Wendlyn at the Pumpkin Festival

"Wendlyn's Doorway"

This evening starts the 2013 Milford Great Pumpkin Festival. For lucky people like me, (aka, those setting up their booths in the town hall auditorium) we don our festival game-on faces tomorrow morning at 10 am and can't relax again until 8pm. I'm also there from 10-3 on Sunday. (Monday? I'm crawling under my giant fern on the balcony and falling asleep in a fetal position until Tuesday.) I never got to make my steampunk faery in time for this event - I just wasn't inspired enough by a storyline. BUT! I did create this cute little girl. For your viewing pleasure: "Wendlyn's Doorway."

Wendlyn is a bit of a ragamuffin, bohemian sort of gal. She started with an antique key, a couple of pieces of wood and some fabulous ribbon I found at Michaels of skeleton keys. Not being a huge wood-worker, my father went to work cutting and connecting the two boards to create a stand and backing for Wendlyn's portal to the realm of Faery. I created the door out of copper, silver and green clay, cut the keyhole by hand and -magic!- you can peek inside the keyhole to see the lush magical forest beyond. Want to see more? Well, Wendlyn is the keeper of the key to unlock it. Maybe if you ask her really nice...

Her skirt is half clay, half real ribbon and lace.

Wendlyn is also a special addition to The Silver Branch OOAK faery line because she is a teaching piece. I took pictures of her throughout the creation process (when I could remember to! Sometimes momentum is everything in sculpting). And I will soon be taking down the ridiculously stuffed fan art board in the hallway to post pictures and explanations of her creation. This way, I hope more visitors to Riverview Mill and my studio will understand how special these little faeries are because of all the work that goes into them! Here is one of the creation images.

Working to position her head. Forgetting to give them ears is one of my worst habits. Ears are so fragile when the clay is wet that it's best to leave them off as long as possible. I've sometimes had to rush sculptures out of the hot oven before they've cured after realizing they're missing their ears! I didn't forget this time. Once her head was positioned, she got two cute little pointed ears.

10 More days to go!

So True.

It's only 10 more days until The Silver Branch studio/shop grand opening! November 3rd and 4th at the Riverview Artist Mill, 29 Howard Street in scenic little Wilton NH. 9-5:30 on Saturday and 10-4 Sunday. What will one find there, you ask? Well, my helper elves and I with a tray of mini cupcakes and a never ending carafe of awesome tea at the very least. T.S.B's original Naturally Shed Faery Wing© Jewelry will be 15% off for the weekend, and all faeries, mermaids and larger sculptures (gnome chess sets, larger dragons, large mushrooms, etc) will be 20% off.

I need more room for new sculptures! You will also get a chance to clay around with a quick polymer clay project at the studio! The Fan Board Contest is already receiving submissions and there will be 3 hand sculpted prizes! (Winners are determined by an impartial jury on Sunday evening. Since I know most of my customers, I'm sadly not a judge. Winners will be contacted by telephone or email.)

"Golden Opportunity" To the gnomes, all is safe - the dragon is sleeping...

....or not.

New sculptures include the dragon scene you've been glancing over above. "Golden Opportunity" tells the story of two unsuspecting gnomes and one suspecting dragon coming out of her slumber. This sculpture was so fun to do. The only part not sculpted is the actual wooden treasure chest and a few glass jewels for effect. The gold inside, the loot bag, the dragon and The Silver Branch's signature gnomes are all hand sculpted and painted. Each scale on the dragon's back was sculpted into place by hand.

"Mabon"

 You'll also meet Mabon, a faery who looks amazing on any shelf, but even more so on her lily-pad throne in a glass vase (not in picture, obviously).

And my new little shoulder gnomes... I should have a few more by then. I'm accepting their applications for positions on shoulders, hat brims and other perching places right now. (Note; Gnome in picture was reading to Janna - not visa verse. I like my employees to be well read.)

I will also have regular class schedules ready to go for the months of November and December! No more will you need to schedule (unless you want to). The first class is this delightfully non-edible mini orange cake pendant and earring set. Yum!

I have the sunniest studio in the mill! I have to in order to keep the flower faery babies warm in the peonies.

  So if you're in the area, do come. It's also "NH Open Doors" weekend and many other artists in the mills will be open to display and probably demonstrate their artistry. You will find silver and metal smithing, jewelry, pottery, miniatures, paintings, photography and more this weekend!

