This is kind of a short, random, slightly amusing post. I don't really have anything to say, but I was looking at the search phrases that have brought people to my little blog, and I found some of them rather funny. Some of them actually make sense, like "art at Gordon College" or names of people I've quoted like "Jann Semkow" or "Margo Buccini." Others, however, make little to no sense at all. Let's see what we've got.
* "I guess today" -- You guess today... what? Who searches for a phrase like that, and just how many million hits did they get on the search engine?
* "that I have my shopping cart" -- Um... complete phrase anyone? And why are you looking for info on who has a shopping cart?
* "and stone chips in" -- This person is apparently also a fan of fragments that make no sense. Now I'm wondering where I was talking about stone chips...
* "Berry College and Dada and Neo-Classicism and drawing and..." -- Ok, I admit... this one was me. I wanted to see how many random art-related phrases I had to type into Google before I could get my blog to come up. Here's a hint... it's a lot.
* "What do I do when black stuff is on my shell collection" -- Seriously? Wtf? How did this pull up my blog? Where was I talking about black stuff on shells? Did I drunk post again? Jeez. And how should I know what to do when you have black stuff on your shell collection? If it was me, I'd assume my shells had caught the black plague, don a Hazmat suit, and carry them out to the dump to bury them six feet under the ground in a pretty (yet safe) little shell collection funeral.
Sunday, December 19, 2010
Saturday, December 18, 2010
Uninspiring Inspiration
Well, I feel compelled to write something here tonight, but I have no idea what to write. You could say that I'm bored out of my mind and trying to motivate myself to actually work on something. I thought about telling the world a little more about myself, but it seems a little self-centered and boring. I'm really not all that interesting to talk about, even if I try to act like I am. Anyway, I suppose I should talk about something art related. Let's see where this takes us.
Occasionally someone feels the need to ask me deep, artistic questions, and most of the time I don't have any good answers for them. I think for some reason, people always assume that all artists have these deep, expressive, passionate, creative souls that defy logic and order. I really wonder what a scientific genius like Leonardo da Vinci would think of the modern view of the artist. For instance, my mother can't stand that I like symmetry and balance. When we have to work together on decorating or setting up a display, she'll often say something to the effect of "You're an artist! You're supposed to be creative with it, not have it all spaced out evenly! Put down the ruler!" Really? When did that happen? Apparently people who are obsessive-compulsive can never be artists. It's a good thing no artist ever relies on ratios or perspective or rulers. Other people will stand in front of one of my pieces and ask things like "What does it symbolize?" or "What does it mean?" or "What inspired this?" That's typically when I blink slowly at them, point to the piece, and go, "It's a face. It was pretty... so I drew it." Ok, so maybe not all of my pieces are that simple. But seriously. Why does everything have to mean something? I get that some people create really abstract, symbolic, or meaningful work, and that's awesome. If that's what they want to do, cool with me. But why do all artists have to be lumped into that group? This part of my rant is starting to sound like my previous post on art. I'll stop sounding like a broken record now.
What was I talking about? Oh yeah. Deep, artistic questions. Ok, so I can't really answer questions about meaning and parts of my soul being in the work and all that jazz, but I can answer questions about inspiration... sometimes. Sometimes it really is just as simple as "I really liked that person's face, so I drew her," or "I saw these really cool beads, so I brought them home and just put them with a bunch of other beads that matched." Other times, it's slightly more complex, though often not much more. Sometimes, I'll see another work of art that inspires me, so I'll take an element of that work, whether it's the style, mood, technique, or materials, and I'll try to incorporate it into my own piece. For instance, I really liked all of the elegant but unrealistic swirling lines in Linda Bergkvist's piece entitled "Kareena" so I tried to incorporate a small piece of that in the hair of the vampire in "Blood Moon" (forgive the glare at the top of the photo; the original drawing is in a frame).
