Words and Pictures

These days I'm more inclined to let pictures do the talking for me, so here is what I've been up to of late:


An attempt at Deryn Mentock's beautiful Boho Hoops; she's Da Woman, a fantastic teacher and a great mentor. Next time you offer this class, I'll be there!



Subversive Lace: Blue Buddha Boutique's Staggered Japanese Lace bracelet. 0.5mm, 0.6mm and 0.7mm rhodium-plated copper rings. It's subversive because of the enamel skull at the clasp behind...



Like so...



...to keep the clasp centered when I wear it.


And of course, can't forget:


Caipifruta in Graz, Austria, for the World Youth Choir Championships this July!
Photo credit: Tracy Wong



With Grupo Chorus from Brazil - some of my favourite people in the whole world. Caipifruta + Grupo Chorus = GrupoFruta/CaipiChorus. Viva! Viva!
Photo credit: Tracy Wong

So folks, that's what I've done and where I've been, and that's my story and I'm stickin' to it.

Sometimes...

...I wonder whether it's worth pouring in so much effort for things, only to be proved a second-rate coach/operator/person time and time again. Because despite all my dreams, maybe that's just about as good as I'll ever get.

It's a wonderful feeling, knowing you always let people down.

Not To Scale

I don't want to live to scale - small life, small box. I want to live large, dream big, make it count.



I want to live, not merely exist.

I don't think it's too much to try for.

The Dangers of Being Fred

I tend to have surreal conversations with my friends. Today is no exception, with the result that a chat about art prompts interspersed with random bits about Cthulhu plus my distinct lack of drawing practice, birthed this little monstrosity.

The prompt, incidentally, was 'Fred'. No, I don't know why this came to mind. My mind is a scary, scary place, as evidenced by the appearance of John Constantine in My Little Pony trench coats.



I suspect need a SAN check now.

The Importance of Being Uncomfortable

Part of my sketchbook project - never tried Victorian lettering before and might not try it again!


This year, I set myself a resolution to make myself uncomfortable.

Not in the 'sleep on bed of nails every night and torture myself with really bad music' sort of way. More of a determination that if something comes along that isn't creepy, makes me panic at the thought of having to do it, and has the occasional makings of the impossible, I'll jump in and give it a shot.

There's a rationale to this twisted logic as crazy as it sounds.

It all boils down to this: I'm a person who abhors change. It was fine when I was still in university, but a series of moves across three continents in succession gave me a distinct disinclination towards upheaval. Stability, a place to come home to without having to constantly live out of suitcases - more and more, that got to be something imminently desirable. My gluten intolerance only compounded this, as travelling on a gluten-free diet? It gets hairy sometimes, and I dislike being ill even more than I dislike upheaval.

For the past two years though, I've been restless and fidgety, and I couldn't quite pinpoint why. Not until last year and only because I had to sit down and be brutally honest with myself - I'm discontented. I miss doing things that I used to. I feel stuck in a rut and creatively unfulfilled, and all in all, it was leading to a downright spiral of depression. The biggest reason? I'm afraid. I see new things and I think oh, that's great, but I'm too much of a coward to step up and say, Sure, why not.

The move to this new place last year was the beginning of a sort of mental shakeup. New place. New life. New things. Why was I still sticking to my comfort zone and bitching, when really, whose fault was it?

So this year? I've accepted two teaching positions that terrify the -crap- out of me. I don't feel capable, and I don't feel comfortable at -all- taking them because of the age groups involved - but the only way I'm going to grow is to stretch myself and -make- myself do it.

I've registered for an online jewellery class taught by a wonderful friend and mentor even though I'm scared stiff I won't do well and that I might have difficulty getting a butane torch and I might burn the place down due to stupidity. If I call myself an artist, I need to expand my skills - and being a cicak under a rock and bewailing my lack of 'em ain't going to get me anywhere. So it's kick-myself-in-the-butt time - knuckle down and just do it.

I'm trying to jab myself into resuming learning one new language. I figure if I want to say I'm bored, I can at least say it in the lingo of another country, which will make it slightly more interesting.

And I took a bookbinding class way out at the other end of the world this January because even though it was a crazy commute and I had to end early to go back to teach, I figured it was worth it. I've wanted to take that class for years. What's a little difficulty getting there anyway? Composers like Bach and Scarlatti -walked- to the next TOWN to hear concerts - that's harder than taking the LRT and making two or three changes, right?

Be less lazy, more forgiving, more productive, learn more stuff I've always meant to but haven't - that's what I'd like for this year. And let's not forget achieve very hard but not impossible things, like a win for Caipifruta at Graz this July for the World Choir Championships.

The importance of being uncomfortable - it keeps you from stagnation, and the pain of an overly large backside.

The New Year Rising and the Helm of Dreams

For Kenny, after reading about libraries and Neil Gaiman's marriage

How I loved him. Every night, waiting so eagerly to slip into sleep, easy as a scalded peach slips its skin – but of course, he was only a figment of fiction and I could hope, I could dream that perhaps I’d see his eyes as I’d written in a story so long ago.

