Euclide's Vision

Artist Gregory Euclide constructs landscapes depicting nature as idealized images.

His recent work starts with a beautifully rendered painting and then he adds bits of nature and other materials to make it protrude from the original piece.

He might add layers of paper, pine needles, ferns and even styrofoam to depict his vision.

Stop by his website and take a peek. I think you might enjoy the 2D into 3D approach and stylized way he represents his landscapes.

Reef Collaboration for Shannon Hill

As many of you know, fellow glass artist and all around nice guy, Shannon Hill is very sick with cancer.

I just saw a thread on Lampwork Etc. that an artist collaboration is being organized to benefit his kids in some way.

A team of glass artists are building a reef scene for him and would love you to send in a turtle, seashell, fish, coral or anything related. Items must be in hand by May 10th.

Organizers, (Brent Graber, Mr. Smiley is one of them) want to make it as inclusive as possible and honor him and benefit his kids at the same time.

Any COE is fine.

Send it to:

Shannon Hill
Reef Collab.
716 NW 6th Dr.
Boca Raton, FL 33486

So far, some of the artists who have donated include Robert Mickelsen, Ben Burton, Rashan JOnes, Wil Menzie, Wesley Fleming, Lucid Visions and many others.

I had been thinking about either sending in this mermaid or the starfish, but since have changed my mind. I'm going to make something special for this.

One of the reasons why I love this glass world, is the way folks come together for each other. We are a community of supportive and kind people who love glass. All of our work together will make an outstanding collaborative piece that will honor Shannon and help his kids. Would you please join me on this?

Artist Self Promotion in This Economy

Most of us artists are pretty happy hanging out by ourselves for a good part of the day and doing our artwork. I mean, that's what we enjoy the most, right?

Well, right. But we aren't going to sell anything unless we put ourselves forward, let the public see a little who we are and what we do. Our glass art doesn't just sell itself, even though we would dearly love it.

But face it, the economic cosmos are swirling and right now, we're getting just the debris. High end retailers like Neiman Marcus and Nordstroms reported double digit drops in December. I've read that shoppers are changing their buying style from high end looking good, to feeling good. In the retail world, less bling and more classic styles are moving along.

While I'm no economic marvel or even Ben Stein, I think this could bode well for our industry in the long run. If people are buying more classic clothes, then won't them want more original art jewelry at a reasonable price to make themselves stand out?

So how do they find us? It certainly won't be sitting behind our torches in our studios. We need to put ourselves out there and promote ourselves. Have you signed up for Twitter.com, Facebook or even Classmates.com? Do you have a solid online presence? What do people find when they google your name or your business name? Most importantly, can they find you...easily?

And how are you advertising your glass art beads? Are you on Flickr.com? Do you have a blog? Post on public forums and just as importantly, have a local presence? Are you advertising in places where people who would want to buy your work might be?

Tell us what you're doing to put yourself and your art "out there". You don't need to give away business secrets, but a few hints and tips would be nice. Let's hear them.

And by the way, this is my current Facebook profile photo. It makes me laugh and apparently it amuses others too. If you look closely, that's my black handbag on my head and I took the photo with my Mac computer's camera. Who knows, maybe I can start a trend with recycled handbag hats?

See you tomorrow. I've won the Marie Antoinette Blog Award from Sterling Sue and will blog about it. But first, I need to bake a cake so we can celebrate appropriately.

Meet Lucite Green ~ Margie Deeb's Choice for Spring's Color of 2009

Margie Deeb, Author of the Color Report for Bead Artists and color expert has written in her "Margie's Muse" about Lucite Green this month. In her opinion, she would love for it to be Spring's color of 2009.

And personally, I would have to agree with her. Not only do I love the color, but also she used my lampwork fish necklace to illustrate it. (Please contact me if you are interested in purchasing it. It's not on my website)

Margie's latest publication, The Spring Summer 2009 Color Report for Bead Artists, shows Panetone's (the world reknowned authority on color) 10 chosen colors for the season. Margie takes these industry colors and shows you how to use them in different palettes, combinations and percentages. What a difference it makes!

Margie includes lots of beaded jewelry and pieces to show the reader how the combinations and amounts of each color look in actual pieces that were made by her readers. I don't know about you, but that sure helps me a lot.

And here's one more tip. Margie has year's of color information available for FREE in pdf form on her website through her Margie's Muse and she also does podcasts. Just go here to download the pdf's. You'll learn so much. I took a day long class from Margie and learned so much about the choices I was making unconsciously, and how to improve and add variety to what my natural taste is. I'm a big fan.

And if you're interested in which glass I used to achieve this Lucite Green color, it was Check Glass's 53122 Mint Green which is COE 102. I love this color. It says fresh and happy to me. I pair it with aqua for a beachy look.

