Saturday 2 January 2010

Bird inspired things

Here are a couple of bird inspired bits, relating to my residency at Whitby Museum.  The museum has a large collection of Victorian stuffed birds (I am sure there is another name for them!).  When I first began my residency I spent quite a lot of time sketching and doodling in that section of the museum, partly as I had always ignored them (a kind of dislike of old stuffed creatures I suppose).  Anyway, over the year I have become quite fond of them and developed an obsession with the way in which birds have been used as motifs and patterns on objects everywhere.  I made a few glass bird shaped beads which have been in my box of bits since last spring.  Anyway, I have now made these.  The left hand piece is actually a clasp for a bracelet I am planning.  The charm is based upon various ceramic jars and pots in the museum that are long-legged birds.  I think they are possibly from Africa originally - but I did also sketch some bird shaped ceramic vessels in the Etruscan museum in Rome while I was on holiday.














The glass bead is my first successful attempt as making a lamp worked glass bead over a silver core.

2 comments:

Joy Funnell said...

Love Em! The one on the left is my fav. Is the silver core Art Clay Silver? Well done on making the bead without melting the silver - I can see that must be a challenge!

Lynne Glazzard said...

I bought this silver core! I did try one on art clay silver a while ago but melted it partly. It is too expensive to keep melting them though, so I was a bit hesitant to try again.