel, the dummy retrieved from the local dump for £2 a year or two ago.The last of the big spenders, me. .

Well, that said, I have actually stuck one or two on some simple chain, but chain that consists of large, artily crude, home made (by me) links that suit the vibe of the piece. Using plain copper or upcycled garden wire hammered flat(ish) for strength and because I like how it looks.

A large image transfer poly clay square with some double sided through drilled squares that matched the colour

 I am encouraged by the results and am considering trying to sell some pieces. I admit to feeling somewhat intimidated by this prospect, as the subject of price rears it's contentious head. . .

Ethel again, showing you how it should be worn

Also, I am not entirely sure where to sell. I need to research some Facebook groups I think and ask around for some feedback and advice. Any thoughts you may have on the matter would be gratefully received ;-)

So here are some more things I have been working on. . .

Enjoy. .. and see you next time,

Jon x

Electronic components, a poly clay im trans square and a plastic railway figure

A bit long maybe?

Two fuses and a big electronic whatsit in a nice shade of blue

Copper links this time

Landmarks Rushing By. . . Domestic Stuff - Who Do We Think We Are? . . ;-) Cats, and of course, Beads/Drops/Thingies

I only noticed the other day, quite by chance, that I had reached an interesting landmark. It was four years ago on the 3rd of October, that I made my first bead sale on Etsy. (and probably about six months before that, that I had encountered my first bit of polymer clay) The beads in the pic were the ones I sold, and the buyer (from the West Coast USA) rejoiced in the rather wonderful surname of Carefree Buffalo. . . Not the sort of surname you get in the UK ;-) 

It only occurred to me later that this might be a native american name, but the image of a carefree buffalo skipping over the prairie, probably wearing my beads, still makes me smile.

Well, my Etsy shop is still chugging along four years later, on about 1200 sales now, and making beads has become a important part of my life, from being something it would never have occurred to me to get involved in. . . Life huh? ;-) 

Well, I've long ceased to worry about how I got Here from There. 

Embrace the randomness is what I say!

On the domestic front, I have been planning our living room makeover for a while. We are going for some fancy wood panelling on the wall round the fireplace, complete with some fancy wooden corbels and bits. 

The trouble is that even when you know the dimensions of the things you are ordering, it still comes as a surprise just how flippin big they are sometimes. The wonderfully ornate one in the middle is 10 inches by 11-1/2, which is pretty impressive. It will look amazing, if somewhat over the top. 

Still, us pretentious arty types with high falutin ideas aren't afraid of going over the top on occasion. . . It's going to be at the faux baronial end of the Georgian scale, if you get my drift, All dark wood and knotty grain. . .

Still on the domestic front, it's a big front. . . Here is what we did to the bathroom. 

The tiles were made by me with my heat press etc. The image is a copy of a William De Morgan tile design that my wife painted very large. I photographed it, sorted it all out on Photoshop to result in a three by three, nine tile design with single tile width edging. The tiles even have a crackle glaze effect, done in photoshop using a photo of a crackled dish of my wife's superimposed over the individual tile images. 

And I did the tiling too. . . I impress myself sometimes! Not too often, mind.

Staying with the bathroom for a further moment, here is my digital fractal based shower tile design. It's a continuous image representing water in an abstract way. That was another learning curve. 

Before I actually got round to tiling the shower we made do with bubble wrap stapled to the plasterboard wall. . . nice. . .

Boudicca or Boodie or Boo

Cats -

The three cats we adopted as kittens about a year and a quarter ago are in fine fettle. Now the weather has started to get a bit colder and wetter (we don't half need the rain! It's chucking it down as I write) they spend a lot more time indoors. I sometimes think they are too confident and well adjusted. There are three chairs round the kitchen table and the selfish little beasties are far too relaxed to worry about where I'm going to sit, fah! 

Actually they are joy. Happy, affectionate cats. We love 'em to bits ;-)

Cleopatra, or Cloppy or Clops

Hereward, or Hairy Boy or Himself

OK, the bit you have been waiting for, maybe. .  the Beads/Drops/Dangles/Thingies. . .

