Jewelry Artists Maria Psaltis, and Debbie Crothers, plus Polymer Clay on Canvas

I am proud to feature two wonderful polymer clay
Jewelry Artisans from Australia

Maria Psaltis

Maria Psaltis is from Sidney and is a mother,wife and polymer clay artist. She also works with young people at risk.

Maria creates some of her jewelry with varied materials, for example, adding polymer clay mokume gane beads to the leather rose below to create this exquisite necklace.

You can visit her website at:
http://www.oneandonlyuniquedesigns.com/

Maria was featured on Polymer Clay Daily in July of 2010.

In Maria's own words:

What a surprise to be featured on Polymer Clay daily..I read through the post everyday and have often had my jaw hit the ground with some of the most amazing work from artists around the world.It is truly so exciting for me.

Maria has a shop on Etsy and you can view her beautiful jewelry at:
http://www.etsy.com/shop/mariapsaltis

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Debbie Crothers
Geraldton Australia

I am a mum to 3 great kids. I also have a wonderful husband (15 years married) who is very supportive and encouraging. I live in Geraldton which is on the west coast of Australia right on the beach. It's a great place to live and raise children. I mainly work with clay but I do also teach beaded jewellery making at our local community art gallery. I've been working with clay on and off for a few years but more seriously in the last couple. I find it a fantastic medium to work with and am totally enjoying exploring the possibilities of clay.

Antiqued African Style Bangle Handmade from Polymer Clay

Quirky and unique is this gorgeous bangle. I've used an African face mold to create the pieces that make up the basis of this bangle and then surrounded them with textured pieces of polymer clay. The whole bangle has been brushed over with oil paint and then rubbed back to create a rustic, antique finish.

You can see more of Debbie's beautiful creations at:

http://www.etsy.com/shop/DebbieCrothers

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Polymer Clay on Canvas

Create a miniature art canvas with polymer clay shapes and accents such as beads and buttons. Use cookie cutters to help you create shapes with the clay and household items such a comb to create texture. This project comes to us compliments of Heidi Borchers for Inspired at Home.

Materials:

• Polymer clay
• Canvas 4” x 4”
• Polymer clay
• Pasta machine (dedicated to clay use only) or a rolling pin on freezer paper
• Rubber stamps or texture sheets – assorted designs – or household utensils
• Baby powder (or cornstarch)
• Knife or clay type blade for cutting clay
• Cookie cutter for heart shape
• Non stick baking sheet (dedicated to clay use only)
• Acrylic paint - black
• Brush – ½” flat
• Rub ‘n Buff Metallic Paste - gold & silver
• Assorted beads, charms, and glass mirror pieces to embed into clay
• Aleene’s® Platinum Bond™ 7800 All-Purpose Adhesive
• Oven

Instructions:

1. Soften (condition) clay by running through pasta machine several times (or roll out with rolling pin). For final thickness you will need about 1/8’ thick.
   
2. Place onto freezer paper or a non stick baking sheet while creating design. Determine and cut size, shape and placement in order for clay piece to fit on canvas.
   
3. Prepare rubber stamps by sprinkling with baby powder and shake off excess. Carefully push prepared rubber stamp into clay. For heart shape, use a cookie cutter and cut out clay. Overlap pieces and press beads and charms or mirrors into clay.
   
4. Roll out several long snake type pieces and flatten out. Imprint with lines using knife. Press around stamped heart, beads, charms and mirror pieces.
   
5. Place clay piece in oven and bake according to package directions.
   
6. When clay piece is cool, glue onto canvas. Let glue dry.
   
7. Paint entire canvas and baked clay piece with black acrylic paint. Let dry.
   
8. Apply Rub n Buff according to package directions. Let dry.

Heidi's Designer Tips: If you don’t have rubber stamps, you can use household items. Look for intriguing patterns in decorative buttons and kitchen utensils. For the lined pattern on the heart, I used a comb. Also, it’s easy to change up the design with different cookie cutter shapes!