Dream’s eyes. The Corinthian had none, only sockets capable of so much blood.

How she loved him, Jade the White-Haired. She’s found in no canon other than the long-forgotten annals of role-play in the Endless’ extensive universe – a demon in the shell of a scorned, betrayed girl, each tattoo on her beautiful, tebori-marked body a soul that she’d claimed. And of course, she fell in love with eyes that were pools of shadow with glimmers of light within. She didn’t mean to, but she did, and every night in sleep she would wait to see them. Hope for them to appear.

Her secret that she likely carried to the ends of forever, this. When the role-play universe of that world ended, she walked hand-in-hand with Dream and vanished into the distance, united at last with the one she had grown to love so well. I like to think that she was happy at last, and that she gave him pleasure too, the time they spent together.

A beautiful fiction invented to keep out the cold, to quote Vienna Teng’s beautiful ballad Blue Caravan. I too wanted to escape the mundane and search for the exotic, the fantastical, the greener grass on the other side of some mythical pasture far across the sea. Well. I can’t say ‘wanted’ when I still do, really.

The legacy of Dream’s Helm, isn’t it? Finding it buried in the corners of the mind deliberately left untouched for years, not being able to resist the temptation to pick it up and slip it on despite the bony spine, the bulbous skull, the alien, almost frightening appearance.

Because in the end, the need to dream, to wish, to yearn for, is sometimes as necessary as breath. Old desires, long-suppressed, sternly forgotten against one’s will, bubbling slowly to the surface in an instant of unexpected trigger – news of an old friend, now a successful author and recording artiste; the marriage of a writer/artist whom you’d always harboured a secret crush on; the jet-setting, exciting lives of acquaintances and more friends; the plans of dear ones.

None of it bad, of course, no such thing – in fact, you’re thrilled for them – but the secret little yearning reaches its tendrils out and tugs at the heart, whispering, ‘You wanted that life too, many, many dreaming ago. Now look where you are...’

So many heart-burnings. So many acid recriminations against the self, against the workings of the life you’re leading, against how mundane it all seems compared to the rest.

And yet – and yet – a little small still voice floats up from the depths of the envy abyss yawning in front of you, like hope in Pandora’s box.

Lives, it says. Your students. The lives you teach in this new life you’ve begun by accident and continued by choice. The ones that you can perhaps can make a difference to, the ones whom you have made a difference to.

I weigh them, as I’ve weighed them again and again – my life now, my students, my work, against the words I always dreamed of writing, the unknown artist I dreamed of marrying, the life I might have had if only I’d stayed in another country instead of returning home.

And what I know now, as I knew then but refused to accept, was that contentment is learned. It is a decision not based on the heart, but rooted in commitment and the surety that a life can count, if you make it do so.

So I sit here, holding Dream’s Helm between my hands – so heavy and smooth, this marvel of bone and memory! – and I wish the abyss away, close it with a decision. I’ll do it many, many times in the days and months that make up the year.

Because whatever else I might have dreamed and yearned for, this life counts, and I make it count only if I seize each day, each year of it and keep moving on. More often than not it’s plodding and trudging, but I have made my choice on what I value and what matters in the long run – and with that, comes contentment and peace with myself.

The Helm is heavy on my head, comfortable even. It promises flight and new dreams and even journeys into the past, pleasant or unpleasant. Oh I’ll indulge, I know - I can’t help it, I might even linger a little in those dark, familiar depths.

But I won’t be confined there. I must keep moving. Because in the end, life is short and the lives along the way are precious, and there is work to be done – and that, I think, is what matters.

Almost Home

And once again I've let the blog go for a few months before updating. I know, I know. I'm always apologising for this, but the truth of the matter is, I -have- been busy with some key things in life.

I've just been through a crazy three week period in which my first jewellery bazaar and my 2nd level Australian Kodaly Certification went head-to-head. I survived both with sanity a little less than intact, and passed my certification exams far better than I expected.

And got a bout of gluten poisoning/food poisoning to celebrate.

But this morning, some friends and I went to help out at a house - the little boy's room needed painting, and the mother needed the wire nettings on the windows changed and some water pipes fixed. It's hard to be a single parent, working as many hours as she does, and I really admire her. I couldn't stay long because my stomach decided to run riot, but I was very glad I could be there for even a short time to help clean.

One more week till I go home for a much-needed break. One more level before I finally get the full Australian Kodaly Certification I've been working on for two years.

In more than one way, I'm almost home. And it's a good feeling.

Wednesdays with Gluten-Free Girl and the Chef: Pizza Pizza!

I've been absent from my blog for a looooong time - most of this is due to life throwing up a lot of busy-busy-busy with very little time to do any jewellery or creativeness that way. Well, that and I've been travelling - this time, I've just come back from Vietnam - Hanoi to be exact! A few of us in the choir I sing with travelled there at the invitation of the Vietnam National Symphony Orchestra to sing in a huge-scale celebration of Hanoi's 1000th birthday. The repertoire was Mahler's 8th Symphony, nicknamed 'The Symphony of a Thousand', making it particularly fitting (and challenging, but that's another blog post altogether. Hanoi deserves one of its own.)

