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by syndee holt | |
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MyTop Ten
Techniques |
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Millefiori
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| If I had to pick 10 of my favorite items to showcase 10 of my favorite techniques — what would they be? Now, given the diversity of polymer clay, picking just 10 techniques can be pretty tough, but I do have some favorites. I decided to look in all my most-used spots in my house and, sure enough, each of those areas had a clay piece. The kitchen yielded my favorite switch plate, created with mosaic pieces of clay. The table next to my 6-foot red velvet chair in the living room is home to my favorite vase, covered in Skinner-blended shapes and coils. My toolbox is covered in molded seashells from my beach. My dresser is decorated with portraits of my sons, transferred to clay. And of course, my wrists and jewelry boxes are overflowing with clay. 1. Skinner Blend My favorite technique, the one I couldn’t live without, is the Skinner Blend, developed by a friend I couldn’t live without, Judith Skinner. Math has never been expressed so beautifully as it is in a Skinner Blend. These blends add richness and depth to any clay project. Once you make your first blend, a whole world of color combinations open up to you. Want to try something really neat? Add a thin layer of gold clay on top of your blend. The gold will blend into the colors and add a rich jewel tone. 2. Millefiori My next favorite technique is millefiori in clay and the pinroll, or spiral, is my favorite basic pattern. Even my living room carpet is sculpted in spirals! The technique of Millefiori is originally a glass technique that has roots back to the ancient Romans. The murrine or canes of colored glass were used to add decoration to vessels of all types. The technique really flourished in the 16th century kilns of the Murano Italian glassmakers. Millefiori in polymer clay is like a treasure hunt, except you also bury the treasure, when you lay the canes for the pattern and add the outside wraps. The thrill of cutting a millefiori cane to reveal the design never diminishes. The number of times a clay millefiori artist has to explain, “No, the design isn’t painted on,” is infinite. The necklace on page 35 gets more comments than any other single piece of jewelry I have. The technique is simple, just a pinroll repeated in different sizes, but the design is strong. Hey movie fans — ever notice how often Tim Burton incorporates spirals into his art design? 3 Raku Did you know that Raku was first created by the artist Chojiro Raku, in 16th century Japan? Fifteen generations of his family have produced Rakuyaki to the present day. Chojiro’s Raku was produced in monochromatic blacks or red. Modern ceramic Raku is a symphony of glazes, creating an oil-slick effect of colors. We’ve translated this ancient ceramic art to polymer clay to produce pieces that are individually unique in design and colors. It lends itself to virtually any surface that we can use for polymer clay and it’s a great “team project” for you and your budding junior artist. The junior artist can be in charge of finger-painting the Pearl Ex colors onto the clay, while you take charge of the actual construction of the piece. I once held the vase to the left in my hand while I explained to a ceramic show promoter that this was polymer clay and not a “real” ceramic Raku vase. He didn’t believe me until I showed him the exposed glass interior! 4 Stamping Speaking of stamping, I resisted using stamps for the longest time, and now I can’t live without them. I have drawers of stamps — big ones, little ones, bold ones and delicate ones. The great thing about stamping on polymer clay is that you have two surfaces to work on. You can stamp the surface of the clay as much as you would stamp on paper, but you can also stamp INTO the clay, creating multiple surfaces for color. I love my journal cover (on page 36) because it reminds me of the fantastically gorgeous gold-stamped leather we saw in Florence on a rainy spring afternoon. The pendent is stamped with my favorite stamp from RSP Hawaii. It’s bold and delicate at the same time and gives me tons of surfaces to introduce colors. It’s evocative of the paisleys of the 1960s, so it fits my “Earth Mother” clothing style perfectly! 5 Molds When you first learn millefiori in polymer clay, everything becomes a pattern you can cane. When you learn to use and create molds in polymer clay, everything becomes a texture you can mold. I remember when Julie Downing, my great clay friend, was regaling us with a horror story of some hotel she stayed in for a clay conference. She told us that, “the room was a nightmare, but it had this great texture around the shower ...” and sure enough, she had the mold to prove it! Of course homemade molds are not our only source, the crafting companies are providing us with more and more pre-made molds for polymer clay and we often “repurpose” molds created for other crafts like candle and candy-making. The shell molds on page 38 were created from shells from a beach near and dear to me — this way I can bring a little bit of the beach with me when I travel. 6 Stones From ancient techniques to ancient materials, we can re-create most of them in polymer clay. Precious and not-so-precious stones are no exception. Recipes for re-creating ivory, jade, coral, amber, turquoise, fine woods, and many more are readily available to the polymer artist. There is a tremendous amount of perverse satisfaction that comes from walking into a gallery that features precious and semi-precious stone and having someone from the gallery compliment your faux-stone polymer clay necklace as if it were the “real thing.” Yes, the response is priceless — if not precious! The bracelet on page 37 is created from a combination of Sculpey Premo clay and Black Piñata inks, with touches of translucent clay mixed with Sangria Piñata ink. The finish is from constant wear. The silver is from Bali, extra pickled (the black areas) from annual trips to the Hot Springs during our San Diego Clay Guild Sandy Camp retreats. 7 Transfer There are many, many ways to transfer images to clay — special papers, liquid clays, gin transfers. Mine are created from portraits that are digitally converted to sketch and then transferred with rubbing alcohol (the ink is toner-based) to the clay. After they’re baked, they are hand-colored with either oil-based pencils or watercolor pencils. A couple of strategically placed cotton balls underneath the clay when it baked added the dimensionality to Koji’s cheeks and hand on page 35. I have also scanned my kids’ drawings from when they were little and transferred them to the clay for a more permanent record of their art. 8 Mosaic Mosaic techniques in polymer clay are another translation of an ancient art. We can create our own tiles, or tesserae (one of the most beautiful words in art!), in our own colors, shapes and sizes. When you use the tessarae in its unbaked state, you can even bend it to form around curves like the edges of the switch plate on page 35. Clay mixed with Liquid Sculpey creates the grout after the first baking. You can even use the transfer techniques to create patterned tiles. 9 Extruding I owned an extruder gun for a long time before I ever actually used it. The catalyst was Marie Segal, who leaned over at a Clay Day and said, “You know we can extrude clay and create cords of any color, size or length ... ” The rest is Expression history and pieces of Marie’s extruded knitted and knotted work have been displayed worldwide. I used the pieces on a much smaller scale to link and highlight some crystals sent to me by a friend in Prague (see page 36). My son, Tahichi, extruded the pieces to create a 3-D model of the DNA molecule for his biology class that still hangs in the classroom three years later. 10 Sculpting Sculpting is not my forte, so I really admire those that have mastered the art in clay. In fact, polymer clay sculptures have slowly taken over my china cabinet to create a miniature gallery of clay in my living room. The amazing thing about polymer clay sculpture is that they can be so small you need a magnifying glass to view the detail to a large tabletop piece. The clay-covered can (on page 36) was a collaboration between my sons and me. Tahichi drew the design, Koji picked the colors and I did the building. |
Skinner
Raku
Stamping
Molds
Stones
Transfers
Mosaic
Extruding
Sculpting |
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