recent wax

Here is a recent wax I finished.  It is a plumeria, the national flower of Laos.  The wax is about 11mm in diameter.  After it has been cast I will make a rubber mold from it and make earrings.  

 

 This is a photo I took of some in Laos 2 years ago:

watercolor rendering

Recently I became interested in doing watercolor renderings of jewelry designs again.  I took the jewelry design course at GIA in 2001 and learned how to do watercolor renderings, but within a year of finishing the class I had completely stopped doing them.  I like the look of them, but they were usually just too much work.  Living in a small apartment in Korea I am really limited with the kind of jewelry work I can do here, so I decided to relearn to draw and paint.  In December I ordered some books and jewelry illustration and rendering.  I also asked my parents to send me all my drawing and painting supplies and all the instructions, handouts, notes and samples from my design class. After I finished that class I had kept all my papers organized and in a folder because I felt I would need them again someday.  I have never been so organized with any class materials before or since then. 

Since there is no school all January and February, but I am still required to be at school, I have had a lot of time to practice drawing and painting here.  So far I have been doing the technical drawing exercises in Jewelry Illustration by Dominique Audette and the painting exercises from my GIA design class.  I recently got the book Techniques of Jewelry Illustration and Color Rendering by Adolfo Mattiello, which seems like a good book.  I did a few of the exercises in the beginning but I think I will wait to start on that after I have done most of the GIA design class assignments since they use a different painting technique. 

There are some designs I did in the design class in 2001:

World Jewellery Museum in Seoul

About a week ago I went to the World Jewellery Museum in Seoul.  Most of the jewelry wasn't my taste, but it was worth the visit.  Photos weren't allowed inside the museum, so here's what it looked like on the outside:

New job for 2013

I found a new job in Korea.  I'll be working an an elementary school in Hanam-si, Gyeonggi-do.  I will start at the new school March 7th. 

2012 review

Not much happened with my metal work in 2012.  Just look at the number of postings by year on the side of this blog, I barely wrote anything.  But even when there was something I could write about I didn't.  I have gotten so out of the habit of writing here that I usually don't even think about it. 

I spent the first two months of the year in the US.  Most of the work I was doing was just little things to make money, like lockpicks and aluminum training blades.  I finished a commission for a belt made of silver scales, but most of the work for that was done in 2011. 

I finally went back to Korea at the end of February.  And just like my first year in Korea, I totally stopped working on stuff once I got to Korea, even though I did bring my carving tools.  I finally started doing a little wax carving in the summer and continued working on things occasionally the rest of the year. 

Near the end of 2012 I decided to start doing watercolor jewelry renderings again.  I took the jewelry design course at GIA about 12 years ago and learned to paint with watercolors, but it was so long ago I think I need to relearn it.  I had my parents send me my drawing and painting supplies from home, but at the end of the year I did not have all the things I need to start yet. 

This year in Korea was even better than my first year.  Better school and better apartment.  I've been studying Korean almost everyday but I'm disappointed that my ability is much lower than I expected after studying in the country for almost a year.  I really wanted to stay at my school a second year, but there's no money in the school budget for me.  From what I've heard, almost all foreign teachers will be gone from high schools in my province in the next school year.  I want to stay in Korea one more year, so I am looking for a new job now. 

Tool stores in Seoul

Last Saturday I went to two jewelry tool stores in Seoul.  Both were in Jongno-gu, Seoul.  The first one (in the photo below) had a pretty good selection.  I bought a nice solid plastic ring mandrel, a ring sizer, and a needle file.  I had been to the store once before in April or May, when I found it accidentally, but didn't have much time to look around.  The other store my Korean friend in the US told me about.  It was much smaller, but had a bigger selection of hammers.  Both stores had a lot of the same stuff you can find in the US, but they also had a lot of Korean made tools and some Japanese tools.  I'll probably go back later and get some hammers, pliers and maybe a few files and other random things that look interesting.

Jongno 3 ga Station, Exit 7

Carving wax again

Things in Korea are going well.  This year is much like my first year where I am busy enough with other things that I don't think much about creating new work.  That's why I've made only one post in this blog since I came back to Korea.  

I finally started doing some wax carving in July.  I started on a ring, it was nothing special, I just wanted to start on something.  This is my work area:

 

The hardest things about working at a kitchen table in a tiny apartment are that the table is too low, it's not sturdy, its not easy to attach a bench pin, I get wax all over my living area, and there isn't enough light even with the desk light.  So a lot of things suck about it.  That's why I don't try to do anything except wax carving.  

I wasn't too interested in the ring I had started carving so I decided to carve a doodle I did during free time at school.  I didn't want to destroy the original drawing transferring it to wax so I traced it.  My "tracing paper" is actually the paper for blotting oil from your face.  I don't know what they are called in English. 

 

I attached my tracing to the wax by melting little spots of wax with my wax pen.

Then I poked holes along the lines of the drawing using a scribe.  After I took the paper off I rubbed baby powder on the wax to make the holes more visible and cut out the shape and filed the edges smooth. 

Next I deepened the lines using a wax carving tool and started to remove some of the material in the areas that will be carved the most deeply.  

In the picture below was the last time I worked on the wax with the drawing out.  The next time I worked on it I didn't have my notebook with the drawing there.  If I really want to copy the drawing accurately I should always have the drawing out, but it's not that important to me that I copy the drawing accurately. 

This is where I'm at now, there's still a lot of work to do.  I'm not carving the eyes, I'll put them in at the end by adding small drops of wax.  The piece is coming along very slowly cause I don't work very often.  

Below are two similar pieces.  The first one I carved in wax and cast around 2003.  The second one was carved in aluminum in 2006.