Casting: Skeleton to Skin

My first flask was cast by Laura and April. Both that and the second flask I cast failed because of not enough metal. My third cast was successful (yay!).

I am currently waiting on the burnout of my third and fourth flask. I remade and invested the first two flasks. Hopefully all goes well tonight with Travis so I only have to cleanup my stuff this weekend.

I'm really into this process and can't wait to see the results!

J2 Day of the Dead narrative

For my pendant I want to make a filigree picture-frame locket. When you open the locket there will be a chase and repousee sugar skull and etched rose. The picture frame flange will be pierced and etched with stones. The chain will probably be a mixture of hand made chain and rosary beads. I also want to hang a vile from the pendant that will hold soil from my uncle's grave. I want this piece to be true to the Dios de los Muertos style; it will be a celebration of my uncle.

Baltimore ACC show

Friday my mom and I went the the craft show downtown and had a blast! We went around 2-3 and walked around the entire show. I saw Megan and Ashley, they said that Tai and Kelsey were there but I never saw them. I noticed that circles are huuuge (pendants, earrings, etc), also I noticed a few jewelers with crazy squared and abstracted rings with amazing faceted and raw settings. I fell in love with a Jewish jeweler from New York who made amazing Hamsa necklaces. I bought one that I thought was most "me" and I love it and haven't taken it off yet. It's about an inch laser cut silver hand with enameling and Austrian stones. My mom loved the cakes and bought a glass seashell (she has a seashell/nautical home goods obsession). We also went to a cold metal forming demo at 5 by Janice Fowler. She seemed kind of self taught and I knew a lot of the things she was talking about. Her designs were whimsical and clean and usually done in silver.
I loooved the show this year. I wish I had seen more people I liked from last year but that's ok.

February 26 New York City Trip

On Saturday I went to NYC with a bus full of my peers and teachers/mentors. I slept the whole way up which was AMAZING since we had to be at the bus at 6am! I walked around the MOMA with Tom and Trish. We went to all 6 floors (including the sculpture garden) and most of the rooms. We definitely had a lot of fun walking around ourselves but I think everyone would have benefited from a tour, hopefully I get a chance to do that in the future. Also, while we were walking down the steps, we were approached by a woman to write on a card about our visit. Luckily I had my Prismacolor markers that the coat-check man warned me weren't allowed but told me to try and sneak them in anyway. We drew pictures and other lovely things and the woman said that we would start an uproar and others would ask for where the color markers were. Outside I got a pretzel that kind of tasted like beef and a much needed caffeine shock of Mountain Dew.
When we arrived in Soho I think we were all anxious to get out and roam around the city. I went to Kid Robot first with Nat, Shannon, Travis, Tai, Ashley, and Melody. Then we went to Tarina Taratino and a store called Evolution. Then we went and got Pizza from a wonderful place. We went to Moss, Kiosk, and Design Within Reach. We didn't go to the MOMA store in Soho because we went to both stores at MOMA. We also couldn't find Droog either but at that point we separated and Tom, Trish, and I went off and the others did their things.
I put all the pictures I took up on my Facebook page. I didn't take too many because I wasn't sure if it was appropriate too or not.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=273804&id=713502076&l=8d1efbba3c

Hopefully I'll get the whole pop-up thing figured out soon.

Exercising keeps you younger longer

Dr. Mark Tarnopolsky, a professor of pediatrics at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, did a study where he took two groups of rats and made one set very active and one lazy and lethargic. The lazy rats became bald and frail within 8 months (60 years), they all died within in a year (80 years old) while the ones that exercised lived on longer.

I definitely agree with this research. I know of many people of all ages who benefit from exercise or are the complete opposite and suffer from lack of exercise. I remember reading an article many years ago that was about nuns in convents who kept their minds and bodies active in their old age and were living well into their 90s. I think that many people are aware of these facts but choose to be lazy and drive everywhere and take the elevators at school etc. I like parking on the roof of the garage so I'm forced to walk more steps and I walk to the 4th floor of CFA every Tuesday and Thursday.

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/02/can-exercise-keep-you-young/?src=me&ref=general

Google Art Project

Google has unleashed Art Project, which allows you to explore the art of 17 museums across the US and in Europe. There are around 1,000 high-resolution pieces of artwork that you can find and numerous virtual tours. Also, each museum gets to choose one piece of art that they take an ultra-super-high-resolution photo of.

I am really stoked on this new website!! I've already gotten lost in it once for a good amount of time. The single piece MoMA picked was Van Gogh's Starry Night and it is incredible how close in you can zoom. You can see each individual fleck of paint. I also liked how they used the Google Maps live street view thing for the virtual tours.

Spring Semester 2011

It's a new year and a new semester has begun. I'll be using this blog for both Art 361 Digital Object Design, Art 318 Metals and Jewelry 2, and Art 319 Metalsmithing. I'm really amped about these classes and can't wait to learn a lot of awesome new metal/jewelry techniques.

I can't upload pictures anymore!!

Something happened to my internet preferences and now pop-ups won't load. Does anyone know another way of putting pictures on here?

Until I can resolve the problem I have uploaded the photos onto my Facebook in a public folder. I will try and put all the photos I need for my Casting class and J2 there.

Click here for photos