Occasionally someone feels the need to ask me deep, artistic questions, and most of the time I don't have any good answers for them. I think for some reason, people always assume that all artists have these deep, expressive, passionate, creative souls that defy logic and order. I really wonder what a scientific genius like Leonardo da Vinci would think of the modern view of the artist. For instance, my mother can't stand that I like symmetry and balance. When we have to work together on decorating or setting up a display, she'll often say something to the effect of "You're an artist! You're supposed to be creative with it, not have it all spaced out evenly! Put down the ruler!" Really? When did that happen? Apparently people who are obsessive-compulsive can never be artists. It's a good thing no artist ever relies on ratios or perspective or rulers. Other people will stand in front of one of my pieces and ask things like "What does it symbolize?" or "What does it mean?" or "What inspired this?" That's typically when I blink slowly at them, point to the piece, and go, "It's a face. It was pretty... so I drew it." Ok, so maybe not all of my pieces are that simple. But seriously. Why does everything have to mean something? I get that some people create really abstract, symbolic, or meaningful work, and that's awesome. If that's what they want to do, cool with me. But why do all artists have to be lumped into that group? This part of my rant is starting to sound like my previous post on art. I'll stop sounding like a broken record now.
Continuing with this piece as an example, other times I simply take inspiration from the things I like. I love vampire mythology and novels (no, not Twilight... sorry to all you sparkly vampire fans, but I stick with Anne Rice... just don't mention the movie version of Queen of the Damned... that might actually be worse than Twilight). I also love Amy Lee, the lead singer for Evanescence (ok, maybe I don't love her personally since we've never met, but I love her voice anyhow). So for this piece, I took some basics from Amy Lee's appearance, added in features of my own appearance since I had to use myself as a model for the shading, and turned the resulting creation into a vampire. I also happen to like the full moon and cherry blossoms. Ta da! You have the whole picture. Combine Linda Bergkvist, Amy Lee, vampires, cherry blossoms, a full moon, and a little touch of yours truly and you get one of my pieces. No deep, meaningful experience abstracted on paper, just a logical stream of thoughts and preferences. Uninspiring inspiration. Gotta love it. Anyway, that's enough about inspiration for one night. Maybe I'll elaborate on it more or cover it from a jewelry standpoint later on, but for now my fingers are tired and I need to find something less exhausting to keep me entertained.
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Happy Rut Day!
"People often say that motivation doesn't last. Well, neither does bathing -- that's why we recommend it daily." ~ Zig Ziglar
So I'm pretty much in another rut. I have fragments of ideas but no motivation to turn them into complete realities. I think maybe I'm just a little burned out from my job and the holidays and some personal issues. I get burned out pretty easily. I finished my commissioned project (hopefully I won't break it again) and made a few beads, but aside from that, I haven't created anything. So, instead of providing interesting details about some amazing thing I'm creating, I'm just going to put up a pretty picture I made several months ago so you don't lose interest in me while I'm rolling around in my rut. This piece is called "Siren's Gaze" and was made for my "Visionary" collection at Berry College, same collection that this piece came from. Thanks to my lovely friend Miranda for modeling for me.
So I'm pretty much in another rut. I have fragments of ideas but no motivation to turn them into complete realities. I think maybe I'm just a little burned out from my job and the holidays and some personal issues. I get burned out pretty easily. I finished my commissioned project (hopefully I won't break it again) and made a few beads, but aside from that, I haven't created anything. So, instead of providing interesting details about some amazing thing I'm creating, I'm just going to put up a pretty picture I made several months ago so you don't lose interest in me while I'm rolling around in my rut. This piece is called "Siren's Gaze" and was made for my "Visionary" collection at Berry College, same collection that this piece came from. Thanks to my lovely friend Miranda for modeling for me.
Saturday, December 11, 2010
A Weekend of Ow...
"Oh Lord, you give us everything at the price of fatigue!" ~ Leonardo da Vinci
Ok so... long week... longer weekend. I'm exhausted and still have more stuff to do. In two days I've driven over 300 miles by myself. I feel like someone took a sledgehammer to my body when I wasn't looking. Just now got home from Berry College. My roommate from last year graduated today, and I'm so proud of her. Just wish Berry wasn't so far away. So I made the three hour drive up there, did the graduation thing, and made the three hour drive back home. And can I just say that tights are manufactured in hell? I mean, jeez. Those things are evil. Always falling down or rolling up or getting those stupid lines in them. Evil evil evil. Ok. Yeah.