The week before I left for Hanoi however, Shauna of Gluten-Free Girl and the Chef blog mentioned something very exciting - Wednesdays cooking from her new book, Gluten-Free Girl and the Chef. If you don't know who Shauna is, she is one of the most inspirational people in the food blogging world that I know of. She's spunky, caring, innovative, and she's been one of the biggest influences in my life as far as being able to survive gluten-free goes.

Unfortunately I haven't been able to get hold of her book yet so I wasn't sure I was going to be able to take part in the Wednesday cooking sessions, and left it at that. However, thanks to Michael Ruhlman's interview with Carol Blymire of 'Alinea at Home' and 'French Laundry at Home' fame, I -was- able to participate in this week's Wednesday - baking pizza!

This is -me- of course, so I -had- to run into problems first reading of the recipe. Corn flour. Now...here in Malaysia, that's what I call corn starch. But corn starch had already been mentioned in the recipe so I was pretty sure that wasn't what was being asked for. A bit of slightly confusing research drew up an article that mentioned Southern cooking and the silky smooth flour made from finely-ground corn meal. Ahhhhhhhhhhh. That helped.

Except I didn't have any of that, and the nearest thing to hand was maize meal, rather coarse-ground. To heck with it, I thought about it for a moment, then grabbed the maize meal, weighed it out on the rickety contraption that -calls- itself a manual kitchen scale but in reality should be more 'Cook's Domestic Torment', and went right ahead with the recipe.

By golly, it worked.



I am not the world's best photographer so the first shot I got of the pizza coming out of the oven is cringe-worthy (and I forgot I had a camera tripod). But I was far, far too excited to even think about proper photography at the time - I had PIZZA. Glorious, safe, pizza!

(Rolling dough into a circle, however - that's another story. The adage that anyone who can draw a freehand circle will make a good artist? LIES. -MY- circle looked like someone patched together a 2-year old's sense of geometry and mangled it with a Picasso perspective. Thankfully, that's got no bearing on the taste of it or I'd be in trouble by now.)

This morning, I got some better pictures of the project that hopefully do the recipe a bit more justice.





Notes:
1) I mixed up the entire batch of flour and realised that my small oven wouldn't contain a 10" crust, let alone anything bigger. So I halved it. I didn't need to do a thing to the recipe otherwise, apart from adding just a little more water to bind the dough properly when it was getting mixed together - and that likely because my measurement for the oil was a little off.

2) The dough was a bit wet and sticky to handle for rolling. When putting it between two sheets of parchment paper didn't work, I removed the top sheet of parchment paper and substituted it with plastic wrap instead. Once rolled out, I took the entire thing, parchment paper and all, and put it on my baking sheet as I don't have a pizza stone. I was afraid that not sprinkling the bottom with corn meal might make the whole thing stick, but as it turned out, I needn't have worried. The crust came off the parchment paper beautifully. I also will try rolling the dough out thinner and using a different flour to see if that makes any difference to overall texture; I might need to bake the crust for a bit longer to get it browner and crisper.


Taste-wise? FANTASTIC. I topped this crust with tomato puree, spinach, black pepper smoked pork strips, green apples and parmesan. The one remaining crust in the fridge is going to get eaten soon; perhaps I'll try roasted eggplant, home-made tomato sauce and bacon. Either way, I would make this again in a heartbeat. Thank you so much Shauna, for this beautiful recipe!

Celebrations and Catching Up

So before this update gets even tardier, let me just set the record straight:

1) I'm back from China!

2) We won three Gold Diplomas - Gold IV in Folklore with the Young KL Singers, Gold V in Jazz with my quartet, Caipifruta, and Gold II in Pop, also with Caipifruta.

3) Overall the Malaysian contingent came back with their heads high - the MIA Ladies Chorus were the champions in their category, winning a Gold medal in the category for Female Chamber Choirs! Not only that, the Malaysian choirs scored a total of about 7 gold medals and 5 silvers - not a single bronze, how about that for hard work. YEAH.

4) I'm moving house so it might be another stretch before I update again. Hopefully not -too- long a stretch of time.

So, before I dash off to pack, let me leave you with a few photographs from China:


The Caipifruta Vocal Quartet, doing soundcheck for the Jazz competition.


More soundchecking! It was also 8am in the morning, so those smiles were partly for our own benefit as was kind of too early to be singing ANYTHING, let alone jazz.


The quartet just before the Pop competition. Twiggy pose!


Don't remember who took this photo, but here are the Girls being all model-like.


And we pose for a postcard...

All the above photographs (except the disclaimered one) taken by our amazing pianist, Tay Cher Siang, who is an equally amazing photographer. I mean, just -look- at those shots!

More updates when I finish The Move of Doom - but if you really do want to know what I've been up to for the last month and before, hop on over to the Caipifruta Blog for a more detailed explanation. There's even pictures!

Up, Up, and Awaaaaaaaaaaay!

