September « 2009 « Polymer Clay Etc.

27 videos, step by step, beginner cane workshop

What people are saying about this tutorial. jennifer rose Just finished this first workshop on how to make canes, and I must say I learned so much. This is exactly what I have been looking for, someone who could explain cane making in a step by step that process that I could replicate. I watched the videos, went into my studio and began to create all of the canes Alice showed. I finally have results I can be proud of, and I say thank you so much for doing this workshop. My only question now is when do we get more workshops. If you are only going to take one online class let it be this workshop. Thank you Alice for your hard work, and your dedication to helping others learn the joys of polymer clay.

Selling Your Polymer Clay Artwork

The Tourist

Creating with polymer clay is fun, addictive and costly if everything you make stays at home with you. Don’t get me wrong, that can be a good thing if you can wear a different necklace, earrings, and bracelet set every day. Have polymer clay art in every room of your house! Light switch covers in the dining room, cover vases and sculpture the livingroom, covered knobs on the bedroom furniture and mosaic tile mirrors in the bathroom. (Did you know you could replace all the buttons on your kids clothes with polymer clay……..oh never mind…sorry)

Then you start giving your masterpieces to your friends and relatives. And they love them, the first 3 or 4 that is. After all how many nercklaces, earrings, bracelets, light switch covers, vases, sculptures, covered knobs and mosaic mirrors can they use?

The time comes when you just have to find a place to showcase your work or just give it up all together. You know we don’t want to quit, some of us just can’t. So what’s to be done?

If you are reading this online, then you have the skills to find the right outlet for your work right at your finger tips. I’m not going to talk about Etsy, or ArtFire, or any of the other online places to sell. You probably already have a shop set up on one of these sites. If you are successful and are selling your art faster than you can produce it, then you can skip the rest of this post.

But if you are a bit frustrated with your online shop sales, then you aren’t alone. It’s hard to be the artists, the marketer, the agent, the packer, and shipper, etc. All you want to really do is make your art…..well sorry.. that will probably never happen for most of us! We will all have to do some things to promote ourselves. But maybe you are living close to a solution to your problem. Or at the very least another outlet for sales.

There are thousands of art/craft galleries around the country and almost every town, no matter what size, has at least one. Maybe you have contacted you local shop with no luck. Well how about shops or galleries within a hundred miles of your house? Tourist spots are fabulous outlets, or just busy cities with a reputation for “artsy” shops.

I randomly picked Jackson, Mississippi to see what I could find. I did a google search for “arts and craft galleries jackson, mississippi”. About halfway down the second page there was a link to the Jackson Free Press that said…………..
Culture The Fall Arts …The Jackson area certainly has numerous venues for arts of all kinds, from museums …. Chimneyville Crafts Gallery Works by 400 members of the Mississippi

That looked interesting so I click on the link and bingo! There was an article about the Arts in Jackson and the names of 44 arts and or craft galleries around the city.

The next step was to check over the list and see what sounded like a good possibility. I found several, the first was Chimmeyville Crafts Gallery. I did a google search and couldn’t find a website for Chimmeyville Crafts Gallery, but found out that it was operated by the Craftsmen’s Guild of Mississippi, Inc.

I did another google search for the Craftsmen’s Guild and found their membership page

These were the membership benefits for $75.00 per year.

Benefits of membership include:

-Invitations to show and sell work at all sanctioned Guild events such as the December Chimneyville Crafts Festival
-Referrals to other national and international festival organizers
-Direct referrals to collectors, buyers, designers and wholesalers
-The privilege to sell and demonstrate work at Guild retail galleries and exhibits
-Direct referrals to feature writers, authors and producers
-A quarterly newsletter with articles designed especially for the professional artisan
-Invitations to special members’ meetings, workshops and social events

Notice that you can sell and demonstrate your work at Guild Galleries, I think they have two.
Also there is a referral service to collectors, buyers, designers and wholesalers. If I lived within 100 mile of Jackson, I would be a member of the Guild. If for nothing else but the referrals. ( I didn’t check any further to see if you have to be present to sell you work. Some places require that you volunteer a certain amount of hours a month.) But I would still join for the referrals.

I didn’t look any further, but there were several galleries that looked promising. I would see if they have a website, find their email address and mail them an introductory email and two or three (low resolution) photos of my work, asking if they might be interested in featuring them in their gallery. If you receive a positive reply, then an appointment can be arranged and a road trip planned. Find a friend to go with you and make a day of it.

Next post I’ll talk about the importance of pricing your work to sell on your own website shop with enough room to then be able to sell to the shop owner at wholesale. You shouldn’t undersell the retailer that is carrying you work.

You can do this kind of search for any city you live in or near. We have a great advantage outside of the internet. Not many people have seen the fabulous artwork that we are making with polymer clay. We have the opportunity to be the first in a gallery, shop or guild to offer polymer clay art for sale. You don’t have to do craft fairs or festivals, (even though they can be another great way to sell your work). It may just be a matter of finding a couple of just right galleries close by.

Good Luck, let me know how it goes.
Part 2 Pricing Polymer Clay Artwork to Sell Wholesale
Part 3 Mermaid Bracelet Listed on Etsy
Part 4 Inventory Lists for Your Polymer Clay
Part 5 Display Cards for Polymer Clay Pins and Necklaces
Part 6 Creating Tags for Your Polymer Clay Creations

Road Trip

My friend Alice Hansen and I took a road trip down to Matlacha, FL and Pine Island to Julia’s Arts Gallery.

Julia's Arts

Julia’s Arts is featuring some of my polymer clay work, bracelets, bottle stoppers, perfume pens, and my fish mosaics. The Mermaid on the blue bottle and the new fish bracelet are living there now too.

