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It was a beautiful sunny day and with the best ever turnout for the LPCG things were looking up for a cracking time. We welcomed newcomers to the group Kerrie, June and Christine and started off with a 'show and tell' session which lasted virtually until lunchtime. Kerrie kicked off with her pendants (photo 1) and her tile beads using Maggie Maggio's colour scales as her starting point and also shared her tips for polishing and buffing using micro mesh cloths .
Carol
had bought her amazing small bowls (photo2) and talked through her
technique for a no armature bangle. We discussed the trials and tribulations
of deciding how to cost one's work for sale (topic for another session).
I had some new flower earrings to show and wrapped bangles using cheap
and cheerful 'blanks' from Claire's Accessories (photo 3). Christine
showed us her beautiful worked entered for the Progress and Possibilities'
annual competition run by the National Polymer Clay Guild in the USA
(photo 7). As well as information about an exhibition of contemporary
jewellery( www.louisaguinessgallery.com) .
Clare then shared with us her funky collection of bears and other animals and a beautiful harvest festival basket. (Photo 4) Caroline had been experimenting over the summer using glass paints ( PEBEO) to create an unusual a dichroic effect and much advice was given about some 'engineering for her reversible necklace. Susan likewise had been experimenting after the Nottingham Clay Carnival weekend and influenced by Christine had some trumpet beads and a tactile Jeffrey Dever-esque pod.
Our discussions continued over a fabulous 'pot luck' lunch in the garden (highlight of the day?!) about our aims and aspirations for the LPCG and what were the best and most practical steps to take to put them into place.
· A yahoo email group so we can all talk together
· A flickr site with photo images or a simple website
· Guest artists to spend the day with us. We are hoping that Lisa Pavelka will teach a workshop in February 2009 in Rotherhithe. Lisa is a leading polymer clay artist from Las Vegas. She has published several books on pc and has her own Q&A page in Polymercafe magazine. See her website, www.heartinhandstudio.com
· PR overtures to relevant magazines and organisations i.e. The Craftsman , Craft Magazine
· A 'proper' regular venue so we can have larger number of people
As usual we were running out of time and finished off with a good demo from Susan showing the tearaway technique (via Gwen Gibson, via Celie Fago, via Louise Fischer Cozzi etc etc!) She also bought some great black and white images from www.needlenthread.com which worked really well on polymer clay. (photo 5)
We set dates for the next few meetings Sunday January 18th and Sunday 22nd March
For further details please contact Carol at carol@carolblackburn.co.uk or Susan at susan@rimmer.com or Debbie at Debbie@bethere.co.uk
My husband who had taken refuge upstairs said all he could hear were gales of laughter coming from obviously very happy people. What more can I say.
Debbie Carlton
Photo credits, 1-5 Carol Blackburn, 6 Susan Rimmer, 7 Christine Dumont
The London Polymer Clay Group met on July 10 at Caroline's house. The day was a feast of clay and food sharing which flashed by with hardly a moment to draw breath.
One of the themes under discussion for the day was the need to expand the group and the members expressed an interest in attracting artists working in different media to increase the cross fertilisation of ideas. At present we have Debbie who also works with Precious Metal Clay and Caroline who works with pottery. The day started with five of us: Caroline, Claire, Carol, Debbie and Susan. We decided that we would be organised and have an agenda for the day, though our enthusiasm got the better of us once we had had some food, delicious as ever, and all thoughts of the agenda went out of the window.
We started with our usual Share and Tell. An exciting moment where new ideas and concepts are shared. There is a hugely generous sharing of techniques, websites and hot tips as well as honest feedback on each other's work. Each person opened up their boxes of recent work revealing the diversity of our visions. Claire who runs polymer clay classes for children shared two of her latest projects: a Father's Day card sporting three ties made of polymer and a noughts and crosses game in polymer both beautiful and quirky. Following on from our last meeting she also covered a hairslide with a complex cane. Caroline shared her latest work in which she incorporated hessian into clay. Susan had a range of beautiful objects she had made including one using extruded clay. Having seen this we all decided to do some extruding. She had also worked using piñata inks and also using Angelina fibres and gloss to achieve a dichroic effect. Carol had much wisdom to share and great examples of subtle gradations of colour made by Dan Cormmier. Debbie brought new books to share as creative jolts and we salivated over them before admiring her work. Some of her pieces were crystal encrusted, she also worked out a way of making bangles using a foil armature, another idea we decided to work on later.