Incredible how fast time passes, but the Big Day is finally here! I'm leaving for China later on to compete in the World Choir Games held from 15th - 28th July in Shaoxing.

I will most likely be internetless for the entire duration, since I'm not bringing Siggard in case of accidents (my laptop, not a significant other, just to set the record straight). Besides, a lot of sites are blocked in China so the only thing I might be able to access in a net cafe will be my email account.

Hello world. I'm coming to kick some serious butt, hopefully not my own.

Till the 28th, au revoir! (I might even have sketches to show if all goes well.)

Maille on the Brain, Maille on the Brain...*sung to tune of Pants on the Ground*

My wonderful brother, who has gifted me with more useful things than anyone I know, recently ordered me a pair of Eurotool Ultra Ergo Pliers from Blue Buddha Boutique, where I got my lovely aluminium and stainless steel rings. I made the mistake of wrecking my current wire-work pliers while trying to work with the stainless steel rings, and I figured it was time to get proper chainmaille tools if I was going to be weaving maille for a while (and since I seem to default to that, it may just be my Fatal Fascination.)

Well, they arrived, and I've been going bananas with 'em since. They are absolutely -wonderful-, and they stand up to 16ga stainless steel rings beautifully! I never knew what a difference good tools could make - sort of stupid admission there, coming from a chainmailler-in-training, but since they're not available here, I've never had a chance to work with them.

The results of my labours, in between choir competition rehearsals and teaching, are as follows. Yes, the stainless steel rings gap a bit; I'm still working on being strong enough to close them entirely and I'm aware it might be considered shoddy work amongst proper chainmaillers and elite of the elite. So if there are complaints on that score, yes, I know it already, and I invite you to try working with 16ga or 18ga 6.4mm stainless steel rings or any form of low-gauge stainless steel if you haven't done so before. Then come and bitch at me.

(If it seems like I'm constantly doing disclaimers, well, it's because I'm fed-up of back-biting and sniping and people thinking I might be trying to cheat buyers with such bad craftsmanship. If I don't think it's good enough, I don't sell it. End of story.)


Moon in a Barrel Earrings: Barrel weave, 18ga 5.6mm stainless steel.

Rebeca of Blue Buddha Boutique has a design called Crescent Earrings. Since the finishing rings of my barrel-weave pair were inspired by her design (and they do look like a crescent moon, the two different sized rings put together!) I've named the design 'Moon in a Barrel' as homage.



Pink and Indigo Blues: Barrel weave, 18ga 6.4mm stainless steel, 18ga 6.4mm anodized aluminium, 19ga stainless steel hand-hammered clasp

This particular mix of anodized aluminium is called 'Berry', but it didn't look very berry-like after it was all woven up with stainless steel. The name's the result of deciding Indigo Blues didn't quite cover that startling pink in the bracelet; it's rather lame I know but I didn't have any better ideas.



Candy Stripe Earrings: Barrel weave, 20ga 3.2mm stainless steel and anodized aluminium, glass beads

Why yes, I've been on a bit of a barrel weave kick, why do you ask? The AR (aspect ratio) of these little danglies didn't allow for a second anodized aluminium ring and while I wasn't too sure I liked it at first, they've grown on me steadily with a kind of old-fashioned candy charm. They looked like traffic lights until I added the glass bead. Then they started looking more like candy stripes, so Candy Stripe Earrings they became.

I'd also finished a necklace with a Japanese flower and chainmaille centrepiece a'la the chainmaille edition of Wirework Magazine, but I forgot about it, until it was too dark to photograph. End of this week perhaps, when I finish with the insanity of the Malaysian Choral Eisteddfod, for which I'll be teaching alto sectionals for the next few days. In the meantime, I'll probably throw up some pictures of some older projects that should've been up, but which got neglected due to life and other madnesses.

Fascinating Chainmaille, oh won't you stop picking on me!

The Lunar at Night

One of my best friends ever visited me at the end of March. I've written about Jeremy before in another post, and he remains one of the only friends from my university days whom I actually -see- on a semi-regular basis. All right, so two years isn't really semi-regular, but given I haven't seen my entire batch of crazy US friends since 2003 - well, you get the picture.

In between juggling work and catching up, I sat through several RPG gaming sessions with Jer and the Bloke, and one day I actually brought along some wire to fiddle around with while we played. Not having a very clear idea beyond 'pendant', I free-formed it and wrapped away with a cheerful optimism that should have been an advanced warning.

Well. The pendant took about a week to complete because like a typical dimwitted ninny, I miscalculated the curvature of the two frames I was wiring together and it turned out lopsided. The result was an imbalanced piece of nicely wired crap which bugged the daylights out of me because it wouldn't hang straight. This lopsidedness got even worse when I wrapped the -heavier- half of it with silver beads (yes, very smart I know. What was I thinking --oh wait. I wasn't.) In the end, I had to add some silver beads to the other side of the frame to compensate - but even then it wasn't quite enough to offset the weight disparity. Finally, I ended up hanging a focal bead and a curved silver piece from the centre loop and that more or less did the trick.

