Exciting day in the workshop

The day got off to a rousing start due to some naughtiness by a couple of unnamed class participants.  Carol Simmons has developed a phenomenal cane slicer with a very sharp blade, and some creative folks decided to "illustrate" the potential risks of using it.  We all waited expectantly for Carol to see our work, but she kept walking by the slicer without seeing what was there.  Finally we heard a shriek and knew that our trick was a success.

Bloody severed finger

For the last two days we have been frantically creating component canes to go into our kaleidoscope cane, and today, everything started to come together. 

A bunch of component canes

Laying out cane slices to figure out the design

Fabulous job of interpreting inspirational fabric

Partly assembled cane

Laying out my cane

My cane before reducing

The operative word is "intensive"

The workshop I'm taking with Carol Simmons is called "6-Day Kaleidoscope Pendant Intensive", and the operative word is "intensive."  We meet from 9am to 9pm, plus more time earlier or later depending on whether we are morning or night people, with just a short break for lunch and dinner at a local restaurant before returning to the studio.  Carol is with us the whole time teaching and working with each of us on our individual canes.  I don't think I've seen another teacher put in so much effort for his or her students.  I had intended to blog daily but quite frankly, I've been too pooped at the end of the day to do anything but put my feet up and sip a glass of wine before hitting the sack.  


The group of students are all great fun and we are having a good time as well as working hard and learning a lot.

Big Hollow Beads

I'm taking an online class from Christine Dumont at All Over Creation who also does Voila! She has done a great job with the videos, and the forum discussions with other participants have been terrific.  We are all doing the class at the same time so we can learn from each other.  Here is my first big hollow bead:

It is about 34mm or 1 and 1/3 inches

Beyond the Blend

My marathon week of claying finally came to an end and I am recovering at my mom's house in Pennsylvania. I darted out of the Synergy gala dinner just before the live auction, which I heard was a lot of fun, and drove back to Damascus, Maryland to get ready for Dan Cormier and Tracy Holmes' two-day workshop called Beyond the Blend. Dan is a very analytical and precise kind of guy and he has spent much of the last two years working with clay blends in the pasta machine. He has come up with an interesting method for achieving complex, predictable and repeatable results. He also likes developing tools and introduced the SHARK, a device for limiting the spread of clay in pasta machines. It helps when you want to make a narrow blend or just a narrow strip of clay. Griffin Cormier was there as well, running around in his jammies, and he kept us all entertained.

I can't say enough about Rob and Wilma and Devon at Artway Studio/Polymer Clay Express. They gave the students the run of the store and instantly provided anything we needed for the class.

I'll be offline for awhile. I'm driving my mom down to North Carolina for a big family reunion and probably won't be blogging til I get back to Canada around March 8. Unless, of course, you want me to show photos from my cousin's 50th wedding anniversary.

Savarick class, Day Three

Dateline: Damascus*

Intrepid international blogger Cynthia Blanton was felled by a sniper's bullet while reporting from a clandestine meeting of the ASPCA.** Not really. I just WISHED someone would shoot me. During the afternoon of the third day of class, I developed a wicked case of food poisoning and became overly familiar with the toilet facilities at the Artway Studio. I totally missed the last two hours of class which apparently had something to do with tassels. In my fevered condition, the only use I could think of for tassels had nothing to do with polymer clay.

I had planned to photograph everyone's finished projects, but I was too sick and besides, nobody finished anything. The class was really about process and technique, so we were intent on learning as many different methods as possible. My approach to workshops is to siphon every last drop of information out of my teacher's brain and worry about finishing things or having the most original design when I get back home. I'm hoping the class participants will send photos of their projects when they finish them.

The highlight of the class was learning the source of Seth's Secret Sauce (aka S3), a magical liquid he uses to smooth clay surfaces. We are sworn to secrecy, so the only way to learn about this wonderful formula is to take one of his classes.

I'm glad I had a day off between class and Synergy because I'm still recovering. Tomorrow will be a full day of seminars, speeches, panel discussions and the opening of the gallery of artist's work. Most of my clay heroes are here and I can't wait to see their work in person.

* Damascus, Maryland
** American Society for Polymer Clay Addicts

Savarick class, Day Two

Whew, I'm pooped. We had a full day of vessel construction in class today, and I was so busy, I didn't take any photos. Each student is trying to make three vessels with different shapes and features. Each one requires multiple layers of clay, so we switched back and forth between them, working on one while another one was baking. Seth Savarick, the instructor, is a computer jock as well as an artist, and he makes good use of the computer for designing objects and silkscreen patterns. In addition, he prints out useful templates for measuring and marking components of the clay pieces. Because each layer of the vessel builds upon the prior one, it is critical to make the "foundation" layers as precise as possible, and the templates help with that process.

Tomorrow we learn how to make lids and bottoms and apply decorative veneers....

Seth L. Savarick's class

Today was the first day of Seth L. Savarick's 3-day class at the Artway Studio called Inner Spaces/Outer Voices, Creating Personal Containers to Wear or Carry. Seth makes a variety of beautifully finished, gallery quality inro, lockets, minaudiere and vanity purses. Most of us were expecting to see tiny little vessels, but his are actually larger than the photos on his website suggest. We began with a discussion of his design process, learned how to properly leach and condition clay (I thought I knew how, but he taught me some things), and then we began learning a variety of ways to make core forms, the shapes around which he builds the vessels.

The teaching facilities at the Artway Studio are quite good. In addition to a long room with our work tables, there is a lecture room with an overhead mirror, the kind you find in cooking classes, and a variety of chairs, including some tall ones towards the back of the room. Smart. I think everyone had a good view of the demonstrations. And of course, any supplies we needed were instantly available in the store.

Tomorrow we start building vessels.....