A Few Photos

As promised, here are a few photos of pieces I've made:

 

I created this with the help of Kate McKinnon's book, "Sculptural Metal Clay Jewelry", by and large the most fun book ever written on the subject...it's full of the most ballsy, in-your-face, hefty PMC pieces I've ever seen. 



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Yes...It's a finger. My Finger. This had to be the most fun I've ever had working with PMC.  I used Cold Mold compound from Rio Grande, item 701-042 to make a mold of my index finger, pressed the PMC into the mold, and fired it up in the kiln.  I wore it to work on Halloween 2012 (not 20012 as it says in the picture...too far into the future).  Maybe this year a necklace of fingertips

I've also explored fold forming during the past couple of years.  It may be a little rough on the fingers, but it give me some of the most serendipitious results...you know, happy accidents.

 



 

Fold forming is the technique that really makes me feel like a hard-working, kickass craftsperson...kinda like the village blacksmith.  There's annealing, quenching, folding, annealing again, quenching again, unfolding, pounding with numerous types of hammers, annealing, quenching, unfolding....and on and on till I get the look I want...Aaaaarrrrgggg! (picture here a muscle-popping blacksmith pumping a bellows and pounding a hunk of iron at the same time...yeah...that's me).

 

Wendy Edsall-Kerwin's blog Hammermarks is the go to site for fold-forming enthusiasts (at least as far as I'm concerned).  She's the person who turned me on to the chasing-on-air method of fold forming.  Wendy not only creates one-of-a-kind jewelry pieces using this method, but also makes very interesting sculptural bowls and wall art pieces.  Oh, and did I mention she has an Etsy store? You can get there through a link on her blog...just tell her Betsy sent you.

 

If you're serious about learning this method of manipulating metal, the go-to book on the subject, "Foldforming" by Charles Lewton-Brain is the best there is on the subject.  Might be the ONLY book there is for all I know.  When I first became interested, I found it pretty hard to find information on the subject.

 

Let me know about your own experience, if any, with fold forming...we'll share ideas and maybe Pinterest boards and other sites.  And BTW, I'm still learning my way around Pinterest, so go easy on me.