Julia's Arts - Gallery

It’s a delightful gallery with some really wonderful art by some very talented artists. I’m thrilled to be included.

I love little Florida coastal towns, the “artsy” buildings are so colorful. They grab your attention and make you feel happy, lift your mood if you’re feeling glum. Get you ready to kick back, grab that drink with the umbrella and relax. You’ll find some of the most unusual art work in these cool, colorful galleries.

Alice and I had a great time, we stopped in Punta Gorda to have lunch on the way home and visit some galleries there. Charming little town and they have made a great effort to come back for the devastation from hurricane Charlie several years ago.

Alice has had her painting and prints at Julia’s for several years now. Alice’s work is amazing! She is famous for her marine life watercolors. Manatee and fish of all kinds fall under Alice’s spell and no color escapes her brush. She sells her original artwork as well as prints and note cards of most of her paintings. You can contact Alice through her gallery page at Highlands Art League. Or see more of her work on Julia’s Arts website.

Now all I have to do is figure out how to create these wonderful gentle manatees in polymer clay. Don’t you just love the colors Alice uses?

Manatee Family - Alice Hansen

Polymer Clay Fish Bracelet

I used the same canes to create this bracelet that I used on my mermaid in the last post. And again, I layered the cane slices instead of butting them side by side as in the video. However, I did draw a pattern and built the fish first before putting it on the bracelet.

Laying Out The Design

You can just see the pattern between the two fish. I’m fitting the fish on a piece of glass. To see my video that explains how to use a pattern and a piece of glass, just sign up for my newsletter. It’s free.

Bracelet Covered With Black Polymer Clay

I covered a bracelet with black clay, then laid my fish on top. I made sure everything was securely down and baked it.

Side View of Fish Bracelet

Notice the tail on this fish, there is another slice of this cane on the other side. In fact, these are the last two slices of the cane. In the last post I told you that this cane was made from left overs and I was only able to get 6 slices out of it. Four I used for my mermaid’s hat and these two for fish tails. I didn’t waste that little bit of Skinner Blend.

Polymer Clay Mermaid Using Profile Face Cane

Polymer Clay Mermaid

See what happens when I start thinking about merchandise for galleries on the beach. I was mixing colors and making canes for leaves and plants for my flamingos and started thinking about my fish mosaic.

I ended up with a mermaid……………..

When I mix my colors, I try to mix them with the same amount of grey to get my base color and then add white and skinner blends. I am looking at the book Color Inspirations and am interested in play with the “mud” idea too. But for now I’m mixing grays with my color blends to get a muted result.

Then I make different canes using the mixes and Skinner blends. When I’m ready to work on a project, I have canes that blend and go together nicely.

Polymer Clay Mermaid Close Up

I used the coral Skinner blend in each of the canes. Sometimes as the main body of the cane and sometimes as accents. Her hat was leftover bits of mixed color and Skinner blend. It didn’t make a very big cane and I only got six slices off of it, but I only needed four to make her a smashing hat. I used the other two slices on a fish bracelet I’ll show you in the next post.

Watch my video Don’t Waste That Little Bit of Skinner Blend to learn how I use even scraps of Skinner blends to make usable canes.

I used the same method to build this mermaid as I do for my fish mosaic except I’m layering the canes instead of butting them up next to each other. It’s less labor intensive, but doesn’t create the same level of sophistication as the mosaic work. It just depends on what effect you are trying to achieve and how much time you want to spend.

To see how I do my mosaics, just sign up for my newsletter and watch a video for free.

I love these blue bottles and I’m quickly running out of them. Here’s one I did for a fund raiser at Highlands Art League. It made $135 for the league. I was delighted as there was some incredible art work auctioned off that evening from some very talented artists.

Polymer Clay Wine Bottle

Polymer Clay Wine Stoppers and Perfume Pens

Perfume Pens

A group of perfume pens ready to go to a shop. Below is a group of bottle stoppers. The same face cane with different hair and hats. I also sell them in my Etsy Shop.

Wine Stoppers

I get my stoppers and perfume pins from Boston Clayworks. They are both fun to do even without the face canes and they make great gifts.

The Case of The Flamingo and The Turquoise Bathroom

Polymer Clay Flamingo Top

I started mixing some truly wonderful greens to make some items for a shop in South Florida. I thought I would try some flamingo things. A bracelet might be good and naturally salt and pepper shakers.

I don’t know why, but flamingos have always sold well for me no matter what medium I was working in. I haven’t ever figured it out. They are so wonderfully tacky, you would think people would avoid them like a bad hair day.

But I have them in my 1970 big, turquoise bathroom along with a really funky painting of mermaids my father did in the sixties, not cute but with that sixties “look”. The flamingos make me laugh, and maybe that’s the answer, they make people happy.

When I say turquoise bathroom, I really mean turquoise. all the walls but one are turquoise, the whole shower, the floor, the toilet, and the sinks are turquoise, amazing. But there just isn’t anything to be done about it, so we decided to like it.

That leads me to what I did today instead of making fabulous canes out of my fabulous new colors. I painted the one wall and the ceiling of my funky turquoise bathroom. and what color did I paint it you ask? I am ashamed to admit….white. ugh…..Can you believe it. My husband and I don’t seems to agree and so we don’t decide. I believe painting the wall white was not deciding.

But now that it’s painted, I think just maybe, with all that turquoise, maybe white will help the mermaids from trying to leave the painting and run away from home.

The good news is that it is finished and tomorrow I can work on my clay projects.

Flamingo

This is a container I covered several years ago to hold cotton balls. Not a very pretty container, but as I said, the flamingo makes me laugh and it’s functional.

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