Slingshot Necklace

Sticks and stones
And cuttlefish bones

One of my new necklaces spinning off from Swamp Cartography.

3 Brooches

Fresh from the jewellers bench: 3 etched silver and gold brooches. These are the forerunners of a larger series for Swamp Cartography.

Each has a portal of sorts to take you under the surface or deeper into the landscape.

Storm Brooch - front and back

Brushbox Brooch

Hakea Brooch

Not quite symmetrical

These wallumy earrings are made by smoodging tiny porcelain coils flat which are then pressed into clay and silicone molds made from direct impressions from nature. Then they're painted, sponged and fired. Finally pairs silver hooks are made.
Pierced ears anyone?

Silver and Clay

I've been visiting Rebecca's studio. We are into the creation phase of our wallum project and are spending time in each other's studios,learning "cross discipline" skills.

We painted silver and copper with brown, road tar goo and when it was dry, I scratched leptospernum blossoms and leaf silhouettes exposing the metal. The plates were then dipped into and acid bath.
We are working on a couple of ranges of jewellery incorporating metal, porcelain and thread. Here are the porcelain pendants in the background with silver cuttle fish castings of twigs in the foreground.

Twig Impressions Experiment

Working on this project and teaching a cuttlefish casting workshop, I have been inspired to venture out of my happy little comfort zone in cuttlefish casting by making impressions of these leptospermum twiglets from the Wallum. Inspired by what the students dared to do in class after informing them that "it probably wouldn't work but give it a go anyway", I found I was able to get quite delicate impressions in the cuttlefish bone. These castings are only 5cm long, to give an idea of scale. I also pressed some of the tiny tea tree seed cases into the cuttlefish, closed up the mould and poured molten scrap silver from the crucible to make these 2 pieces of double sided sheet: The castings are relief style owing to a brass sheet inner cutout mold. And the cuttlefish pattern shows its wavy texture in the background. Quite appropriately too I would say, as the cuttlefish bones were all found along beaches adjacent to Wallum/heath coastal areas like Kangaroo Island and Bribie Island.

Photo Process

Taking photos in the Wallum we have been experimenting with paper backgrounds to get a better outline of the intricate leaf and branch patterns. The paper encourages the illusion that the photo is being taken against sand or sky. This photo of Twigrushes was taken at Women's Lake and you can see how I extracted the strong black and white graphic which will make an excellent etching resist.

Then there are the beautifully serrated Wallum Banksia leaves photographed rather artificially by spreading them on a sheet of white paper. Photoshopped to make positive and negative resists for etching. Someone recently commented that these patterns are reminicent of 70s wallpaper design! They are certainly bold and reductive.

Results: Two silver pieces etched with the Wallum Banksia leaf pattern.

What to do with these metal plates that are accumulating around me like loose pages from books remains an enigma.