I'm often asked by customers about my birds. Some of my great inspiration comes from the various characters in my flock - a mix of rescued budgies, a couple of lovebirds and a heavily spoiled blue crowned conure. In the midst of all this shed faery wing harvesting, sculpting, gnome hiring, dragon taming and grand opening planning I couldn't help but remember it was exactly a week ago we lost a deeply beloved member of our family and wanted to remember him here as a bird who could not be more gnome-like in curiosity and habits than anyone I knew. Cosmo was a lovebird filled with immense character, sense of adventure and a brave spirit right up to the end of his time with us. We will always love you, Cozzie. <3

The Masquerade Faery

Brand new as of 10 minutes ago! Meet my newest one of a kind creation. And like all my creations, the name usually doesn't happen for at least 24 to 48 hours after I'm done with the sculpture. Until that time, let's just call her the Masquerade Faery. She's all set for any goblin king hosted ball!

Like most of my faeries and mermaids, she was created around an idea from a found object. In this case, a clearance priced bunch of feathers from the craft store. I flipped them upside down and immediately thought up this dress! Despite the grand garb, I took special pains to sculpt her figure. I timed myself. With the distraction of occasional snacking, she took 9 and a half hours to sculpt. That was just her figure. It took me about 7 hours to get her costume, hair, coloring, mask and wings done today. That was record timing for me.

I'm hoping to figure out a way to put her up on etsy, but like all my faeries, I'm terrified of shipping her.She's pretty strong, but the thought of her tumbling about in a box across country or the ocean, no matter how tightly packed, scares the jitterbugs outta me! I wonder how other art doll creators do it....

When Pigs Fly

"When Pigs Fly"

I was going to post about a new 'scene' I made with gnomes and a chalkboard and glowing clay, but in light of the unlikely things happening around here lately, I've decided to unveil my latest faery sculpture to the blog instead. If someone had suggested that NH might fall prey to a blizzard that dumps 20 inches of snow and knocks out power to thousands and thousands - all before Halloween - they might reply with the title of this sculpture. I certainly would have! :)

This sculpture is seriously much more impressive in person. There's just no decent way to show the perspective of the piece with my amateur camera know-how. But, be that as it may, I've done my best. A rather adorable pig with wings is being coaxed to fly by a flying fae boy. He is in mid-air with no apparently visible support. And the miracle is he's rather quite sturdy up there! Whew!


This all came about when I found some brass rods at the little country hardware store down the street. I've been dying to work on a more difficult armature, something that would wow people. I'm pretty happy with the result. Why the theme? I was working with the television on and there was a commercial involving a dog on a roof with some flying pigs... and some canned baked beans too. Not sure where that came into it, but the flying pigs stuck in my mind. I thought, wouldn't it be nice to show just how you could get one to fly? Hence the faery and a way to try out an out-of-the-ordinary armature design.

The pig completely supports the faery. To make this design, I started with a basic (and I mean stick figure) sketch in full scale of the piece I wanted to create. Then I bent the brass rod along the center of gravity for both the pig and the faery, and then I prayed to the sculpting gods that I guessed correctly on the angle of the faery. Too far forward and he would have tipped. I got it just right! The bar runs through the piggy, up his wing, up the faery's arm and down through his torso. From there, I constructed the armature of the pig and sculpted the basic body of the pig before finally tackling the faery. This took a long while. I was so worried about the balance and center of gravity, that I put the finished pig with the brass rod sticking out on my "to do" shelf at the mill and didn't touch it for at least a few weeks. >.<

Aerial shot

When I mustered up the courage and repeated my little "nothing to it but to do it" mantra a few hundred times, I started working on the armature of the faery itself and then the clay. I was relieved that the finished piece not only didn't tip, but it was highly sturdy. You could actually push on the faery's legs (within reason, of course) and it wouldn't tip.

So I will definitely try more interesting armatures after show season has slowed down a bit.

Starfish Lullaby

For the first time, I've made a sculpture without an actual story in mind. I picked up this smooth granite stone off rocky Rye Beach in New Hampshire. I saw a starfish. I saw a mermaid. I brought the rock home to let the story create itself. Well! It worked somewhat; the sculpture came out easily enough from my imagination... but the story still remains at large.

This adorable mermaid is indeed tuckered out. She sleeps snugly under the cozy arm of a starfish. However, why is she doing this? Something tells me there's a friendship story in this little sculpture. Perhaps this is a good contest question.

I'm looking forward to another trip out to the rocky Atlantic coast so I can take pictures of the pair in their 'natural environment'. Nothing beats a natural setting. As I only completed this sculpture today, I had to make due with white paper and a light box.

Her glass bead belt and her sparkling tail are best viewed in person. You should all come to Wilton, NH to see her. :)

The starfish came first. I blended 3 colors and 2 brands of polymer clay to get the right color, shine and strength that I wanted. I used an eye dropper tip to impress all of those little bumps which are common on starfish of the NH coast.

The mermaid was just plain fun. Unlike the 'Captive Mermaid' and 'Shell Maiden' sculptures I created before her, she has wing like fins shooting from her back. Her copious blue hair shimmers with silver specks of light and it unfortunately hides her awesome shoulder fins. But, the beauty of art dolls is that you can move her hair and style her hair to reveal her lovely shoulders. :)

Is it just me or does the Captive Mermaid look... happier? o.O

She needs a name - New Painter Faery!

