Rustnstuff

Sunday, July 5, 2020

Creative relaxation

I did quite a lot of letterpress printing over the weekend - but that is for another blog. By way of a change I spent the morning on Saturday making some earrings based on circles - some folk prefer things in the round.

This was opportunity to use smaller flat pieces of silver-plated copper and brass. The circles of metal were punched using a disc cutting tool, the anvil and a very heavy copper hammer.

I cut, ground and polished enough pieces to make 8 pairs of earrings.

I only got time to assemble 4 pairs - the pair at the start and the three below.

A gentle and relaxing process.

Friday, July 3, 2020

Metal

I have finished the stash of patinated copper leaves; and they have now found their way into the DEP gallery-shop as you can see from the photo above.

A few more photos of the leaves with their polished edges follow.

I love how the red light of the roller door mechanism in the garage-studio reflected off the silver-plate bowls in progress early this morning.

Wednesday, July 1, 2020

Blossoms, birds and droplets

I was going to open the post with the following photo; but it seemed to be too malevolent - an evil crocodile eye??? So I thought the gorgeous sunshine colour of the wattle might be more uplifting.

Birds featured in our lives quite a bit today. We often wake to the chorus of a gang of kookaburras such as the two on the wire in Treehaven way. Over the last few days a flock of yellow tailed black cockatoos have been cruising the neighbourhood with very noisy calls - not sure what that means.

There was a soft dew overnight resulting in blossoms looking refreshed.

The morning started with a valley full of clouds lakes between the ridges.

Sunday, June 28, 2020

Unintended progression

It was a rainy day today so the opportunity to 'fix' the patina on the leaves and do the final grind was not too be had.

On Saturday I decided to print a R U OK? card - quite a few people are not ok at the moment. I deliberately chose random and worn wood type because I think it tends to match how many folk might feel; and it has a unique aged character.

Choosing the type also had me looking for suitable wood type question marks. Strangely we don't have many in our collection - we will need to keep our eyes out for more. When I gathered our collection together it suggested to me a connection with a micro poster (A6) about taking action. I planned to print (If not now then when?). I decided to print the poster in two colours - the orange I used on R U OK? and black. To do a single print for each poster meant hand inking the font and questions separately with two separate rollers; and then printing.

When I finished the micro posters I thought I might print off a few post cards using one colour. This caught Fiona's eye at the same time she spied a test wood printed mini poster (A5 size Be the change) that was in black still sitting on the gallery press. Her creativity went into action and she suggested we could experiment with an overprint. With a bit of measuring and registering we managed to print a poster that combined two posters. I found a couple more of the Be the change trial mini posters - so I over printed them.

This led me to think it would be useful to do limited edition of the combination poster. I have now printed the orange section; and later I will overprint with the black.

You can see why I used the title Unintended progression - one thing just led to another.

Friday, June 26, 2020

Patina, pickle and production

I'm making a stash of patinated copper leaves for the DEP galley-shop. It has been quite some time since I have made copper fold formed leaves. I'm making some that measure about 12-13cm in length; and another batch about 19cm in length.

Warning process photos follow.

Another photo of the patina process

I will give the leaves a coat of matt varnish to fix the patina; the leaves will then need a grinfg to get rid of sharp edges and create a few bits of raw copper highlights - maybe I will get to that over the weekend.

Wednesday, June 24, 2020

Wednesday fragments

It was too cold and windy for a walk this morning so photo are of the light in the valley; and some of Graham's micro orchids etc.

Photos of the gorgeous winter dawn light - the very clear cold air seems to produce the blue and pink layers - it only lasts for about 15 minutes.

Some of those orchids.

Bee at work on a grevellia.

Sunday, June 21, 2020

Out of darkness and other bits

I committed to making seven sets of business card sized inspirational word cards. Whilst I did this as you will see from the photos following, I did get side tracked by the gorgeous purple and the gold dusting powder. I decided to try the colour and the dust on black cards that were left over from one of Fiona's earlier jobs. I was delighted in the beauty of the contrast of the colours. As I said in the heading to this blog it was almost like the words were emerging out of the dark paper.

I decided to do a limited run of hope, peace and shine - words we need in these challenging times.

And those photos of the other inspirational words on 300gsm white cotton paper.

Fiona's dad (Graham) does a lot to encourage action in folk - I asked him if he would like a stash of shalom cards to give out since I was on a printing roll.

Fiona asked me to do a print test on some old beermat coasters to see how they would come out if you printed them on all siders - interesting word coasters emerge.