I have too many!

What would you do if you lost all your possessions?

Books, ornaments glass, clothes, paintings… Clutter.

In some ways to lose all my possessions would make life simpler as long as I had somewhere to go? Our house has got crowded with ‘stuff’, we have collected things over years and years, and we are trying to get rid of some of it.

But it’s easy to become attached, an object can encompass memories, look at it and you look back in time. Does losing your possessions give you freedom? Or is it oppressive? What if you only have the clothes you stand up in, no credit or debit card…. Knowledge of where you live would be important. Knowing how to light a fire, keep warm, find food and clean drinking water. The inhumanity of men to the homeless is a fear if I went through with disposing of my possessions.

An artist did do it. He crushed all of his belongings I think. It was a very powerful art ‘happening’, but what happened to him? Was he paid to do it, has he replaced things, did he survive? The problem is that in a world of thousands or millions of wonders each day, does anyone even notice.

It would be good to dispose of my belongings, to free up myself, but I’m getting too old to survive such a thing. I will have to keep at least some of my things..

Making fused glass

Share a lesson you wish you had learned earlier in life.

A few years ago I met a fused glass artist who showed me how to work with glass to create jewellery, bowls and other hand made craft pieces. A friend of mine helped mount the glass with wire weaving.

I wish I had learnt more about it so I could experiment more with glass. This piece was made with dichroic glass which gives it a metallic sheen. I made it into a pendant.

The trouble is that I can’t afford my own kiln so I’m limited in making things at workshops. The original glass artist moved away and it took a while to find another one, I’ve been to a couple of workshops with her and really enjoyed it.

I’m interested in doing other crafts too, like ceramics, but again there is a lot of cost involved. But I am a bit of a jack of all trades (master of none?)

I could have chosen a much more important subject to show how I have learnt from experience, but I’m not in the mood to consider a serious subject today.

Necklace

I’m pleased to say one of my necklaces, made of dichroic fused glass has gone to a good home. Fused glass is a way of heating and melting various colours of glass together to make a unique pendant.

I made these a few years ago, I haven’t really pushed the sale of them as I’m concentrating on my paintings, but every so often I get them out and today I gifted one to a friend who kindly helped me out.

I will try and sell the rest of them this year. It’s about time they all found new homes!

Bottles 2020

I like collecting them

Drawing from 28.6.2020, bottles, just came up on Facebook memories. The other photo was imported from the free images media here. I’d imported my drawing twice and can’t work how to delete the other one, only replace it. Of course I just realised how to delete it! So this post will probably end up with one photo, and a long rambling explanation why it had two…. Hang on. Sorted, I can see three pictures in the preview but only one in the post!

Glass

Glass pieces waiting to be fused.

A few years ago I went to a fused glass workshop. I made glass cabochons that were then surrounded by wire woven to support them. The result were some amazing and bold necklaces.

The artist that ran the workshop was called Angela Ashton. And my friend Deborah Travis did the wire weaving so the results were really a good collaboration. I found this on Facebook memories and I really wish I could do it again, although Angela moved back up to the North East Coast I did find someone else who does workshops, the only problem now is the cost and I’m sure with the price of fuel these days the process won’t be cheap.

Glass

Glass roof and glass bottles letting the light through. Rain water running down the surface from a drainpipe on the wall above. Glass bottles are perched like pigeons on a beam below the skylight. Bright blue sky and white clouds scud past high above. The roof of the Spode museum building is visible behind the bottles. This was in the ‘Factory Floor’ conference and party room at Spode. I like the conjunction of the glass roof with the glass bottles is pleasing, it is also interesting to see the metal industrial chimney rising above the roof.