Moral of the story: Calculate your frame right to begin with, and you won't wind up with a design headache like I did. Just saying.

Because I'd used anodised steel wire and silver beads for the pendant frame, I wanted to call it something Dark and Gothic and Night-like. When I put in the blue focal pearl, I thought it looked rather like a hanging moon - so in honour of the game, the character I was playing and the fact that I'd worked on it while gaming, the piece got christened Lunar.


Lunar: Anodised 18ga and 24ga steel, pewter beads, 20ga artistic wire, blue cultured pearl.


See how the frame gets lopsided? Yep, kids, don't try this at home. It makes you crazy. It still doesn't hang straight enough for me despite the fixes.


I thought I could get away with not wrapping the top loops but they looked too bulky and uncouth so they got covered up.

I'll consider this a prototype and see if I can't refine it any further. Anodized steel wire is a joy to work with; I should really give it a bit more attention.

And next time, I -measure- both frames and secure them -properly- before I start wrapping away like a crazed cat for cream.

The Strange Attraction of Opposites

Some months ago, I was commissioned by a friend to make a bridesmaid's jewellery set. Her only stipulations were that it be simple, elegant and fuss-free.

Given that the bridesmaid dresses were fuschia and white, I thought Swarovski pearls might add just the touch of elegance necessary. I also wanted to use whatever I had on hand in the interests of keeping costs reasonable, and also because I've been trying to exercise more creativity in the reinvention/upcycling/recycling of materials that might not otherwise be seen as 'jewellery components' at first glance.

My friend is a big proponent of recycling and being environmentally conscious. Digging through my stash of stuff, I discovered I had leftover metal washers from a previous project, and enough headpins and eyepins to last about fifty years (all right, I'm exaggerating, but I've got quite a bit of those things lying around). I also had a sheet of aluminium that's been crying out to be used for a bit since I got my jeweller's saw at the beginning of this year. I'd been wanting to experiment with texturing as well, since I've got a chasing hammer that's only been used for flattening metal up to this point.

The result was aptly named 'The Strange Attraction of Opposites' in honour of pearls meeting metal washers. I gave it an adjustable 52cm (approximately 20")chain that could be set to either matinee or choker length, depending on the dress. The earrings measure about 6.5cm (just a little over 2.5") and the pendant is 2.4cm (approximately a little over 1") in diameter.


The Strange Attraction of Opposites: Swarovski pearls, rhodium-plate jump-rings, silver-plated eyepins, metal washers, hand-cut and textured aluminium pendant.


Pendant detail, with a bit more of the texturing visible.


Earrings.


Earrings, another (slightly more artsy) view.


Oh yes, my friend loved it. Even better!

The Dream and the Dreamer

Once upon a time, when dreams were plentiful and less prone to being blasted out of existence by reality, there was a little girl who loved to sing. Morning, night and noon, she'd be warbling like the birds from sun up to sun down, and all manner of hours in between.

What do you want to be when you grow up, the teacher asked at the end of each school year, and made the class write it down. The little girl wrote 'Singer' for maybe three of her twelve-plus years in school, before she was told that fairies weren't real, that believing in fairies couldn't make you fly, and that dreams couldn't sustain you in reality.

The little girl became a big girl, and her dreams drifted further and further away, like lost balloons - till she hurt her voice so badly that she didn't think she could ever sing again. So she buried that particular dream, and went on with the process of growing up.

Years later, the big girl joined a choir, never thinking that it would be anything more than something to pacify a ruined dream. What she didn't know was that even broken dreams could repair themselves and grow bigger and bigger, till they became reality.

The choir got stronger, and the big girl kept singing just because she loved it - until one day, she was asked to sing with her friends in one of the biggest events in the world, and she couldn't believe it till she actually saw the invitation.

And that is how the little-girl-turned-big-girl came to rehearse and get ready for the Day of Choirs at the 2010 World Expo in Shanghai, China - and also to compete in the World Choir Games with her adult choir, and the quartet she'd been singing with.

And that is where I've been for the past few months, preparing for the competition and raising funds for the trip. Which is why my updates have been so infrequent, and may be a little more sporadic than usual. Still trying to register that we'll be singing in Shanghai, I keep having to look at the invitation to believe it's real!

Deconstructing Pipas

My nearest and dearest are pretty unanimous about the fact that I've got an inherent tinkering gene - I can't ever leave well enough alone. This holds true for cooking, for music improvisation, and also jewellery.

This is also usually a recipe for some sort of disaster. Just so you know.

Many moons ago, when I was starting to learn that there is this thing called WIRE! which you can play with and shape, I got to know Corra of De Cor's Handmades. I was - and still am - in awe of her abilities to PWN wire with the best of them, and bought a couple of her tutorials to try and convince myself that maybe I could reach that level of skill.

