Here’s a link to a brand new page with the mosaic table Bryan just finished. There’s a LITTLE bit of polymer clay in this one–but mostly stone and ceramic with crystal glazes. It ended up looking kinda like a game board! It has all the beautiful pieces swimming permanently in a poured two part epoxy resin surface. The picture shown here is of one corner of the table. Featured are crystal glazed tiles created by master crystalierre and potter Fara Shimbo.

http://polyclay.com/epoxyresin.htm

Dyed in the wool comes this weekend…but LAST week we dyed the cottons and silks. While we rested up and things dried, we put together a quick 30 second video with an ambient music soundtrack.

I’m learning how to use a webcam and the digital camera as a video recorder, and playing with the hardware and software is how I learn best.

 http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=36089812

Music provided by Bryan Helm. If you like it, take a listen to his podcasts at My Life In Sound.

We’ve had rain all the first part of this week, and we needed the moisture. It is beautiful in a sunny way today, and we’re starting into the annual dyeing days! Today is prep day–I’ll be mixing dyes, and getting them into the bottles.  I just ran off the sheets of labels for the plastic bottles. This year we have:
#03  Golden Yellow 
#05  Soft Orange
#8A Pagoda Red
#09  Scarlet
#13  Fuchsia Red
#14A  Hot Pink
#15  Amethyst
#18A  UltraViolet
#19  Plum
#19A  Lilac 
#21  Teal Blue
#23  Cerulean Blue
#25  Turquoise
#27 Midnight Blue
#28A  AquaMarine
#37  Bronze
#44 BetterBlack
#45 Jungle Red
#47 Chartreuse
#50 JadeGreen
#60  Lavender
#62 PeacockBlue
#64  Orchid
#96  Lapis
#97  Citrus Yellow
#105  Pewter
#111 Black Cherry
#112  Periwinkle
#113 GoldenBrown
#115 Eggplant
#118  Yucca
#312 Strongest Red
#510 Basic Brown

We use Procion MX series coldwater fiber reactive dyes. We’ve found that labeling the bottles after mixing them up makes it easier to tell what’s what, when you have lots of colors. We also have bagged swatches (that’s the picture at top) so that we know how the color is going to come out, mostly.

Another good tip I’ll share with you is to mix your dyes with water and then pour through a coffee filter into the bottle, that way those pesky little red or turquoise spots are not a problem.

This year I’m dyeing lots more pieces of turned wood, because I LOVE how last years batch turned out. No ribbons this year–I did a lot of them last year.

They went into the current crop of Spirit Doll Kits along with the cotton and silk fabrics, and polymer clay faces. I’m selling them on Etsy.comwhich is an on-line site presenting handmade and vintage items. I’ll be adding lots more items in the upcoming weeks as I clean out the studio and help fund upcoming shows and projects.

I’ll also be dyeing some t shirt dresses and shorts for my own summertime wardrobe, and backdrop and curtain fabric that will be used in the Aunt Acid Show. They WERE beige muslin–how drab!! They were great when I did out door shows and needed backdrops that did not compete with the displays. But for this particular show, we can take LOTS of color. I’ve been gluing mosaic set pices, and things are coming along splendidly in a visual sense. Now for another big dose of color, and we’ll be onward into the Summer of More Love…and we happen to love art and music and humor, so I’d say these good times to “Be Happening”.

Speaking of summer time fun, I’ll be teaching a week long seminar on using dyed fabrics and polymer clays to make spirit dolls, icons, and masks this summer at Tougaloo College Summer Art Colony. July in Mississippi is time for some HOT ART!!

Bryan Helm makes audible and visual mosaic art.  Some of his instuments can be used for music. The ones that can not keep a tone are recycled into beautifully encrusted works of art that Senor Gaudy might well have liked.

He uses polymer clay, glass, wire and found objects and each finished instrument is different. Here’s a photo of the back of it that I’ve taken into Photoshop and played with a bit, taking the creative connections even a little bit further.

Many of the impressions that were stamped into the polymer clay tiles that cover this piece were made using custom stamps anda molds we had made at Ready Stamps in San Diego, using dingbat fonts to create our own designs, then to rubber–then to polymer clay and now here.

We’ve recently opened an online shop at Etsy.com, where handmade items are featured for sale. Please do come and take a look at our items up for sale there, which include the Tumbling Blocks Guitar shown here and in the book “Adapting Quilt Patterns To Polymer Clay”.

He’s recently finished the Little BlueGlass Guitar, and has just begun the Big Green Twelve String. We’ll be sure to show it off when it is finished!

He is also tiling a table for a commisioned piece locally, and it features gorgeous ceramic tiles that have crystals grown into the glazes, made by Fa Shimbo.

 I’m gluing too–working on the tiled backdrops and set pieces for the Aunt Acid Show. That’s sure to show up here in the blog soon too!

I’ve been working for months now on getting ready for “The Aunt Acid Show” and it’ll be a lot more work to come before we air the first episode. We’re writing the segments, the music, creating the sets, the costumes and props…even the star and supporting cast.

Aunt Acid is a puppet, a performing artiste, a political humorist and a spokesmodel. She’s taken a while to come together , but the progress has been fun, and documented along the way. Her head is polymer clay over papier mache, and now I’ve added the sections pertaining to her body and her hands. These are NOT pc, but rather fabric over wire armature.

Does using two colors of polar fleece for the skin mean she’s bipolar? hmmm….. maybe!

The final stitches are in place, and as soon as she’s had time for her manicure (gotta make the nails!) makeup, and hair she’ll be ready for the photographers.

head  http://auntacid.com/originalsyn.html

body http://auntacid.com/auntiebody.html

hands  http://auntacid.com/handsoff.html