February 11, 2012

What's Old Is New Again

Artists have a little trick. When they are working on a piece of artwork and they are not sure if they like it, or they are not sure that it's finished, the trick is to put it away and not look at it for a day or a week or a month, or even longer... When you look at it again, you will see it with fresh eyes, with more objectivity, and often you know exactly what to do.

I do that. I put artwork away. Sometimes for a day or a week or a month. Sometimes it is longer. Much longer...

When it came time to pack up things for my big move to the new house recently, I was forced to go through my stacks (and stacks) of orphaned pieces of artwork and look at each them with fresh eyes. I was surprised to find many watercolors paintings that I had totally forgotten about. And happily, I LIKED them. I have no idea how long ago I painted them. Here are three of them:




It was fun to have "new" material to work with and I couldn't wait to see how these images would translate into jewelry. I scanned the first two paintings into my computer, then cropped them in various ways to find snippets that would work for pendants or earrings:

I printed them up on high quality matte photo paper, then cut them out and sealed them onto the back of glass tiles. The backs were sealed, jewelry findings were added, and voila! Here are some of the designs I came up with:

On the back of each pendant is a suggested meditation such as "Savor..." "Seek..." or "Wish..."

I've added these jewelry pieces, and more, to my Etsy shop... Click on this link to see the current selection of Nature Lover Jewelry. I am also offering boxed sets of the new designs, which include matching earrings and pendant plus a chain at a savings of $4.00.

My "old is new" original watercolor paintings are also for sale in my Etsy shop. Just click on any of the images above for more information.

Enjoy!

4 comments:

Renee Zarate said...

Great idea, I have a few things that I think I'll put away for now!
What did you seal it with?

Ella said...

Thanks for sharing! So clever, I love what you did with your finds~
YOUR art is really beautiful :D

Unknown said...

Renee-- I use "dimensional glaze"-- you can use Judikin's Diamond Glaze. I get my supplies from Sun and Moon Craft Kits and they have their own brand which has worked the best for me: http://www.sunandmooncraftkits.com/supplies/adhesives/sun-and-moon-glaze.html

Pansy Cottage Girl said...

Love these bold images!