One of the tutorials was called the Pipa Knot. My first attempts at it resulted in this mind-numbling embarrassing -thing- which has since been mercifully consigned somewhere out of sight except in photos:



The sheer magnitude of shame kept me from pursuing the Pipa Knot any further, until my mother's silver earrings two years ago. This time I stuck (more or less) to the original tutorial, and things went (more or less) just fine. That is, if you don't count the many wire breaks I had to hide due to my inexpert handling of the silver wire, and a misplaced belief in my ability. I gave them to my mother with the disclaimer that, should she ever lose them, I'll never make another pair. Cracked, bleeding fingers may have had something to do with this proclamation.

Yesterday, some demon of perversity drove me to revisit the Pipa Knot once more. Except this time, I decided I was going to deconstruct it and see what I could come up with, using more or less the same technique. This time I didn't refer to the tutorial, I just went on a vague sense of memory and lots of glue, hope and sunny cheer that it would turn out SOMETHING resembling ok.

The results are...still somewhat embarrassing due to the fact that I mucked up part of what I thought I remembered. Note to self: USE TUTORIAL next time, memory at my age is a bad gauge of accuracy. I'm sure this would ensure better results.

(I told you I was a tinkerer. I never said I was a GOOD one.)

Behold, the Deconstructed Pipa - just for you, Corra, for old times' sake!


Deconstructed Pipa: 20ga and 28ga artistic silver wire, fire-polish Czech glass beads, amethyst bead. Approximately 1.2 inches (3.5cm).

I tried two new wire-wrapping techniques that I'd seen but not used before, and I think they turned out fairly decently:





The Whole Shebang in Close-Up Technicolour, hanging from something:




So...I still have a long way to go to master this gorgeous knot (so Corra won't kill me when she sees how badly I've butchered her beautiful design.) However, looking (and shuddering in horror) back at what I -used- do to in the name of art, I think I've improved some and that, at least, is worth the embarrassment of keeping old photos.

If nothing else, I've learned to handle a camera better at least!

Eternity and the Eternal Watchguard Against Impurity and Poor Morale

If I appear to have vanished off the face of the known radar blips of existence, well, I have. For a time at least. Creativity has been practically non-existent, struggling and gasping in between work, rehearsals, recording, frustration, and chafing at the non-productiveness of it all. I've been very close to giving it all up because I'm just so tired of fighting the malaise.

But then, Life decided to have a say and I had to listen.

My 98-year old grandfather passed away on 13th March, 2010 at 6.40pm.

I'll write about this some other time. There's too much that's still churning around inside at the moment, from the abruptness of it to the mixed feelings. Another time, yes.

The Sunday after his passing, I felt the urge to pick up my wires and play again after months of anguished, disgusted inactivity. The end product didn't matter; what was important was the process. And so, with a little inspiration from a good friend's jade Alchemical out of the White Wolf Exalted game, this little bit of nothing coaxed itself into being.


Eternal Watchguard: 18ga and 28ga artistic silver wire, fire-polished Czech glass beads, aluminium washer. Approximately 1.5 inches (close to 4cm) in height.




I've been aware for a while that my wire-weaving skills are on pair with an elephant attempting to dance a tango in stiletto heels, so this was something of a practice piece. You can see where all the kinks I mucked up made for uneven little bits in the wrapping. Perhaps I'm overly paranoid, but I've seen far too many diatribes on how most self-styled wire artists can't handle wire worth several tons of crap, and many complaints on how most people shouldn't call themselves 'artists' if they can't master their material. Well. I'm an artist in -progress-. I'm not an expert, and that's why I don't write tutorials, and will continue to refuse to do so. I'm my own worst critic, which is more critical than most hard-core critics anyway, so here's my disclaimer: if there's going to be comments on how badly that wire's kinked and out of control, and how the wrapping is shite, please rest assured that yes, I know it already, and thank you. I'm not going to be selling this piece for obvious and some not-so-obvious fundamental reasons, so I won't be cheating anyone of their hard-earned money either.

Ahem. Just had to get that out of my system, it's been brewing for a while.



This isn't a work of staggeringly heart-breaking genius. But I'll always believe that perhaps, just perhaps, it was my grandfather's last gift to me - that spark of inspiration to -do- finally, after so long.

And for the people who've kept on believing faithfully in my abilities, despite me being incredibly doubtful, thank you. You have no idea how much it means.

Big Red and Blue

Between the purchase of a jeweller's saw and the heady joy of being able to custom-create any shape of metal charms lies the murky depths of Survival, Rent, and Necessary Finance.

In other words: I've been busy with work, rehearsals for main choir, lesson plans and more rehearsals with quartet and chamber choir, and the weather hasn't wanted to be cooperative when it comes to taking photographs of the few little bits of new stuff I've been piddling out. The pictures will come hopefully this week - my balcony is not the best place to take any sort of photos, though I've managed with some squeezed ingenuity so far. I've managed a metal pendant, an acrylic pendant, a necklace/earring set with pearls and metal washers (which I've titled 'The Strange Attraction of Opposites) and a new chainmaille bracelet with a Byzantine Cross centrepiece. Not a lot, compared with most other crafters, but there you have it - I take whatever in-between times I get.

