Screen printing on high fires!

I'm so proud of my great students. They worked really hard to get their images perfect! Way to go!!!!

What an awesome class!  My students were the best!  Here's a look at some of their great work!

Just a few experiments!

The last few weeks I've been teaching lots of classes and just trying to get back on track after the trip.

I think I'm getting things where I want them. Here are a few of my quick experiments on new screen printing ideas.

3 sushi plates! The 2 on the ends are completely smooth, and fully fused. The middle one has texture.

The female freedom fighter is ghosted over the landscape.

The mixing bowls and whisks have Hedy Lamar completely perplexed!

Santa Fe Powder Printing Class

I had a wonderful trip to Bullseye Glass in Santa Fe! My buddy Lisa came with me and it was awesome. We had a fantastic meal at Luminaria at the Inn at Loretto. One of the best meals I've ever had in Santa Fe. Thanks to Perry for suggesting it, I should have been quick enough to invite him and Nancy to dinner with us!

Stacy Smith is a fantastic instructor. She made the class fun and inspirational! Erik Whittemore, the resident Studio Manager was the perfect host/TA/collaborator! A big thanks to Morgan and her team for their support. Bravo on my best Bullseye experience ever! In my humble opinion, Stacy is likely the best ambassador of the all the positives of the "Bullseye Spirit!" I hope they elevate her to the appropriate status she deserves. Enough gushing! (Seriously, I hope they'll let her come teach at Wired Designs Studios.....c'mon Jim!!!!)

My fellow students were great to hang with and gave me a wonderful perspective on all of the different ways to employ these techniques. We were all doing our own things, and they were all so great and different! Thanks everyone. I got to hang with Nancy Weisser, Perry and Colleen, and we had an awesome time.

Here are a few of my samples from the class. I'll be incorporating this technique into my Printmaking Techniques for Glass classes going forward.

This powder print was fired twice; once for the background at full fuse, and then once at a tack fuse for the foreground image. I'm using imagery from my Women's Roles and Identities series.

These were images that we were given to play with in order to learn the technique.The 2 on the left are full fuse on 6mm, the 2 on the right are tack fused on 3mm. Both have equal merit and use.

Very little distortion! Halftones work really well.

Part of my Women's Roles and Identities imagery. This is all powder.....no sheet glass. Cool huh?

This was all done in a single firing! Love the effect!

Yesterday I had a private Torch Fired Enamels workshop. My student is a wonderful lady who has seen and done it all! We worked on stenciled enamels, and component projects. I had done the centerpiece of this necklace previously, and just wasn't completely happy with it. So my student and I added some components and took it to the next level.

I'm teaching this technique in Las Vegas at the Glass Craft Expo next year. It's called Glass on Metals!
I know that all my glassy friends will love doing this!!

This piece is copper enameled and riveted with silver connections.
I love acid green and turquoise together!

We were going for something Asian. These look really great on!

Printmaking on Glass

Wednesday's class was fantastic! We made silk screens, created our own photo resists, created photo transfers, worked with Gel Medium for ink transfer, and finally focused on direct painting with Enamels! The workshop, which was a consolidated version of our regular class gave everyone a taste of print making techniques and provided all the students with a sample of each type to take home. There sure was a lot to cover in a short period of time, but we did it and still managed to laugh!

A big thanks to Gary M. for his awesome seafood gumbo and homemade cornbread for lunch!  It was truly a southern treat!

Here are some pictures to give ya'll a feel for the whirlwind that was our day!

This is a combination of silk screened and photo resist samples.
There's even a photo transfer with some overlaid enamel!

More overlaid enamels!

Here's the gel medium transfers, and the photo transfers.

My sample of a silk screen thumb print under a photo resist figure.

This is a thick block that has photo resist works inside and an enamel painting on top.
This is in the kiln now! (I'll post a finished picture when it's complete.)

Here's my painted enamels overtop of a gel medium transfer background.

Here's part of the group dry filling their blasted resists!

Join us for the next one of these workshops in October!  Here's a few sample photo's.....

Strip Construction Class!