Two big turned look beads with a couple of resistors

My supply of unemployed beads is still going strong, although I am looking forward to the day when I start making some new polymer clay things instead of sparking ideas off already existent ones. I'm still experimenting and learning, and people still like what I am making, so I am happy.

A pair of textured charms with shaped wire bails

Wiggly wire is a new departure

Image tiles and looped wire 'flowers' is another

With it's subtle variations

Distressed image transfer beads with wiggly wire

My last pair of 'shards'

And the idea of hanging shapes from bent wire constructions was another one I liked.

So, as you see, life potters along in an enjoyable and satisfactory way. What could be nicer? ;-)

Until next time,

Jon x

Weather Served in Chunks, Crunchy Grass, Wasp Bother and More Arty Components

Grid Spikes, my ideas often end up getting combined at some point. .

It's been a funny sort of year weather wise. Everything has come in chunks. We had a a couple of weeks of cold and snow, just when we were expecting Spring, then we had weeks of wet/very wet weather and now we're experiencing a big chunk of hot, dry stuff. Very nice to have bright sunlight and lovely warm evenings in the garden of course, I don't want to appear ungrateful, but the lawn is brown, and crunches when you walk on it. Time for at least some rain, but maybe not a big chunk of wet weather. Moderation in all things and a bit of variety, like things used to be eh?

Double sided, round, hollow, polymer clay beads on upcycled wire stalks

Talking of 'things', whatever the weather I have been finding some time to make some. 'Things' that is. As in 'not readily definable objects'. I seem to work best creatively when I don't have a solid aim in mind but just let ideas happen and see where they take me. They don't always take me in obviously usable directions, but that's ok, the process is always useful somehow even if the product sometimes isn't.

Well, my process isn't quite as random as that maybe, I do like to set some simple, but not too rigid guidelines to keep the creative flow from turning into a total splurge. 

Freedom and control, the two opposing forces we juggle with and negotiate between. . .

Rejuvenated texture squares and upcycled wire

The things I have been making combine polymer clay beads and wire in various ways.

I have quite a few beads lurking here and there that I never quite found the right use for, never managed to sell, took down from my Etsy shop when Etsy was looking like an increasingly bad option, (it has improved imho) or rescued from unsatisfactory necklaces I made quite a while ago. 

I have been combining them with upcycled, scavenged, thick wire mesh to make simple, what I call 'Industrial Boho' earring components and the like. 

OK, pretentious maybe, but it sounds better than 'Unwanted Beads and Discarded Wire' earring components. . . ;-) 

Kind of African Gothic texture spikes from an abandoned necklace plus bent wire bits

The wire I use is thick but quite malleable, so I can bend it with round nose pliers to make interesting simple shapes, and basic loops, being sure to smooth off any sharp edges in the process.

Distressed image trans rectangle and wire combination

The previously mentioned electronic components get a look in every now and then too. I'll get round to using them more in due course. Plenty of time for that.

I was going to make these into earrings myself, but decided to sell them as is

A groovy 'Traffic Light' pendant - no they don't light up

I recently, as in just the other day found a two part epoxy glue that bonds metal to metal. That is going to be very useful going forward as I am not yet versed in the art of soldering. I tried it out and it works well. Tightly wrapped wire and good superglue has worked well so far but super tough epoxy will work even better.

More rejuvenated texture squares with upcycled wire grid bits, and suitably grey coloured epoxy glue on the wrapped join

The good news is that people seem to like them and my regular customers like them well enough to buy them so I'm pleased ;-)

Oh yeah, wasps. Some smaller than usual wasps were just starting to build a nest in the shed, I only noticed when one stung me on the knuckle as I was reaching for the lawn rake, and another managed to tangle itself in my t shirt at the lower back and stung me there too. That got my attention ;-) I sprayed the beejasus out of those buggers so that will have sorted them. Stinging me! The nerve!

Anyway, off on hols to a lovely Greek island for a week so see you when I get back.

Jon x