During the sporadic bits of time when I actually -don't- have to lesson plan and the designing work starts to frustrate me to the point of screaming, I've been watching Hellboy and reading up some of Mike Mignola's other work. Mignola is a comic book artist who does amazing things with black and white - I think I like his black and white work better than the coloured pieces, honestly. It reminds me of Marcos' work - yes Marcos, I LOVE your stuff! I mean...Miss Trouble, who could ask for more?

Which led to this weird, somewhat contemplative and random journal entry. Yep, I'm officially on a Hellboy kick; I'll have to hunt up 'Seed of Destruction' soon the next time I hit Kinokuniya. It's been a while since I drew anything - as much as this is blatant derivative, it felt good to be using markers again.


The one and only Big Red Paranormal Investigator with the Bureau of Paranormal Research and Development (B.P.R.D), Hellboy himself, and his blue amphibious friend, Abe Sapien. Abe came out horrible, but I'm putting that down to me-artist-fail. Ah yes. This utilised the famous Grunge Eraser Alphabet Stamps which I mangled some weeks back.

2010: Send Me Out Into Another Life...

...lord for this one is growing faint
i do not think it goes all the way.

-- 'Words from a Totem Animal', W. S. Merwin


Carpe Anno - My first personal art journal entry since 2002 - a new beginning, a new skill. My old journal pages were usually for other people, I don't know why I never did any for myself. It turned out better than I expected, certainly. And, amazingly, I loved being able to be messy - something I should do far more often I think.

New year, new post - a bit late, I know, but I think it's not too late to pick up from where the last year ended, and forge on.

A year. Four alphabets which cover 365 days, which ought to be so much longer than they work in reality. A blink and 2009 is over. Hullo 2010, will you be taking a side order of Challenges with your order?

Because that's really what 2009 has been all about, on a personal and not so personal level. Leaving a source of steady income to teach freelance, taking vocal exams, preparing for an incredibly difficult choir production, embarking on singing as a career - I can't say I was ready for any of them when they fell on me like Newton's proverbial apple. And yet, here I am. It's a testament to grace, and grace for the journey.

And then there were the Big Things - starting Dawn Studio Creation on faith, hope and a gritting of teeth, beginning the 3-year process that will give me the Australian Kodaly Certificate of Music Education, struggling through finances that never seemed to rise above anything but a mere lukewarm negative some days. Creativity blocks, comparisons, competition, insecurities - I'm not sure I would have chosen any of these to be constant companions for an entire year, frankly. And yet, I don't think I'd trade them for anything; if I did I'd lose some of the most precious things I've had to learn in the process.

Faith. Hope. Love. Courage.

So here's to 2010, where Courage tilts her head and says, Come on out into the water now, you've been standing on the diving board for too long. Time to grit those (stained and incredibly dentist-neglected) teeth and forge the rest of the journey that began last year. Here's to faith, where sometimes everyone but you believes that you CAN do it, and when people around and dear friends may be the only ones who keep your dreams alive by reminding you that you're not alone.

Here's to hope, when that last damned niobium jump ring breaks and there's no way of getting another order from overseas for another month due to shipping, and the commission's due that weekend. When the -next- set of pliers you break might just mean that you can handle -most- gauges of wire, but not stainless steel - but you will, someday.

Here's to love. Loving what you do, loving what you want to be and what you want to create with every fibre of your heart even though it can hurt so much to do so. When passion seems an exercise in endurance, and nothing seems worthwhile any more, but it's all you have and it's all you love, and you have something to say so you say it anyhow in whatever medium you can.

Here's to you, all the wonderful people who've been there for me when nothing seemed like it could ever get better past the catastrophe stage.

Thank you. Happy 2010, everyone - Carpe Anno!

For The Love Of Lumps: Finished Result!

After much experimentation, trauma, unplanned designed changes (ie: accidents) and screeches of utter torment - behold, the Two Lumps Necklace!





Everything went together incredibly smoothly once all the components were in place. Aside of having to measure the chain links and aesthetically balance everything for the best effect, nothing out of the way took place, and no more forsaken laments of operatic proportions were necessary. I did sand down and appropriate several aluminium washers for use, since I wanted to break the monotony of the chain somewhat. I think it worked.


Eben came together looking as smart and savvy as he is in the comic. As well he should, after all that trouble!


Snooch, dear darling round Snooch, looking as comfy and lovably nuts as always.


And one can't forget Birdbirdbird after all, looking all smart and unruffled.

It's been quite the experience and all for a good cause. How much better can that get?

The Two Lumps Necklace will be on auction at Tarlia's blog sometime during the next few days. If you're Malaysian, passionate about animals, and want to do a good deed for some very deserving dogs and cats, come support the cause! There are some other lovely handmade items that will be going up on auction as well, so come check it out and drop a bid or two!

For The Love Of Lumps: Process, Part 2

When we last left off the Great Insane Two Lumps Necklace Project, the glued-together shapes were being flattened under a pile of delicious recipe books and awaiting verdict.


Part 4: DOOM DOOM DOOM DISASTER DOOM

Well. They turned out -awful-. I thought it might improve things if I matte-sprayed them, but nooooo, the ultimate consensus was that very little - save perhaps Cthulhu eating them or an elephant stomping on them - would help matters.



