Wild Things part 1.

 My earlier pieces chronicled the struggles I had trying to be totally vegan.  Mineral beads and wood and string and such were not a real problem, but to hold them together and not twist up when they clasped was an ongoing issue.  This first batch has some ring and bar connectors.

This is one of my first biggies and I got a show in the Chandler Vision Gallery, Chandler Arizona, from running into the director wearing it!!

I like this one.  It was some of my first experiments with toning the gourd surface to get more depth in the drawing. 

You can see I put my blank shards, smaller pieces of gourd, that I just like the shape of, they have black painted edges and are matched on the back to eliminate imperfections with either acrylic or putty, if there are real issues.   

I believe the white is a plastic type bead.  Not bone or ivory, but faux.  the nuts MIGHT actually be real, but they are coated and sealed and make very nice accent beads.

That clasp... it is so tricky.  I have long hair and it gets tangled and is somewhat hard to undo.

This piece sold so quickly, I wasn't able to get a good photo without the glare!  I thought for sure I was on to something!!

My first Owl

I made this 5" wide piece, and attached small blank beads with an accent tigers eye bead as my first attempt.  It did not use stringed beads, just twisted cord.

Next I tried ready-made macramé style cording.

I liked these pieces.  I used pretty small "beads" and  had thought of reviving my own macramé skills, but even this was more work than the art, which was my original intent.  

On the boat, you will see the double magnet clasp that I found PERFECT, after much experimentation for the pieces!!

 

Stringing

 This not my favorite part.

I did decide how nice these beads were, not matter the size.  I loved the way the beader had incorporated it in her are work.  So, I started to learn a new skill.  Stringing beads.

My first pieces were specifically of the animals in the Phoenix zoo.  We had an art event there, and I wanted to feature the beasts themselves.   Most were African and I found an amazing bead shop that had organic beads, including the phenomenal black punched out vinyl records that made the traditional black and white strings used by some Indigenous Africans. For my VEGAN style pieces, only wood, string and seeds etc were used.  Some stone, but not the traditional bead beads.

I later incorporated bone, which made for elegant accents in black and white pieces.  The following work will show a myriad of these pieces, I fear all of my zebras have sold, but I am going to display the African necklaces individually.

This piece DID sell and here it is on an actual neck.

Other small goodies

 In honor of the concept of scrimshaw, I decided to make a few pieces harkening to the sailing ships and eastern lighthouses. These I call beads.  They are for use in stringing with beads or macramé or any sort of creativity this inspires!

and some winged thingies. 

This last group is drilled and ready to string. I have a bunch, all under an inch, set for stringing.  Macramé or used in another piece.

Below is a piece I sold and how the artist used it in a beautiful beaded necklace.  WAY out of my league!!

Now What?

 I am going to post a LOT of images of the piece I have completed.

I love the shard, small pieces that can be drilled so you can string a bit of jewelry (it will not be great for gold or silver as it will catch fire, unlike the ivory pieces but with care, you could manually put it in a bezel.)

Here are a load of my pieces.... just out there...

Southwestern mammals on inch and a half to two inch pieces.

Smaller, up to an inch, western wildlife... and a cat.

Zoo creatures.