Pokai Bay Designs

Ladybugs! June 29, 2009

Lampwork

Ladybugs are a beneficial insect that lend themselves well to artistic interpretation in glass. The first ladybugs in my ladybug series was done using a ladybug button as the model. Something looked wrong — it was too stylistic but it was a good place to start. Next turning to the trusty Google image search — I found dozens of ladybug images and learned that there are about 70 species — so just about any variation of orange, red-orange, white and black can be used to make ladybug beads.

Ladybug beads

I can see why glass artists like to do sets or series, because my ladybugs are improving with each set I do. Photos to be added to the post as soon as I reduce the size of the images. Also I’ll post the button which was the stand in for my first ladybugs. Today I found some ladybug corpses — which in this area are a duller orange than ladybugs in other parts of the country or the world. I will encase these ladybugs in jewelry grade epoxy resin so that I have permanent reference models.

My ladybugs sculptures are abstracts of the ladybugs. Westley Fleming’s glass insect sculptures are so realistic that they’d almost fool the insects.

Metal Clay

As soon as I program my kiln for Silver clay I’ll start firing the huge backlog of silver clay I’ve produced — some from as long ago as FOUR years! I have torched a few silver clay pieces — and that might be best things about silver clay — you can actually design and shape a piece, dry it and then torch it in a few hours. It’s is sort of like fast food art for the soul. I also have a packet of Bronze Clay and Copper clay which need a different kiln firing schedule. It took me forever to program the lampwork (garage) program in the kiln’s Orton controller. Thankfully I have my ancient table kiln I used for enameling when I was much younger and fearless. Back in those days I sprinkled enamel on copper and fired it, all without using a face mask or gloves. (They weren’t in the instructions back in the stone ages.) I will be putting the small table kiln back into service for enameling on silver (and copper).

Electroforming beads

This is a relatively new artform, which takes planning to gather the materials in order to copperplate beads. The photos I’ve seen of copper electroplated beads are pushing the edge of what can be done with beads! (links to be added in future updates).

Fiber Arts

Crocheting — back to the basics. Sometimes computers are slow — so I’ve found a way to make use of the waiting time — I crochet. I’ve found a round — wave or chevron pattern Afghan. And Amazingly it is almost 45 inches in diameter — of it’s project 50 inches when completed. All this in just over a week while waiting for the computer to do it’s thing. Dial-up is so last century.

I’ve been using dial-up to research Caribbean Geothermal — which 21st century technology from the 20 century. Many of the documents are pdf files — which take a long time using dial up. Google does save many of these files in html format — which does speed up their viewing.

(edited to add photo of my ladybug beads — so cute and so addictive!)