Before lunch we practiced extruding and I am sure that this will spawn much new work for next times sharing. But as ever one thing led to another and as we were feasting our new member Helen Philips appeared fresh with her box for sharing. She soon discovered that she had been using quick drying clay and not polymer so a quick crash course in polymer ensued with demonstrations of skinner blends, skinny blends, jelly rolls and stacking. A lot of ground was covered in a short time and she made some objects from polymer for firing at home.
After this Caroline started to play with the idea of making a bracelet and helped by Debbie managed to achieve this managing to work out how to impress a texture on both sides of the bracelet without compromising its shape.
Despite wanting to organise the day in a more structured way the pull of the clay seemed to take us elsewhere and we all left filled with new ideas.
For next time we decided to set a theme, The Vessel. We are each going to bring some ideas with us and then build our object during the session. The idea is to share and to break new ground with the clay.
Next meeting will be at Debbie's house on Sunday 28 September 10-4pm bring lunch to share. If you would like to join us contact Debbie on: Debbie@bethere.co.uk
Report written by Caroline Schuck
It was our seventh meeting, and this time, it was my turn to host it at my home in West London.
Everyone arrived around 10am and once the kettle was on, we got straight down to catching up on what had been happening since we last met around two months ago.
The previous weekend had seen a popular event in the British Polymer clay calendar. "Polydays". Several of us had attended and so we started by hearing all about what they had learned and done. This opened up many interesting and varied avenues of conversation.
At the last meeting, Caroline had shown us a technique for texturing clay, using a very simple little gadget. (Actually a spiked onion holder!) To our surprise she kindly gave us each one of our own, so that we too could make regular lines, curves, waves or holes to our hearts content! Often when working with polymer clay you will find that the most useful tools are small inexpensive things that you may already have around the home.
As always, we had a very impressive show and tell session, with some beautiful professionally made items of jewellery that Carol and Debbie had brought back from a recent visit to the US, together with peoples work from the Polydays workshops and other interesting "experimental works in progress!" I always look forward to this bit as there is always such a range of projects and ideas to see. Also, it has been very interesting to see as members grow and improve in their work.
After our coffee/tea and homemade muffins, we got down to actually having a go at a few techniques. We experimented with translucent clays, layering them with different coloured foils to great effect. This we made into beads and brooches.
Next, Carol showed us her "Chop & Change" method or Bargello technique. Which produces a wonderfully colourful sheet of patterned clay with a woven appearance.
Susan explained how she had been playing around with a thin sheet of clay one day and created a way of making the clay look like it had been smocked. This was fiddly but looked both very effective and pretty.
With every inch of our table space covered in our tools and creations, we moved into the other room for lunch, which was once again a gourmet affair. (A word to anyone interested in joining our London group, "it is worth coming, just for the lunch!")
Lunch was followed my more endless chat and a bit more hands on claying, before we all packed up around 4pm.The day always seems to fly past, I am sure we could just go on and on!
All in all the day was a very enjoyable exchange of creative ideas and friendly chat.
Our next meeting is scheduled for July 10th at 10am, this time at Caroline's home in Swiss Cottage, London NW3. If having read this, anyone is interested in coming along to join us, please contact Caroline or I, on cals@carolineschuck.co.uk or claremcknight@tiscali.co.uk space is limited, so do please contact us in advance.
Clare McKnight
'Image transfers onto polymer clay' was the theme of the February meeting of the London Polymer Clay Group but we began with our regular 'show & tell' session. This has become a much anticipated feature as everyone delves into tins or bags to retrieve their recent pieces, some finished and some as samples but all very varied. Many pieces were made at or as a result of classes that we had attended in the 2 months since the previous meeting. We spent the morning experimenting with image transfers and baking samples though, as often happens, we ventured off at tangents to the main topic and explored various hollow forms and 'pillow' beads.Another tangent was texturing and staining raw clay using spirit-based coloured inks. We also discussed using 2 part resins for a glass-like surface on finished pieces and canes made of translucent clay and foils. These are topics for future meetings.
After a 'potluck' lunch we continued with image transfers, trying out techniques learned at classes with Donna Kato and Robert Dancik and comparing inkjet and laser toner printed images. It seemed that the most successful transfer methods used toner prints on uncoated papers.
Our next meeting will be on Thursday 17th April in West London. We have left the main subject open as it will be a few days after the BPCG 'Polydays' and we will have our class pieces to discuss at an extended 'show and tell'.
Please contact Clare McKnight claremcknight@tiscali.co.uk for details of the next meeting venue.
Carol
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