Monday, October 19, 2009














Here is some more interesting jewelry. These are made by Sakurako Shimizu. This series titled "Waveform Series" are laser cut shapes of sounds. The first image is of a bell, and she has used other sounds such as giggles, yawns, sneezes, or couples saying he old "I do" This is a good example of another industrial process (laser cutting) applied to an individual series of work.

I really like the idea of capturing something in a piece of jewelry. Mainly a piece of a person because they are made by people, and worn by people. I guess this is why I also enjoy the bio jewelry. My jewelry sale project also relates to this, as I'm selling away pieces of my face. I like the idea of people some how being connected because they all have a piece of the same thing. It's almost like they are in the Lucy Club or something. "When our Powers Combine" maybe that should be the title.
At this point I'm having a hard time with the title.
But I'm anxious to get back to it... so adios.

"A radical evolution from the spit handshake or blood brothers ritual, Biojewlery uses lab grown human bone tissue as a design material. Their intention is to have nuptial rings created from the bone tissue of both people to be wed. Now that the Modern Primitives are growing up, this seems like their ideal wedding band."

Wow, I want one!!

The process begins with bone cell donors. Their cells were then seeded onto a bioactive scaffold. As the cells multiply, the form the shape of the scaffold, here a ring.

Check out more about this at www.biojewellery.com

I've always thought that using a diamond or gold to say "I love you" doesn't really make much sense, and is usually only a financial responsibility for one participant. But Bio jewelry literally gives your partner a piece of you. I think that is an amazing connection to have. Obviously these don't need to be taken into the context of the wedding ring, but I think it works well for that idea.

Saturday, October 3, 2009

face mold - jewelry sale

Hello Everyone,

My jewelry sale project is starting to get sorted out. My plan is to

1. make a mold of my face 2. cut it into a grid of squares maybe 3/4 inch or so 3. make a mold of the squares 4. cast the squares in Silicone and 5. attach them to rings (maybe Brooches.... maybe, but I'm really feeling the rings.)

I made a mold of my face this weekend. It turned out pretty good, but I'm going to give it another try this evening after work. I used Algi-Safe (by Smooth On), Plaster bandages, and then duoMatrix Neo (also Smooth On) plaster mix to do the casting. When I try this tonight I'm planning on using brown wax to fill the mold. this way I can easily cut it into pieces with a jewelers saw. We'll see how that works. Hopefully I can get more then one cast out of it. The Algi-Safe was hard to save after the first cast. But, I'd like to have at least two faces. Because I'd like to make a cast of a solid face for the display.

The next step is to make another negative mold of my face that I can use to cast the Sorta Clear Silicone into. For this I Bought a less expensive silicone rubber to use. Silicon will not cure properly in a urethane mold.

I have most of the process mapped out at this point. I"m just considering how to adhere the eventual cubes of my face to the rings. Silicone doesn't adhere to metal, so I'm thinking that if I have a threaded cone shape or something that will prevent the metal from coming out. I can cast them right into the pieces, then screw them onto the ring posts using Thread Lock to keep them in place.

Each piece will eventually be a small cube of my face mold. I'm going to engrave or etch the location of each ring as it pertains to my face. Most likely 1a 2b 3c etc.

I'm really excited about this project.