Rainbow colour

I'm so sorry for the fuzzy pictures I plan to replace them once my hands are steady.

As I have mentioned and noticed in my last blog posts, colour plays a big role in a jewellery piece. Even though I am making contemporary beaded jewellery that is inspired by traditional beadwork and its colours, I think have moved away from the traditional colours. When I say traditional colours I mean opaque colours, nothing that glitters or shines in a metallic way. If you take a look at traditional beadwork you will see that they used primary opaque colours and their complements.

Marlene ( third year lecture) made a suggestion that I should try making something with these opaque colours and I strongly agree hence the beaded frame above. I feel that in other to be sure of my next move or the next colour scheme, I had to try out all the other beads and colours so as to know what works an what doesn't. The Frame above is beaded so as to be 3D, I'm hoping to create my own beaded bead and have these small elements that make up a big piece of jewellery.

Reflect

The focus on my jewellery last year or in the past was on the beads and how they played a big role on the thin wire frames or shapes that I made. With that in mind my work started to look more home made them hand made, so I started to bend and solder different shape for the Local is Lekker exhibition and I was very pleased with the out come. These shape would make my work different from any other beaders work as I had used one of the jewellery skills or technic (soldering).

One of the things that the lectures and I spoke about is my wire thickness, the one thing that I thought was my strong point was the one thing that limited my jewellery and still made it easy to make.
When the lectures pointed this out I started drawing ideas that had nothing to do with wire but worked more with plate. These are some of the drawings that I came up with and I would like to start making or improving them.

Local Is Lekker starts

This day finally came and I enjoyed the vibe and the short and sweet speeches, this exhibition will run for the whole of June, while the world cup is still on. There are 38 jewellers exhibiting their jewellery, so you an imagin the number of jewellery and the show cases there. Although the focus was on jewellery there were a lot of paintings and all kind of art there. The painting above is one of the pieces that court my attention, I think it is called rainbow children. As you can see there are different raises there.
I strongly feel that there is a lot of talent out there and you really have to know where you come from and where you are going. You really have to create something that stands out, above the rest. I really thought and believed that my jewellery is different and unique and I don't have any doubt in my mind that it still is but I'm amaised at the talent out there and I'm challenged by all their work. I have to push my designs and when I say push I mean to design and experiment more in order to get to a body of work that can not be compared.

My baby

This is my new baby, I've bad experiences with plants and I'm hoping that I don't kill this one as it was also a gift. Still working on a name for her but its on the drawing board for now so watch this space ;-) !
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Crit

Well we had a crit with our lectures, so as to get a skilled and neutral input on our work. I say skilled because they thought some of the things that we know and neutral because they are not our friends who sometime spare our feelings or who know just as much as we do.
I must say that I was a bit tense because I didn't know what to expect. I got to hear what I new at the back of my mind about some pieces but didn't want to admit that it to myself though it was what it was. I also got some jewellery design ideas. Here are some of their drawings, not drawn to the T but make some sense to me. I wish it was as easy said and easily done. The one thing that's stopping me from making things right now, is the 3000 word essay that is waiting to be done by the beginning of next month. Good luck to me!
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Necklace

Some of these are not for sale.

Bead

Well I have always made these wire frame or big jumprings and a part on me is tired of making them flat. So I decided to play around and bead a bead or a shape. The colour as a bit too busy though, they remind me of Christmas.

Make or break?

I believe that colour can make or break a piece and I think that the ring at the bottom is a perfect example. The plain red colour didn't work for it.

Where as the colours bellow suit it best. What do you think?

Bracelet

Making these shapes and soldering everything together before tech closed, wasn't a bad idea because now I can sit home and bead. I don't know weather I should hand this in for the local is lekker exhibition or to just leave it for the NSA gallery.
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Three

Two rings and a pendant. Some people say that the pendant could become beautiful earrings, so I will try that. One could say that the wire work is thin but I wanted it to be like that so that when you look at the rings from the side,it could look like a flower with its stem.
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Left behind

This is a pair that was left behind from all the others that are ment for the local is lekker exhibition. The poster that I made had a lot of different colours, shapes and size and the earring that I made inspired by the images had to be the same.
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Colour

I was cleaning my room and throwing things away, I came across this poster that I made for a first year project. I didn't know then, what I know now and that is I've always been attracted to bright colours, I love colours that are bright and work very well together.(Complementary and split complementary colours :-)
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All is well

Im more then happy with the way that these earrings came out for the local is lekker exhibition at the end of this month. I think that there is room for improvement for some of them but........

Local Is Lekker

As mush as I think I know what local is lekker means, I still wanted to brain storm so as to not leave anything out. Fun, home, mlazi, shapes, size and lots, are some of the word that I could come up with. I went around the areas that I walk throw everyday so as to capture images that grab my attention. These are some of the images that I captured so as to create this calardg. This calardg is busy for a reason, there is a very small section of my life where there is silence because I spend most of my time trying to get around to the next area and I'm always at the texi rank in town or eMlazi.

Vetkat night

I think I will write this as sort of a review, just stating my point of view about the whole event. I really had a tough time getting to the museum, where I had to call a cab for the first time and had to pay R80. 00 for it to take me there. This was not easy for me as I felt that taking part of the Vetkat event was for a good cause, some people didn't feel that way. I really enjoyed the event and felt that everything was very professionally put together. My questions where answered about the pictures being in colour or black and white, they were in colour. I hope that my jewellery gets sold so that some of that the some of the money could be used to help those kids reach for their dream. The speeches, singing and poem were over the top. A part of me still wishes that I had some interaction with the kids in high school, they have so much potential and if given the right tools, they could do far batter.

Final Pieces

I could call this a review or connecting the dots of my jewellery to the Vetkat exhibition. Well this month I had to do a green theme piece of jewellery but I did the Vetkat instead. With this Vetkat exhibition I focused on the images, or his drawings. I was taken in by how explicit I thought some of them where. In order to avoid any discomfort, I focused on the flowers on the paintings or drawings. We got these drawing from the deportment in Black and white and the one thing that I kept asking myself was, (Were they in colour?)

I never really pushed to found out more because I had come up with a solution to my problems. Recreate the flowers and add my own colour to them. I quit enjoyed this exercise because I didn't over stress about the end product, I just started soldering jumpings together, what really mattered in these pieces of jewellery, was the end product to be colourful.