So anyway... Spent a hundred dollars at Hobby Lobby yesterday buying graduation presents and birthday presents and Christmas presents... not to mention supplies for my jewelry. Found some really cool pieces for steampunk jewelry so I can expand on my "Pistols and Pearls" collection. Keys, locks, gears, etc. We'll see how that goes.
Been doing some clay stuff in what little spare time I've had. Finished round two of a commissioned piece which I accidentally broke immediately after completing it a week ago. That's kind of how my life goes. Also carried out my first experiment with the flower inclusions. I'm pleased with the texture but not so much with the color. Continuing my experiments now. I'll try to post pictures sometime soon.
And for those of you waiting to see new portraits, I'm sorry to say that I can't complete anything until I get some new drawing supplies for Christmas. Hopefully I'll get something churned out before 2011.
That's all for now. Congrats to Jess and Emma for graduating, glad I got to see you for five minutes Amanda, had fun eating lunch with the lovely Smith sisters, sorry I missed you Fakhria, and love to all you random people reading this. I'm going to go crash into the couch now.
Ok so... long week... longer weekend. I'm exhausted and still have more stuff to do. In two days I've driven over 300 miles by myself. I feel like someone took a sledgehammer to my body when I wasn't looking. Just now got home from Berry College. My roommate from last year graduated today, and I'm so proud of her. Just wish Berry wasn't so far away. So I made the three hour drive up there, did the graduation thing, and made the three hour drive back home. And can I just say that tights are manufactured in hell? I mean, jeez. Those things are evil. Always falling down or rolling up or getting those stupid lines in them. Evil evil evil. Ok. Yeah.
So anyway... Spent a hundred dollars at Hobby Lobby yesterday buying graduation presents and birthday presents and Christmas presents... not to mention supplies for my jewelry. Found some really cool pieces for steampunk jewelry so I can expand on my "Pistols and Pearls" collection. Keys, locks, gears, etc. We'll see how that goes.
Been doing some clay stuff in what little spare time I've had. Finished round two of a commissioned piece which I accidentally broke immediately after completing it a week ago. That's kind of how my life goes. Also carried out my first experiment with the flower inclusions. I'm pleased with the texture but not so much with the color. Continuing my experiments now. I'll try to post pictures sometime soon.
And for those of you waiting to see new portraits, I'm sorry to say that I can't complete anything until I get some new drawing supplies for Christmas. Hopefully I'll get something churned out before 2011.
That's all for now. Congrats to Jess and Emma for graduating, glad I got to see you for five minutes Amanda, had fun eating lunch with the lovely Smith sisters, sorry I missed you Fakhria, and love to all you random people reading this. I'm going to go crash into the couch now.
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Other Jewelry Artists
"No, not competition, community." ~ Jan Blencowe
Today I thought I'd take the time to put up some of the work from my fellow jewelry artists so that I can both provide you with eye candy and show you a little more of the world of the handmade jewelry business. I don't know any of these artists personally, but I admire their work and their professionalism.
Flower Skull Earrings: $25.00
Ava: $129.00
Copper and Cherry Pearl Necklace: $71.00
Green and Blue Earrings: $30.00
Sapphire Pearl Lampwork Pendant Necklace: $42
Hope none of them minded a little free advertisement. Anywho, I tried to pick pieces that use techniques and materials similar to my own work, so I hope those of you who are fans of my work will like this stuff as well. I don't know if this was at all useful in shedding light on the market I'm "competing" in, but hopefully it was. Maybe I'll do a similar post in the future.
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Polymer Clay: Flower Inclusions
So it looks like I'm getting a second chance to add a little nature to my clay work. Since my mother has been receiving flowers ever since her knee surgery and the first bouquet is finally starting to die off, I've been collecting the dried flowers for another attempt at making beads with flower inclusions. Learning from my last disaster, I won't be creating more tupperware of death. I'm leaving the flowers out to dry in the open air, the slow way. I might try to put some petals in the microwave, just because I'm impatient. We'll see. Anyway, for those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about when I say "flower inclusions" I decided to put up some pictures of successful inclusions from artist Marie Segal. All of the following photos are her work.
Larkspur
Amaranth
Chili Peppers
Lemon Verbena
So basically, you take crushed flowers and mix it up with translucent clay to create unique beads. Ta da! Hopefully I'll be making pretty stuff soon. So far I have yellow roses and red carnations. We'll see how it goes.