See more craft projects at:
http://www.favecrafts.com/Polymer/Clay-on-Canvas-Wall-Art#

Cold Porcelain, Mica Powders, Resins and Nail Art

On my previous post, I had a recipe for cold porcelain. Many of you wanted to see some jewelry made from this recipe. I am happy to present this beautiful piece from Doughroses.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/32176572@N00/

Coral Rose Cluster Pin

by: Doughroses

This pin measures about 3" long and is made with cold porcelain.

See more cold porcelain jewelry at:
http://www.flickr.com/groups/1156910@N20/

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Pendant and Earring Set

By: Rose Petals

You can visit Rose Petals shop on Artfire
http://www.artfire.com/modules.php?name=Shop&seller_id=16446&op=new&body=1

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Mica Powders

I love Mica powders. They give a beautiful finish to your jewelry and or sculptured pieces.  I used green and pink 'Perfect Pearls' on the roses leaves, door and surround for this creation.

Mica powders are made from tiny particles of mica, mica powders provide a pearly, metallic look without metal. They are non-toxic and color fast, with a neutral pH, and though you wouldn't want to purposefully inhale them, they are less dangerous than metal pulvers. Available in a wide array of colors, mica powders have numerous uses for polymer clay artists as well as those who work in other media. They can be applied dry to the surface of raw clay, mixed into raw clay, painted onto raw or cured clay (though most will have to be mixed into a moist medium, first), and so on. Most surface applications will need a coat of polymer clay-friendly finish to prevent the powders from gradually rubbing off.

You can mix mica powder into clay to strengthen the effect of metallic clays or make pearly colored clay If you mix it into translucent clay, they tint it to lovely shimmering colors. Use it lavishly on liquid clay or varnishes to turn cured clay into glowingly glazed pieces.

See this tutorial on one way to use mica powder with liquid polymer clay and ink.

Examples

Pearl-Ex, from Jacquard--
Available in 40 colors, including pearlescents, interference colors, and duo-colors. Comes in .5-oz., .75-oz, 4-oz., and 16-oz. bottles, or in sample kits, usually with 3-gram bottles of twelve different colors.
http://www.jacquardproducts.com/products/pearlex


Perfect Pearls, from Ranger--
Available in six different 4-color sets, which includes one set of interference colors. Unlike other mica powders, Perfect Pearls has a built-in resin binder. This helps them to bond to clay during curing.
http://www.rangerink.com/product_perfectpearls.html

PCE Powders, from PolymerClayExpress.com--
Available on-line in 10-gram jars from www.polymerclayexpress.com. Comes in six different metal colors, in varying coarsenesses.
You can also purchase many of these powders at your local craft store.

Other Fun Ingredients

There are so many things you can mix into polymer clay, glitter, dried flowers, leaves, embossing powder and many cooking ingredients just to name a few.

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Resins

Tonja from Tonja's Treasures wrote a post on her blog about resins that is full of wonderful information. You will be delighted with all her research.

http://tonjastreasures.com/wordpress/?p=2505

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Polymer Clay Nail Art

polynail.com

Apply these exciting pre-designed images to your nails in minutes. Dozens of designs to choose from, they last from 10 to 14 days and can be changed as often as you like. Nail techs love our PolyNail nail art since the designs are easy to apply and appear to float when embedded in acrylic nail gel, but you can also create professional nail designs of your own at home in minutes!

Use the designs by themselves, or along with other designs for your own unique look!

PolyNail nail art is both sturdy and extremely flexible, which makes it last longer and a breeze to apply. Use our designs individually or mixed together to create your own unique styles. Available pre-sliced or in cane form, our PolyNail nail art designs can also be custom ordered to your specifications.

Easy Steps to Apply PolyNail Nail Art

Use nail glue to adhere the PolyNail nail art slices to the fingernail in the desired location, making sure to seal all the edges with glue. Just start with a small drop of glue and spread it around with the tip of the glue bottle - too much glue can make it difficult to place your slices.

Once the glue is dry you may sand the top of the slices lightly with a nail file if necessary to even the edges or remove any excess glue. Since the design goes all the way through the slice you won't mar the design if you gently file the top.

