For the Thou Art Mum 'Tribute' Exhibition

      There is a wonderful artist group that I'm a part of back in Melbourne called Thou Art Mum. They are a creative and talented group of mothers from all artistic backgrounds that come together as 'TAM' for either a yearly or biannual exhibition based on a theme. The theme that we shall be having at Montsalvat, from the 3rd of November till the 27th of November in the Long Gallery, is called Tribute. We each have to create pieces of work that pays tribute to anything or anyone that we are inspired by. Now I love Gustav Klimt, Waterhouse, Vali Myers, Thou Art Mum, The Church ( aussie band ) and so on........hopefully I'll be able to make a piece of jewelry for each of these inspirational people or groups.

Now my first semi finished piece comes from the Gustav Klimt painting called 'The Tree of Life'.

In this painting there is a black bird on the branch kind of minding his own business.....but I always saw it as either a messanger or spy. In the close up of the painting below I was trying to wrack my brains as how to capture the swirls around the bird for a pendant.

I really wanted as many swirls as possible but unfortunately to keep the cost of silver down I decided on using one main swirl for the birdy. The picture below is of the wax carving that I finally created for the close up of 'Tree of Life'. I carved this piece from one solid block of jewelers wax......thank god I have a Dremel machine to help out with the carving, even with the aid of the Dremel my hand feels very tight and old by the end of it all.

Once I was happy with the final wax piece I then sent it out to Chemgold in Sydney, they make the mold and pour it out in silver for me. This is the incredibly stressful side of it all, because once I post the fragile wax piece out anything like very hot weather can melt it out of shape or the mold making side of it might not work and the piece is lost forever! Fortunately that has not happened yet. So when I get the silver back it looks very dull and tinny, unfortunately I did't get a picture of it at that stage (next one I will). So I'm happy to say that the picture below is of the semi polished piece that will be going into the 'Tribute' exhibition. One down...and several more to go!

As soon as I get another silver and bronze one of this piece poured I will be listing it on our etsy shop at www.etsy.com/shop/RedHavenStudios to see what peoples reaction to it is.
Yesterday I started on my next piece that is actually a tribute to Thou Art Mum and all those inspirational girls I exhibit with, unfortunately I won't be able to post the picture of the finished piece for a week or two because of the casting time of Chemgold.....but stay tuned for a preview!

Well it's past midnight, as usual!
So good night to you all, till next time. xo