Last weekend we had an awesome strip construction workshop! The students made some gorgeous pieces. Here are some of the shots of the work in progress and almost finished. The folks did stringer tapestry and conventional strip construction, but then they really changed it up!  I'm so proud of my fantastic students.

Annie

Annie

Sunny's piece

Sue's piece

Denise Leone's class!

Here are some of the blocks we constructed in class. There were so many awesome techniques we learned. Thanks to Denise for teaching us so much! My compressor is happy to have the day off! Yesterday was hot and the compressors engine was giving off a lot of heat. The air just couldn't keep up.

What's Happening this Week?

It's been quite the busy week! 

I've had private classes with my pal Elizabeth and I'm afraid she's gotten more than she bargained for. We worked on color chemistry and reactions and some of the projects didn't work out as she'd planned, but she now has segued into strip construction and pattern bar creation because we've cut up a few of the disasters and are using the pieces in different ways!  I can't wait for her to see the finished product, because they are goon blow her away. I'll show you guys when they are complete!  

Also, bravo to Will! He's going to high school at Winston School! He had to do 2 days onsite as a student and be evaluated by the staff, and at the end, they invited him to attend! We're very excited for him! But it means a 55 minute drive every morning and evening....eeek! Car pool anyone??

Oops, this is from a few weeks ago. It's a demo from my beginning glass class fusing class. Here's what I did with it!

I'm also working on 2 vessel sinks! This one is for my friend Luanne's new powder room. It's gorgeous! I'll be cold working this one this afternoon.

The second one is from a customer in California. It's 4101.31 and 1429, for those of you who know what that is! I'll post a picture of that tomorrow!

Grad School is going well! Just one month left of this semester, which means; one more book (gotta read 90 pages today), 16 more blog postings (about 4 per week), 1000 more words to add onto the final paper. So far I'm doing ok! 

The weather is heavenly here right now! I slept with the windows open last night, which is not the norm here in cedar pollen land, but it was wonderful! Thanks g-d!

Long time no blog!

Yesterday Rene taught a great soldering class. Here's Luanna's first soldered pieces. I'm so proud!

Here's what I've been up to:
I've been teaching a lot since I got back from Vegas but its all good.

Heres some of my class demos

Plus, I've been electro forming like crazy. All of the Vegas samples need to be done and sent out. I feel like a real science geek! But I love it!

Mostly I'm missing my Vegas buddies whom I can't talk to right now cause I'm so crazy busy.

I love that I've been able to be so productive!

Thanks to Nicole and Lisa who were such awesome Vegas buddies! Xo

A little soldering; Soldering Class 1 & 2

My beginning and next step soldering students are so awesome!  Here are a few  of the fantastic things they made!  They've been setting stones, soldering multiple layers, working in brass, copper, nickel, silver, semi-precious stones, dichroic glass, setting prongs, making custom bezels, using bezel cups, making bails, designing, and having a lot of laughs!  I'm so lucky I get to work with them! Somedays, I love my job!!! 

Pretty great for a beginner!

Love the fun prongs!

The Great Vase Project of 2012 is Complete!

Happy to report that 45 gem toned vases are completed! It's been a challenge to pull it off on time, but the City Year Gala event is on Tuesday night and the client is picking them up on Monday! The vases turned out to be beautiful!

A close up shot of the vases!

I know these will look beautiful with candles in them!

We had a visit from our Bullseye Rep, Devon! She did a great presentation on color reactions. Afterward we had a mini-teach where we made sample tiles of color reactions. We had about 30 attendees!  It was really educational and we had a lot of fun making the samples. Now I need to fire a million 3" square tiles....eeek!

I should have them done by Tuesday morning! I'm sure we'll have some great samples.

Just a peek at some of the samples!

I'm starting a new Baptismal Font commission tomorrow for Our Saviour's Lutheran Church in College Station. I really love doing these things. They are very fun and relaxing. It always feels good knowing that something you are creating will be used regularly in celebrations that bring people closer to their hearts and each other.  I'll keep you in the loop with pictures of the progress.