Outside Inspiration: Blooming Glass
April 3, 2015
Inspirational Art
Glass work has really been making the rounds lately, which is my excuse for showing off glass two weeks in a row. But really, this was just too beautiful of a piece not to share, and who knows when a theme would come up again that would have allowed me to share this beauty.
The work is by glass artist Kristen Frantzen Orr; another artist with a serious dedication to nature’s amazing floral creations. I was entranced by the way she has layered and blended the colors, which makes more sense once you know she has a background in watercolors. A couple of words from Kristen’s website reveals a bit more about how she achieves these color effects:
To add detail to her work, she makes special canes from multiple colors of glass, and by combining these component parts with layers of transparent colors, she creates depth and captures an exciting play of light.
You can find more of these intensely detailed glass beads on Kristen’s website, but there are tons more out there online, so search for her by name on Pinterest or Google images to dig up even more amazing beauties.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or an issue of The Polymer Arts magazine, as well as by supporting our advertising partners.
Spring is in Bloom
March 30, 2015
Inspirational Art
I have to say up front that I am not a particularly floral kind of girl. I am far more likely to be found in the plumbing department than the gardening department at the local hardware store, but I still have a sincere appreciation for nature’s creative show during this time of year. Those of us in the northern hemisphere who are lucky enough to be in a climate that has benefited from some of the beautiful weather these past couple weeks are seeing the first of the spring flowers covering the hillsides and sprouting up alongside the country lanes. It makes one just ache to jump about and sing a few lines from “The Sound of Music” … doesn’t it? Okay, maybe that’s just me, but truly, the signs of spring are showing, and we can get excited about the prospects of warmer weather and colorful scenery or be bidding the summer’s bounty a fond farewell if we are south of the equator, so it seems about time that we honor nature’s most lovely creations.
If you will be participating in any upcoming spring shows, a good selection of floral motifs would certainly be welcome displays. I’ve picked out a lovely bunch to share this week. This first set is a bow to the rose and to floral abundance. Not only does Vera Veselova have lovely bunches of blossoms here to share with us, she has a tutorial for it as well! Click the image to get to it.
Now, what could you do with these rosy flowers? Well, I was thinking you could envelope the upper or half dome of a lentil shape, run blooms down the outside edge of a rectangular pendant or, for the truly ambitious, ring the center line of a vase or bowl. Abundance is itself a legitimate element of design. The key is to tone down or control the variety of other elements so the viewer is not overwhelmed. I mean go look at a freshly sprung field of wildflowers … we must admit that Mother Nature knows a thing or two about design!
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or an issue of The Polymer Arts magazine, as well as by supporting our advertising partners.
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Rainbow Turned into Flowers
August 23, 2014
Inspirational Art
Hopefully you’ve been having a fun week, but now for a fun weekend, right? How about something colorful and versatile to try in the studio?
These flower cup beads are created by starting with a rectangular, extruded cane then form a cup over a large ball stylus tool. I just like the stepping away from using circular extruded shapes for extruded canes. There is absolutely no reason not to make extruded canes with any shape you have available for your extruder. This long rectangular shape is particularly fun because of the striations you can make. You will see this in the bead on the first page of the tutorial that I am giving you. And why not reform the cane into long teardrops or flatten them out a little more and roll then into a rainbow jelly roll? Extrude a few and see what you can come up with!
On Poly Cat’s pages , you’ll find the Rectangular Rainbow Extruded Cane being used to create a bead, then there’s the flower cup bead steps you use the cane slices with as well. Pop the URLs for any of these links into Google translate if you want to read them in English, and your browser doesn’t automatically translate them for you. If I understand the translation correctly, the techniques she uses are inspired by others, and she has links and references to those sources so you have even more to check out if you like.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or issue of The Polymer Arts magazine as well as supporting our advertising partners.
Glass work has really been making the rounds lately, which is my excuse for showing off glass two weeks in a row. But really, this was just too beautiful of a piece not to share, and who knows when a theme would come up again that would have allowed me to share this beauty.
The work is by glass artist Kristen Frantzen Orr; another artist with a serious dedication to nature’s amazing floral creations. I was entranced by the way she has layered and blended the colors, which makes more sense once you know she has a background in watercolors. A couple of words from Kristen’s website reveals a bit more about how she achieves these color effects:
To add detail to her work, she makes special canes from multiple colors of glass, and by combining these component parts with layers of transparent colors, she creates depth and captures an exciting play of light.
You can find more of these intensely detailed glass beads on Kristen’s website, but there are tons more out there online, so search for her by name on Pinterest or Google images to dig up even more amazing beauties.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or an issue of The Polymer Arts magazine, as well as by supporting our advertising partners.
I have to say up front that I am not a particularly floral kind of girl. I am far more likely to be found in the plumbing department than the gardening department at the local hardware store, but I still have a sincere appreciation for nature’s creative show during this time of year. Those of us in the northern hemisphere who are lucky enough to be in a climate that has benefited from some of the beautiful weather these past couple weeks are seeing the first of the spring flowers covering the hillsides and sprouting up alongside the country lanes. It makes one just ache to jump about and sing a few lines from “The Sound of Music” … doesn’t it? Okay, maybe that’s just me, but truly, the signs of spring are showing, and we can get excited about the prospects of warmer weather and colorful scenery or be bidding the summer’s bounty a fond farewell if we are south of the equator, so it seems about time that we honor nature’s most lovely creations.
If you will be participating in any upcoming spring shows, a good selection of floral motifs would certainly be welcome displays. I’ve picked out a lovely bunch to share this week. This first set is a bow to the rose and to floral abundance. Not only does Vera Veselova have lovely bunches of blossoms here to share with us, she has a tutorial for it as well! Click the image to get to it.
Now, what could you do with these rosy flowers? Well, I was thinking you could envelope the upper or half dome of a lentil shape, run blooms down the outside edge of a rectangular pendant or, for the truly ambitious, ring the center line of a vase or bowl. Abundance is itself a legitimate element of design. The key is to tone down or control the variety of other elements so the viewer is not overwhelmed. I mean go look at a freshly sprung field of wildflowers … we must admit that Mother Nature knows a thing or two about design!
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or an issue of The Polymer Arts magazine, as well as by supporting our advertising partners.
;
Hopefully you’ve been having a fun week, but now for a fun weekend, right? How about something colorful and versatile to try in the studio?
These flower cup beads are created by starting with a rectangular, extruded cane then form a cup over a large ball stylus tool. I just like the stepping away from using circular extruded shapes for extruded canes. There is absolutely no reason not to make extruded canes with any shape you have available for your extruder. This long rectangular shape is particularly fun because of the striations you can make. You will see this in the bead on the first page of the tutorial that I am giving you. And why not reform the cane into long teardrops or flatten them out a little more and roll then into a rainbow jelly roll? Extrude a few and see what you can come up with!
On Poly Cat’s pages , you’ll find the Rectangular Rainbow Extruded Cane being used to create a bead, then there’s the flower cup bead steps you use the cane slices with as well. Pop the URLs for any of these links into Google translate if you want to read them in English, and your browser doesn’t automatically translate them for you. If I understand the translation correctly, the techniques she uses are inspired by others, and she has links and references to those sources so you have even more to check out if you like.
If you like this blog, support The Polymer Arts projects with a subscription or issue of The Polymer Arts magazine as well as supporting our advertising partners.
