Kind of Strange

In my rush to get these ready for the holidays, I really didn’t take the time to take decent photos of these pieces.  I will attempt to bribe the new owners into letting me have them back for a bit at some point, so that I can get a better set of shots.

The running fox.  Simple pierced pendant using flame oxidized copper (18g, I think) and sterling silver (22g).  Riveted together with sterling wire.  This was made as a gift for a friend and neighbor of mine that helped watch my fat blob of a cat while I was in San Francisco.

Dragon pendant for my aunt.  18 & 22g sterling sheet, pierced, soldered and engraved with a florentine graver and then oxidized.  8mm carnelian cabochon bezel set with an open back. 

Another dragon pendant, this time for my mom.  18 & 22g sheet, pierced, fused and engraved with a florentine graver and then oxidized.  This one using an 8mm trillion cut london blue topaz.  This was the first triangular shaped stone that I had ever bezel set, so the experience was rather ‘interesting’.  Read: Lots of swearing and a healthy dose of patience.

All of these are original designs, drawn onto the silver with a felt tip pen before cutting.  I’m pretty terrible at making any manner of template as well, so while I could likely make something similar in the future, each of these pieces is a unique object all on its own.

There are a few more gifts I should include here, but which I managed to take no photos of.  I’ll see about getting pics from their owners in the future.

Near the end of each JTI class at the Revere Academy students are asked to complete a box ring project.  Every student starts by creating a basic ring consisting of four pieces, which when assembled form an open square on the top of the ring. 

You can see some examples from a previous class here:

http://metalcyberspace.com/blog/archives/244

From this basic idea, students are asked to design and build their own personal box ring.  The time limitation of the project is set at 8 hours for anything beyond the basic ring construction, but that appears to be more of a general guideline than anything enforced.  Students may use whatever materials and construction techniques they want, as long as it builds off of the base box ring idea.

Here’s what I came up with:

Materials used: Sterling silver, 14k gold, peridot, deer leg bone, wolf fur

Additional photos and Meaning(TM) after the jump…

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A sneak peak at the box ring project I completed as part of the Revere Academy JTI program.  Much longer write-up and photos (hopefully sans my grubby fingers!) to follow in the next week.

Sterling Silver, 14k gold, peridot, deer bone and wolf fur

Fairly tired from a long day spent in jump ring hell, so the textual portion of this update is rather brief.

Instead, here are some pics!

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It’s odd to think it’s only been two weeks thus far.  (+1 day if you include today)  Week one wrapped up with a dinner get-together at the home Revere Academy shop manager, teacher and argentium silver afficiando Ronda Coryell. 

The dinner get-together served as a great ice breaker between the two halfs of the larger class, as the interaction between the two during the day is fairly limited.  Some good food, wine and stories all around made for a great night.  Ronda was also kind enough to do several demonstrations on the fusing properties of argentium silver.  It’s easy to see why she’s so enthusiastic about the metal; fusing it provides a clean seam with none of the solder clean-up you might run into with sterling silver.

Below you’ll find a photo of Ronda’s studio space.  I am completely envious of the vast workbench area and the copious amount of tools.  Hell, I’m envious of Ronda’s apartment as a whole.  She’s made that space into one heck of a beautiful place to live. 

Also pictured: The desk space I sit at in the mornings, with a small view.  There have been people working on the windows on the building off to the right for the entire time I’ve been sitting there.  I really wish I could determine what they’re doing, as there’s no way it’s just washing unless they’re the most diligent window washing crew I’ve ever seen.

Lastly pictured, a shot of my little tool container which I use to shuttle my tools between the classroom and studio space.  I know it doesn’t look like close to $1k in tools, but it came pretty close. (+ a few books & polishing tools not pictured).  *twitch* 

Week two involved making round, pierced earrings and various type of stone setting.  I caught some sort of cold bug that quickly turned into a sinus infection and asthma hell around mid-week.  This taught me a fairly valuable lesson about my ability to work while sick.  That being that I really shouldn’t if possible.  With my brain that fuzzy I caught myself making ridiculous mistakes and fumbling tasks that I normally don’t have a hard time with.  This of course leads to frustration and poor overall confidence.  It’s all a learning experience though and I did a fairly good job of not taking it too seriously.  These things happen and I learned quite a bit along the way. 

Week two wrapped up with a trip to see the King Tut exhibit at the de Young museum.  Much conversation was had over how on earth the artists of that time accomplished the work they did with the limited tools of that period in history.  A lot of the work would have been impressive using the tools available today, let alone what was available then.

Week three is off to a better start, though I’m still at the tail end of ye olde lungcrud.   I sound horrible, but am at least feeling a bit more up to actually doing work.  Today we learned a bit about casting and converted a piece of square wire into two half round pieces of wire through the use of magic! (or a draw plate and some tongs)  I look forward to seeing what comes of it tomorrow. 