Dinner & Chat with Fellow Beadmaker Sylvie Lansdowne

My friend and beadmaker, Sylvie Elise Lansdowne was making beads long before I even knew that lampwork existed. We live close-by and get together for dinner every so often to chat. Both of us love whimsical sculptural glass and have found lots of common threads in our ways of looking at it.

The top photo is of Sylvie's "Head Over Heels" bracelet that she has sold in a kit and has taught around the country. She has an Etsy shop that carries her different kits. You can find it here.

After over 2 hours of constant chatter last night, we decided to share some of our dinner conversations through each of our blogs. There are tips and tricks as well as just two beadmakers' way of looking at life.

Remember my blog post about what artists should wear? Of course that hit the table running. Sylvie believes that when selling, we should dress like our customers. Hers wear cute and funky bright clothes and great jewelry. I have only met a few of my customers, so I'm not sure what to wear. I know that I'll need to leave my sweatshirts and flip flops at home. I tend to dress in solid colors so my jewelry shows up more, but perhaps it's time to break free and find my inner artist. Sylvie suggested Quacker Factory on QVC. I'm going to check them out. The problem is, Sylvie is very tall and can wear patterns, while I'm just 5'3" and think solids will make me look taller. (and slimmer too, won't it?) If you have style advice, please let me know. Sylvie is also a shoe lover, and I'm a Teva flip flop or Chucks type fan, so I would be open to artist shoe selections too. This could be a new feature, "dress the beadmaker".

Sylvie is still hoping to get into Bead & Button and I would love to go too. It's an uncharted territory for me, while she has lots of experience. If you are going, please look for her. I promise, you will love everything she has. If anyone knows of a booth to share or has words of advice for me for B&B, please feel free to let me know about it.

We chatted about longer length camp type classes and Sylvie told me about her week at Haystack, in Deer Isle Maine. She chatted about how observing other areas of craft and art will lead you to different ways of learning, styles, etc. For example, a cermics class had people make all the parts to a teapot and then put them in the middle and each take someone else's pieces to put a new one together. They were asked to manipulate the parts and change them. People are more willing to change other people's pieces because they don't have the same "ownership" in that handmade art. That was how Sylvie's pass the bead exercise was started which is widely used by other teachers and groups today.

I'm headed to the Appalachian Center for Craft July 5-10 this summer for an extended glass class with Shane Fero and Fred Birkhill. I'm so excited. Other than it being glass, I'm not sure what we'll be learning. But I've always admired their work and know that it will stretch me as a beadmaker and all their years in glass means there will be a lot to learn.

We also discussed the value of taking from teachers who have opposite styles of what we typically do. I know I've mentioned that concept here before. It stretches your brain to think a little differently and for your hand and eye coordination to get a work out too. Yes it's hard, but it's also like people who only hang out with others who think the same way. How do you grow, if that's all you do?

Sylvie and I are going to be roommates at the Gathering. I know she'll be a good calming effect on me as I'm scheduled to teach my first class there. She's already taught at the Gathering, so I know that last minute pointers will be available.

And one more tip, there's a magazine available at Barnes & Noble and other book stores called Artful Blogging that is a must read. I'm heading out this morning to find it. It's not technically oriented, but more artistic.

There was so much more - life, kids, more and more glass, new stuff we're working on, etc. Two hours of chatter flew by and now I'm looking forward to the next time we share a meal and lots of our lives. To read her version of our dinner, click on her name in the top paragraph.

By the way, that's my bead in the bottom photo. It was a personal exercise, (and the only kind I do), to take a simple coloring book picture and turn it into a bead. But that's another post.

Tomorrow I'm writing about how I added lots of color to my System 96 glass and I'll show you how.

New Tutorial in My Etsy Shop

I thought about all my online coaching and how much I enjoy it. And perhaps there are some people who would like to take it a step farther than the bits and pieces that I offer in my blog.

So here is my first tutorial that is listed in my Etsy shop. Meet Santa Claus. I go through step by step each part of making this bead as well as the preparation needed and some alternatives to how and why I'm doing things.

Santa would love to come visit you before Christmas Eve and he would make a great ornament, focal or even package decoration.

Stop by my etsy shop and enjoy.

http://www.StudioMarcy.etsy.com

From Mundane to Magnificent

Creativity in any area tends to get my attention and this one did it. Who knew, that someone out there is making barcodes interesting?

These are done by a company called D-Barcode who has been making creative barcodes for Japanese product packaging. What a lot of fun!

Now let's turn this into a glass question...what are you doing in beadmaking that might look a bit like others, and how can you add that extra zing of creativity to make your beads stand out?

Later this week, I will take one of my beads that needs a shot of creativity and show you before and after photos of what I did to stylize mine. If you'd like to join me in this creativity exercise, please contact me through my website, www.StudioMarcy.com, and I can post an example of what you are doing too.

Happy Monday!