Found Object Jewelry

At the Art Festival I had come across the booth of Barbara Foley who is from Joplin MO. She made jewelry that had a somewhat steam-punk feel to it but she also made pieces that seemed abstract and more natural with the use of stone beads. I was particularity interested with her necklace collection. One that she had made had what looked to be a vintage camera lens on it. There was no price tag and I wish I would have asked how much it was, not for the purpose of buying it but for the sake of knowing how much it would take for her to part with it. Other than necklaces, she had an endless supply of earrings and pendants that incorporated old coins and misc. other small objects. I have yet to find a website for her but I did find other artists on the internet that had work I really liked.

Etsy user Yumis, has a list of items for sale but the one I liked most was their Steampunk Bracelet, currently priced at $130. I love how the centerpiece is a keyhole framing a small spring. The keyhole is dated from 1910-1920.
(Source)

FashionAndStyleNow.com has a post about handmade vintage-look jewelry. The artist for this piece is not listed. The other pieces on this post are worth looking at but not much information is shared about it.


If you like the vintage look, Jennifer Valentine is wonderful. Looking through her flickr site one can reflect on the importance of presentation. She also has a blog and etsy site that can be accessed through her flickr page.

Tanith, also on Etsy uses used guitar string in her works. She likes to have used guitar string because she thinks "Some strings may have some discoloration, but I feel this adds to the character of the pieces". She has a few bracelets that look like the following, but rather than use sheet music she uses maps or book pages. Very cool.
(From Tanith's Etsy Page)

Artist Louis Waitt uses various pieces of metal and other small objects like dominoes to make necklaces. One of the pendants on his necklaces takes the shape of a dog.

If you've ever seen or read The Magic School Bus, you might remember the teacher Ms. Fizzle, who was really spontaneous and everybody's favorite teacher. If she could be summarized into a necklace, Gerry Florida has done it. His work is bright, colorful, and crazy just like Ms. Frizzle.

(From Pittsburgh Artist Registry-Gerry Florida)

Stillwater Arts Festival

Today I attended the Stillwater Arts Festival that took place downtown. I was very excited in seeing a variety of artist there and lots of people going about looking at things. I've never bought anything at an art festival out of the few I've been to, but today I did.



I bought a small ring from Steve Cast of "Cast Creations". His work was beautiful and his larger pieces had price tags to reflect it. The piece I got was 10$ but I love it. It looks so simple and has an openness to it, yet the structure is complicated as the wire is knotted around itself. It's my souvenir that will remind me about all the things I saw today.

Ty A Kelly, was one of the first artists I stumbled upon at the festival. He had these beautiful landscapes up in his booth and some other paintings that were more playful. Other than painting, Kelly works in pastel and print making. He has an online gallery and a blog too. LINK

Morgan Robinson (Morgan Interior Accents) was one-of-a-kind! Robinson has the very interesting sculptures and furniture. I suggest browsing through Robinson's gallery and portfolio HERE. I don't know exactly how to phrase what I thought about the work, I like it a lot. Robinson says himself, "I make forms and give them function". That's a perfect description.

Wes Jackson's style definitely stood out among the artists in attendance. He says on his facebook site, "My work while traditional in application gathers its strength from the urban aspect of street art....My style is uniquely "Tulsa" and I have Tulsa in my blood." I really like the illustrations combined with other mediums, he really puts time into his work and it shows. Here is his portfolio site.

Stephen Smith was an impressionist artist. I really enjoy all the colors impressionists use. Here is his website. I loved his piece Linnaeus Water Lilies.

Jim Shelley makes glass jewelry. He had some really neat owls and turtles for necklaces and many other small glass pieces. He also can make custom portraits of pets. All of these can be seen at his website.

Rebecca Livingston had a booth full of pottery. She had these neat clocks too! I've got this weird thing for clocks and time in general. I want to have a clock collection someday on a wall in my house.

A list of all the artist can be found HERE.

-Kelleigh :)

How to: Workbook (or IB Investigative Journal)

People ask me a lot what my workbook is, I often carry it around and work on it in class. Well its technically called my International Baccalaureate (IB) Investigative Journal/Workbook. I recently finished up my 1st workbook of 185 pages, I'm quite proud of it. And looking back I feel like I can now tell you how to keep a strong workbook. A workbook does not just have to be for art, its just like how an author keeps a journal. Its a great way to keep your thoughts going in an organized time line and book, collected in one place, not table napkins and in the margins of math hw scattered around your home.
To begin a workbook all you need is a blank page book, no lined pages. The cover I would say should be black, just to keep your ideas from being interrupted by the work on the cover, you don't want your idea to be altered as you look at your book. However, that is just my suggestion, you can get whatever cover you would like. Or just decorate the cover yourself. Its up to you.
Now that you have a book, you need to not worry about who will ever see it. Its your personal space to do as you wish. As you do as you will to each page it is most important to date each page and number each page. On your blank pages you can write, draw, glue, color, paint, or whatever else you can think of.
Write about artists you see. Even if its just going to the store and you see a homeless man selling chalk drawings on cardboard and you like the art, write it down. You see a logo and think something about it, 'the blue and green makes me think the company is enviromentally aware'. Also write about whats going on in your life. "Man smoking in front of my apartment, I hated how he made my porch smell so awful I felt like I was choking." How could you do a piece of art to reflect that? Art that has something to say is important, give an opinion and run with it.
Draw what you like. Its important to draw things you like, along with doing observation sketches to test and challenge you making you better.
Research goes along with writing, but you have to read up on something too. The news paper can be research or an internet article about the new painting a local museaum just bought.
Process pages are important. If you are going to get published or applying to college, they will want to know you are thinking about your work. Show the original idea, sketch it, draw arrows, point out things. Is there symbolism? What is it? Why? What do you think about ___? Why did you draw it so up close? What is their expression suppose to mean? You have to write it down. Write what you change. "I didn't like how full the flower was, so I drew it in its bud state." "The F-stop made the foreground way too blurry, so I'm changing it to a ## F-stop to get a sharper image".

The most important thing is to keep up with your book! Don't stop working in it for months at a time, do a sketch or write a sentence once a week if you must!

Here are some pages from my books::

Notes/Research
book 1

Process Page

book1

book1

book2

I strongly encourage this form of working. It really helps people who are unsure what they are to create in art.