I just finished her today!

click to enlarge

So new that she doesn't even have a name yet (nor does her little creation). I had been working on this cute little fae all week, and had created her painting last week. I was inspired by a little wooden easel I found at the dollar store made for collective plates. It's perfectly faery sized! Plates? Pshh. No thanks. The canvas and the painting are all made of clay. I started by cutting a rectangle out of white clay, then painted on the wet clay with a mixture of liquid polymer and ink. In the center of the painting is a door with stones leading up to it. And as it was the faery's creation, a little magic was in the paints. A tiny (seriously TINY) faery is coming out through the door!

I sculpted her with a needle.

The painter faery (wow... really need to get a name for her!) was really fun because I tried a couple of "new techniques" on her. For one, I had a blast blowing paint through a glass pipe at her to give her a true artist appearance. The splashes and smears are hard to see in the pictures, but she has lots of purple, blue, green, white and silver flecks.

When you stand in paint, you get a little dirty

Another thing I tried was simply dragonfly style wings. Instead of curling long "spokes" for butterfly ribbing, I made long oval loops with blue metallic coated copper and silver spirals inside. Lastly, I had sewed a little beret and created a little matching pair of overalls for her. Because she's not a jointed doll, she was extremely hard to dress (at least for me. I'm really not a seamstress in the slightest!). Making a pair of pants is easy enough, but you can't just slide them on because the legs are rigid. Same with sleeves.

New OOAK faerie! - "Oliver's Snail Mail"

"Oliver's Snail Mail"

Faeries can deliver mail at the speed of magical wings - be sure to specify "air mail" for that service. For all else, there's snail mail. This is Oliver's first job. He's already gotten rather used to the pace.

This art doll sculpture started with a large shell. I'm sure it's some sort of seashell, but it just screamed "garden snail!" to me. I thought about turning the shell into a garden gnome house with a little chimney and a lawn, but I wasn't in love with the idea. It sat on my shelf at the studio collecting dust for at least 2 months before I decided to create the snail that went with it just to see what it would be like with some clay breathing life into it. Once I formed that bizzare little critter, I was on a roll. I saw a mail bag, letters all over the place and a faery fast asleep on the mail bag as he delivered urgent letters. Hence, Oliver was born. ^_^

 

Oliver will probably go in my Etsy shop later in the week, but for now, you can also view him up close at Riverview Artist Mill if you're in the NH area.

(by the way - Charly, if you read this, I posted my letter to you this way. You should recieve it... soon? heh)

***NOTE: I'm doing a raffle for a wicked sweet handmade faery wing pendant for anyone who comments on my blog this week. See the bottom of my previous post for more details on the contest!****

"Shaelin's New Nest" - OOAK Faery

 Warning: photos really don't do this sculpture justice. Honestly, her face, clothing and the bird look much better in person. That being said...

Yay! I was actually able to complete a concept I had locked in my otherwise scatterbrained head for over a month now. I started with the concept of a faery trying to hoist a bird out of the nest, much to the bird's annoyance. That was followed a few weeks later by a trip to the art store to buy the nest. I mean, have you actually sat down and tried to make a bird's nest for yourself? No really. Have you? Not. Fun. Aside the nest, the rest of this art doll sculpture is completely hand made. As usual - no molds.

I started with the bird's armature and then completed the bird before moving onto Shaelin's armature. In my original thought, I had pictured a much smaller faery, but realized her arm span would have to be grotesquely ... lengthy. lol So there you have it. Shaelin was created to be about 7 inches tall if she were standing upright. Her face is about the size of an American nickel.

Penny is actually touching her hair - it's not in the foreground.

I think she's related to Tara from "Tara and the Toad", as she's rather impish and loves causing mischief for small critters.

Her wings are hand made just like all my other faeries. This time, I added brass filigree (hard to see in the photos, sorry) and brown jewels. I decided to go wild with some swirls at the "ribbing" and I think they turned out awesome.

Gotta love faery wings!

On another note, if you're in the Southern NH area, google map 29 Howard Street in Wilton NH and make a large red permanent marker note on your calender to be there between 10am to 4pm on Mother's Day weekend!! It's the Riverview Artists' Mill's open studios. Lampworking, bead supplies, pottery, silver and gold smithing, water color painters, energy workers, soap makers, dresses.... oh... and my sculptures! Will all be there. ^_^

Lastly, I'd like to thank Lori Ferguson  for featuring me in her awesome art blog, Madd Dogg of Tomorrow. Be sure to check out, comment and subscribe! Later in the week, I'll be featuring her work here on my blog (been meaning to do that with a lot of my favorite artists, jewelers, and otherwise totally cool people).