Outside Inspiration: Transfers Inspiring Metal

This will be a bit of unusual Outside Inspiration post. Usually, I have artwork that is made from all kinds of other materials–anything but polymer. But Lorena Lazard, who works primarily in metal jewelry art, has created a series of pieces formed around transfer images made on what else but our favorite medium.

The forms in this piece that continue and define the images in the transfer are subtle and haunting. I know this piece seems a bit dark but the emerging shine of copper at the tips of the leaves and the silver pod forms are quite beautiful, especially against the dark and thorny image of the drawing they are accenting.

Lorena is the daughter of Jewish immigrants living in Mexico. She grew up in a country full of images and symbols she couldn’t relate to and as a result her work focuses on the differences in the world, the contrast and the things that appear to sit opposite each other like the thorny weed adorned in precious metals. Perhaps that is what drew her to add polymer into her work, it being such a different medium than metal.

When it comes to our theme for the week, the one thing I hoped would stand out here is how the transfer is the base for the design, but isn’t really dominant. It inspires the design and works with the additions. In other words, a transfer doesn’t have to sit on its own, untouched. Try adding to a transfer … other layers of clay, embellishments, inclusions floated in a layer of LPC or resin, etc. Use the image as a skeleton for the design and see what it inspires you to do.