Apply a clear coat or a layer of acrylic or gel over the slices, allow to dry, and you're ready to go!

Remove the nail art by soaking your nails in acetone nail polish remover until the glue dissolves, then gently peel away any remaining designs.

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Arte de Vanessa Colon

http://www.nailsmag.com/style/nail-art/archive/26758/uas-hecha-por-vanessa-colon?p=941

You will find loads of wonderful pictures of nail art on the following link:

http://www.google.com/images?q=polymer+clay+nail+pictures&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&source=univ&sa=X&ei=jHh1TfWuI5Oz0QGQsajoBg&ved=0CDEQsAQ&biw=1264&bih=835ou

Three of Australia's Finest Polymer Clay Artists

I am proud to present three extremely talented Australian polymer clay artists.


GREER

Greer has been a member of Aussiepolyclay since June of 2008 and does amazing work. With this piece, she used a wash glaze polymer clay. Layers of liquid clay tinted with oil paints, applied in thin layers and fired separately.

You can view more of Greer's wonderful creations at:
www.vintajia.blogspot.com
http://www.flickr.com/photos/36587278@N04/
www.vintajia.etsy.com

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City Rose

City Rose has created this adorable Spikeboy. He's a sculpture 'sketch'........ an idea that was quickly roughed out start to finish while watching a movie.

From the Artist

I have an overflowing supply of shells of different shapes and sizes. I was collecting them for when I intended to do mermaid sculptures, but I've since decided that I didn't want to walk the beaten track. So I grabbed a couple of those spikey cone shells and this is the idea that formed! He's my little SpikeBoy, created using a rough wire and Magic Sculpt armature, Prosculpt, Genesis Heat Set Paints and TLS (to seal). And shells of course, which have been attached to the armature with epoxy. The paint job on the clothing is intentionally 'painterly-a-la-tim-burton'.

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Sabine Spiesser

"Mokume Gane" Featured on Voila

Sabine is a fabulous jewelry artist and was featured in this polymer clay magazine.

www.voila.eu.com/

Her delightful steampunkery

She found this difficult to photograph with all the shiny surfaces, so she tried scanning. The depth of field on these pieces is amazing.

From the Artist

I took apart an old alarm clock, added some clock parts and just followed my muse. I learned so much from this experiment - definitely have to explore creating three dimensional pieces more.

You can see more of Sabine's work at:
www.papagodesign.com
http://www.flickr.com/photos/papagodesign/

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Kris from Aussiepolyclay found this recipe for Cold Porcelain.

- 1-cup cornstarch
- 3/4 cup Elmer's Glue (white) (PVA)
- 1/2 cup water
- 1 teaspoon Ponds Cold Cream (must use this brand for this recipe to work)
- 1 teaspoon baby oil

**(once you start this, don't stop, especially when heating, don't stop stirring)**

Put cornstarch, glue, water, baby oil and ponds into non-stick pan and mix well. (I use a whisk, but you can use a large spoon too)

Turn stove on low to medium heat and keep mixing mixture continually until it balls up like bread dough. Remove from heat and as soon as you can touch it, begin to knead it. Put a small amount of Pond's on your hands to keep mixture from sticking to your hands.

The porcelain may be amber in color at this time, but as you knead it, if you are doing it right, it will start to turn a bright white and have no lumps and be extremely smooth.

**It is important to wrap this porcelain in Saran Wrap and then in 2-3 Zip-lock Bags, as no air can be allowed to get to it.

This is an "Air Dry" type of porcelain, so you do not have to bake it. (It takes up to 3 days to completely dry, depending on the thickness of your piece. It dries as hard as a rock believe me, and humidity and heat do not cause any problems with the finished work).

***DO NOT PUT IT IN THE REFRIGERATOR EVER***

This will have a transparent look to it when air-dried. You can add color to it with oil colors and mix well.

Click on the following link to see more COLD PORCELAIN RECIPES:

Thank you for visiting my blog and have a wonderful, clayful day!