They just weren't up to standard. Well, my standards anyway and those are extravagantly high. Then again, I'm the one with a reputation at stake if I put something as shitty as this up for auction, so it was time to go back to the drawing board...


Part 5: Remedying Doom and Disaster, Take One

...or rather, the sawing table, in this case. I re-cut the shapes. Given that I did not, at that point in time, -have- a proper clamp and sawing block, my left arm protested very loudly against the force it needed to hold down the CD pieces and keep them from breaking. My table also has a few new saw-tooth notches on it to add to the ones already collected.

For those of you who do not actually believe that my room looks like a drug lab, I hereby submit proof that sawing CDs make a perfectly good substitute for LSD on a film set:



And that's just the edge of my table where I was sawing, folks. The floor under that is a hundred times worse.

Oh. Did I mention that this heroic undertaking was being conducted somewhere around 2am in the morning? Yes, I am a leeeeetle bit insane, why do you ask?

The result:



Note the liberal distribution of white powder all over the edges. Most of it goes away with careful wiping off, but sometimes the sharp end of a jewellery file is needed to get it all clear. The design was drawn into the CD with permanent black Sharpie. It comes off with some concerted cleaning effort, so I wasn't worried that the outlines would be eyesores (so much for permanent, but I'm thankful in this one case).

After filing and sanding down the shapes, I decided that I wouldn't repeat the 'sandwich', and would just stick to having one layer of Lump with the printed quotations on top. I was very pleased with the way Snooch turned out - even though the clear H20-based clear acrylic top coat that I was using was absolute -evil- to work with. I plead first-time usage and user error, rather than the product itself, however.



Eben, however, was a totally different matter from his rounder, much easier-going brother. The varnish insisted on being as temperamental as a PMS-ing woman deprived of chocolate, and I wound up using at least 4-5 coats before I was satisfied. And even then, I didn't like the way the paper wrinkled up and left dark lines.

Ultimately I didn't have to worry about that either because an accident with the latest layer of top coat wound up pulling the -entire- 4-5 coats loose - so there went 2 hours' work or so down the drain.

I re-varnished Eben again, and it -still- didn't come out half as professional as I wanted it to. The dark lines at the wrinkles got even worse, which wasn't particularly a very big crime, but again - me, perfectionist, much. Besides, drilling the holes had made a very slight hairline crack at the edge of one of the holes...



...so against my sanity, I redid the bloody thing. Yes, again. I'm aware this may be considered obsessive-compulsive, but I try to keep my work looking as professionally top-notch as any handmade labour of love can be.

This time, despite the ungodly hour of 3.30am, Eben came together beautifully, for which I was both amazed and incredibly thankful. Because if not, I wouldn't have been able to cut another shape - my saw frame wingnut decided to die an untimely death, and I've yet to have time to go down to the hardware store to replace it.




Part 6: Muffin Love n' Lemon!

One of my absolute favourite crazy quotes from the Two Lumps strips involves a bottle of green food colouring and the words 'Muffin love 'n' lemon'. When I mentioned my intention of including this on the necklace, Tarlia went EEEEE so of course, that made it mandatory.

I sawed the heart shape out of the CD remnants from the previous cutting spree, and salvaged another bit from the previous experimentations on Modern Sunset. Sanding them down and getting them coloured and calligraphed was the -easy- part. The varnish, on the other hand, put on a magnificent temper tantrum and kept me at it for the better part of 3 hours -and- 5-6 coats - which ultimately got ruined by a sheet of paper, so I had to redo that all. Over. Again.

Contrary to popular belief, my favourite activity does -not- actually involve frantically trying to pry paper loose from a delicate layer of varnish, and having the entire several coats rip off along WITH the ink on the words. There may have been a loud soul-searing screech of torment and dismay, but I shall neither confirm nor deny this. Suffice to say, at nearly 4am, sweet dreams are -not- made out of these.

However, as with all things, this too passed, the damage was repaired, and the tags finally turned out quite nicely, all in all.




Part 7: And All The People Rejoooooooooiced

Once all the pieces had either dried or otherwise been repaired, it was time to put everything together and see what sort of mayhem would emerge. I'd kept one particular glass bead for a long time - clear base, black spots, yellow centre rather like a bumble bee (see above picture for reference). For whatever reason, it just seemed to fit perfectly in with the Lumps and the overall comic feel, and besides, I needed something to weight the necklace down so it would hang right - the CD shapes were too light to provide much in the way of heaviness.

After some fiddling around with some 20ga artistic wire, I managed to come up with a decent connector that would allow the bead to both spin, and serve as a stylish little piece to hang the tags from.

I arranged all the components out on my bed, like so:



...and then I put everything together with the help of two pairs of pliers, an obsessive-compulsive perfectionism, and a sense of humour (there was a certain amount of fear and trembling involved, but after wrestling with that varnish and re-cutting the shapes four times, everything subsequent seemed rather stress-free in comparison.)

Tomorrow: The Finished Project! Stay tuned!