Mondays with Marly - Stepping Stones Part 2

By guest blogger Marly

A major heat wave has hit Southern Ontario. Nothing like it since 2007.  I gratefully bow to our little window air conditioner which is managing to keep the house comfortable and cool. A perfect kind of day to write a blog entry since its way too humid to venture outside. In my last blog entry, I wrote about some early artistic adventures...weaving, printmaking, picture framing, and watercolor.

Around 2005, my color palette started to change. The turquoise blues and greens that predominated my earlier work shifted to warmer colors...maroons, reds, browns and earth tones. I realized how much I loved doing collage and started to integrate watercolor and acrylics with photos and Japanese washi papers

 

I decided to take an early retirement from teaching in 2005 so I could make art and travel a bigger part of my life.  I took a course in fused glass and fell in love with the process. I very quickly started to experiment with collaging different colors of glass together.

It didn’t take long before I fell in love with dichroic glass and the way it reflected colours.
I started to make jewelry pieces using this specialty glass.

In between creative adventures, Angie and I travelled to the southwest in my camper van several times between 2005-2007. It was there that we discovered the silver metal clay community and took some introductory courses that got us hooked on creating metal clay jewelry. It wasn’t long before I started experimenting with previous art mediums and metal clay. Could I put in some of my collage art into a metal clay frame?
I discovered that by laminating miniaturized versions of my collages, I could, indeed, include my art in metal clay jewelry.

I really feel drawn to making artisan jewelry right now. My work in various mediums has always been small, so translating my art to jewelry seems like a good direction to pursue. I also love the personal nature of making wearable art. So many people have told me how they think of me when they put on a piece of jewelry that I’ve made. Its feels good to know that people enjoy wearing my creations.

My art experiences have truly been stepping stones. All of life’s learnings can be built upon and used in many ways. So embrace the desire to learn something new. Trust that pursuing new experiences and having the courage to leave your “comfort zone” will only broaden and enhance the creative spirit within. Here’s to the journey!