Saturday, December 4, 2010
Appreciation and Frustration
So, after a long week I have returned to write. I guess I should start this post on a high note before I descend into the depths of despair. I wanted to say that I really appreciate those of you who are following my blog, as well as those who have commented on my posts. It's nice to know that people are interested in my career and I'm not just writing to the empty void, and I've received some very good advice here as well. As far as the comments on my little pricing rant go, I mostly agree and I appreciate the advice. Now here's where we start our descent.
Profit is great. I'd love to take the advice I've gotten and factor it in when calculating my prices so I can sell my work for a logical amount. Unfortunately, the reality is that I can't even sell anything at the prices I have now. My website has been up since July and I haven't sold a single piece online. Not one. And I don't do much better offline either. Let me share part of my records. Since January, I've sold 43 pieces for a total of $640. My expenses so far have been over $1500, and I currently have 100 pieces of jewelry lying around which, priced as they are, amount to $3233 dollars.
I know that getting a business off the ground and running in this economy takes time. Or at least the logical part of me knows that. The other part of me is getting bitter and discouraged and frustrated beyond belief. I'm getting tired of working for nothing. I recently finished this beautiful triple-strand necklace that took me several hours and is made of real garnet, peridot, and freshwater pearls. In my mind it's worth $100 at the very least, but I know that I won't even be able to sell it if I price it at $80. I can't even sell my $25 necklaces or my $7 earrings. People love to look at my stuff and tell me how pretty it is and congratulate me on all of my hard work, but no one buys. Maybe it's because there are several racks of $3 necklaces in town. Maybe they don't have the money. Maybe they're just flattering me and my work isn't really all that great. I don't know. I'm not a business-savvy person, so I don't really know what to do. Lately I've been working on exposure and building up my web traffic, but despite the boom in visitors, I'm still not selling anything. I just made some brochures for jewelry parties in hopes that having a group of women shopping at a party in a friend's home will boost my sales, but honestly, I don't know how well that's going to work out either. So until I get some customers who are actually willing to buy my work at their current cheap, illogical prices, I feel like raising my prices would only hurt me more. Most people already tell me I'm too expensive, so I'm kind of caught between a rock and a hard place here.
So there's my tale of woe. No pretty pictures, inspirational ideas, or good news. Sorry to bring a little doom and gloom to the world.
Profit is great. I'd love to take the advice I've gotten and factor it in when calculating my prices so I can sell my work for a logical amount. Unfortunately, the reality is that I can't even sell anything at the prices I have now. My website has been up since July and I haven't sold a single piece online. Not one. And I don't do much better offline either. Let me share part of my records. Since January, I've sold 43 pieces for a total of $640. My expenses so far have been over $1500, and I currently have 100 pieces of jewelry lying around which, priced as they are, amount to $3233 dollars.
I know that getting a business off the ground and running in this economy takes time. Or at least the logical part of me knows that. The other part of me is getting bitter and discouraged and frustrated beyond belief. I'm getting tired of working for nothing. I recently finished this beautiful triple-strand necklace that took me several hours and is made of real garnet, peridot, and freshwater pearls. In my mind it's worth $100 at the very least, but I know that I won't even be able to sell it if I price it at $80. I can't even sell my $25 necklaces or my $7 earrings. People love to look at my stuff and tell me how pretty it is and congratulate me on all of my hard work, but no one buys. Maybe it's because there are several racks of $3 necklaces in town. Maybe they don't have the money. Maybe they're just flattering me and my work isn't really all that great. I don't know. I'm not a business-savvy person, so I don't really know what to do. Lately I've been working on exposure and building up my web traffic, but despite the boom in visitors, I'm still not selling anything. I just made some brochures for jewelry parties in hopes that having a group of women shopping at a party in a friend's home will boost my sales, but honestly, I don't know how well that's going to work out either. So until I get some customers who are actually willing to buy my work at their current cheap, illogical prices, I feel like raising my prices would only hurt me more. Most people already tell me I'm too expensive, so I'm kind of caught between a rock and a hard place here.
So there's my tale of woe. No pretty pictures, inspirational ideas, or good news. Sorry to bring a little doom and gloom to the world.
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