divajools

My oh my it has been a busy time around here of late! Firstly it is the pointy end of the academic year ( ok so I use that term loosely since I am doing an Visual Art degree ...) and hot on the heels of that have been markets and art bazaars and an increased demand for jewels from retail outlets etc etc. Far and away one of the bestest bits of this busy time has been the exhibition my daughter and I have going at the Urban Cow Studio in Adelaide. It is pretty amazing to have the opportunity to do a mother and daughter gig like this! It is called Woodland Whimsy and even though we didn't physically sit down and work side by side, I am amazed at how well our work compliments each other. We have had great support form family and friends but also from the Gallery and local media. My daughter Ellen even did a radio interview on an arts programme and spoke brilliantly about our show! Oh yeah - proud mamma here. Still, piccies are better than words in this instance so let me share a couple of those with you ...

I am not sure why these pics turned out like this but at least you can get an idea of how the gallery looks.

Ellen's beautiful papercuts look amazing in this space and cast beautiful shadows onto the vintage wallpaper that backs them.

I called this piece "Home is Where the Squirrel is" It is made of pewter, brass, copper and sterling. The squirrel is a little charm I found and the acorn is cast from a charm Audrey gave me. I actually had to make a tool to 'dome' the heart ... (brag alert!)

Here is Ellen with her favourite piece - "Bohemian Love Bunnies" Check out the detail ...

All cut by hand, with a scalpel, from a single sheet of paper ... !!

 The love bunnies inspired this piece -  "Woodland Love Seeker" . I even had to think like a papercutter to make it by working with the negative space to create a layered image. The bunny is cut from epns, the first background is vintage tin and the final background is paper - rescued from a thrown away screenprint at uni! The layers are encased in an old watch case. This was my favourite piece to make.

 Tumbled agate, recycled sterling and watch parts.

Acacia, sheoak and eucalyptus wood that was cut up about two years ago - it should be properly dried and "cured" by now! I added a little sterling silver leaf - simple but pretty.

I am going to leave you with this image of Ellen's work "Jumps Over the Lazy Dog"   just because I love it. It is a bit hard to tell from the pics but the papercuts "float" in front of the background so in good light the image is replicated in shadow on the vintage wallpaper. Now I am switching to holiday brain - squeeeeeeeeeee! Might get a bit silly around here for a while .....