Pics of actual worth forthcoming. I attempted to take some last week but the results were poor.

I arrived in San Francisco Saturday evening.  My aunt, who is currently attending the Art Academy, met me at the baggage claim in the airport.  From there she introduced me to the wonder that is the BART.  I come from the land of Seattle where public transit is close to non-existent, so getting from the airport to downtown in less than half an hour was pretty bloody impressive.  We arrived at her place where we played catch-up and eventually fell asleep. 

Sunday consisted of locating the school and getting settled in at the house I’m staying at.  (thanks Richard!)  The BART runs from a few blocks nearby to within just a few blocks of the school, so the commute is a breeze.  Well, mostly a breeze.  I’m currently staying on top of a rather large hill, so the returning home at the end of the day bit can be a bit rough.  But on the bright side, I’m getting one heck of a work-out.  My physical therapist would be proud.

Day one of the class was largely introductions to the teachers, classmates and general working practices around the studio.  The overall class size was more than 20 people, so classes were broken up into two smaller groups.  I choose the evening class, as I enjoy sleeping in a bit and generally hit my productivity upswing a bit later in the day.    

Day two:  Got to arrive a bit later, which was nice with regards to getting a bit more sleep.  The BART route is easy to navigate and found the school again with no problem whatsoever.  The weather took one heck of a turn, whipping wind and incredible amounts of rain around throughout the day. We worked on polishing a little brass alloy hummingbird charm and just started in on a boxy silver ring before we broke for lunch and switched over to the studio workspace.  Polishing is interesting, but I can’t claim it’s my strong suit at the moment.  The evening studio time headed by Alan focused on ring construction and soldering.  From a piece of square, silver wire we made a simple ring. A large piece of copper wire was drawn through the rolling mill to demonstrate how it worked and pieces were cut for use in making a ring the following day. 

Day three:  More work on polishing this morning on the pre-cast silver ring.  I wasn’t entirely pleased with my output, but it was a good learning exercise as I’d never attempted polishing a ring with such a sharp, stepped design.  Breaking in the new brushes was entertaining and I somehow ended up with copious amounts of rouge dust on my face.  I wandered around the city a bit at lunch, trying to get a slightly better understanding of the surrounding area.  After lunch we jumped into more lessons on soldering, another demonstration of ring construction and got to work on the thick copper ring. 

Overall, my initial impressions of the class have been very positive.  The teachers are very knowledgeable as well as personable.  Alan himself seems to have an endless reserve of patience paired with a steady manner and direction.  The class itself is, as it states, rather intense.  I’m finding it hard to remember what happened on what day as it seems impossible that it’s only been 3 days thus far. 

Photos to follow in the updates to come.  I have the short term memory of a gnat, so I’ve managed to forget the camera the past several days.  Go me!

I love wandering.  The act of setting out with no real purpose or agenda for one’s day can lead to some fantastic experiences and thoughts.  It’s one of the few things in life that really soothes the stress and buzzing of the brain that can come with modern life.  At least it is for me, your mileage may vary. 

Today was one of the few days when I remembered to take my camera along.  I don’t have any expectations that I will get any fantastic photos out of these wanderings, but I have a fun time doing it  and it helps me recall the mood and any thoughts that may have been present at that point in time.

Here are some of today’s wandering photos (click for larger version):

I saw these in the window of a store downtown and laughed.  They’re candles, evidently.

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Not quite done, but wearable! 

The mask consists of plaster strip over fine brass mesh, which I formed on a glass head.  Thankfully said glass head is just about the same size as my large noggin.  It’s held in place on my head with strips of white leather, salvaged from an old pair of pants I found at the thrift store. 

The proboscis portion is a piece of deer leg bone, cut and polished to size.  I dropped it at one point and it split in two.  Thankfully an application of superglue followed by beeswax has solidified it.  Super Sculpey tentacles and toothy bits are near the top, though they’re intentionally difficult to see unless you’re willing to get very close to the mask.  They’re obscured by bleached horse hair left over from a previous costume.

Click for larger view.

From an early birthday and going away celebration in the park.  A small group of us are featured in some Seattle couple’s wedding photos, as they saw our group and thought it would be a fun addition to their special day.  ‘Tis nifty, no?

Copious amounts of tools purchased for class via Otto Frei! I somehow managed to not buy all of the not-on-the-list tools that I wanted rather than needed. I claim this as a victory!

Unfortunately the tools I did purchase are being shipped directly to the Revere Academy, so I won’t be able to play with them until I get down there. Explaining the amount of hammers in my luggage was a less than desirable scenario though, so straight to the school they go! I do appreciate that Otto Frei offers that option with no additional fee, at any rate.

As of five minutes ago, I’ve made the final payment for the JTI course at the Revere Academy.

Place to stay: Secured!
Plane tickets: Purchased!
Time off: Pending final approval

Now to suck it up and buy the required tools & books!