Bugger!

Well that stuffed the post a day but you can’t mitigate for illness eh? Back in harness and more posting to follow

Design Inspiration and Where to Find it

I can’t be the only one whose design world varies between arid and saturated but is never temperate?  When I do get inspired it tends to be by the natural world: the sea, the sky, trees… Words inspire me greatly but I’m never quite sure how to put my ideas into practice.  In fact, I read a passage this morning that really pushed my artistic buttons, but I’m not sure how I will interpret it in jewellery.  Sadly my lampworking skills have along way to go before I can even think of designing – it’s all I can do to produce a good looking bead with the requisite puckers!  Here’s the passage, it’s from The Glassblower of Murano by Marina Fiorato.  See what you can make of it:

She was a revelation.

Blonde hair like filaments of gold.  Green eyes like leaves in spring rain.  And the countenance of a goddess.  She was a vision in blue – the silks of her wedding dress seemed to have a hundred hues in the morning light and the dappled reflections of the canal.

I’m not sure what it is about the passage that speaks to me but I imagine it’s the silks of her wedding dress seemed to have a hundred hues in the morning light and the dappled reflections of the canal.

I would be fascinated to know if the passage inspires you or just leaves you cold.  If it leaves you cold, where do you get most of your inspiration from?

On thinking about it, I find lots of inspiration in my memories.  The necklace in this picture my memories are a great source of inspiration, as in this necklace.

A Tiny Patch of Blue

This piece is, perhaps, the closest to my heart.  It goes under the name of A Tiny Patch of Blue and the idea for it came from something I remember my mother telling me when I was very young. In those days the school summer holidays went on for seven long weeks and I was also bored by the end of the third week. And it always rained.  On one such day mum took me to the window and pointed out a couple of patches of blue sky, and she told me that, if there was enough blue in the sky to make a pair of trousers for a sailor, we could be sure that the sun would come out very soon.  Whilst I was cheered by this statement I can remember being very worried because there was no specification as to what size of trousers; I mean, were we talking toy, schoolboy, or adult? I certainly couldn’t see enough blue sky to make an adult pair of trousers…

For those bead makers amongst you, the stormy beads were from Rob Johnson’s studio in the Cambridge Fens.

Major Sources of Design Inspiration

I think I should point out before continuing that, although my personal interest is in silver and glass beads, the principles of design apply to whatever art or craft you are involved in.

The World around Us

I think it’s safe to say that what we see around us is the major source of design inspiration.  It’s for this reason that any art or design text book will advise you to keep a sketch book.  Now, I don’t know about you but I can’t draw too well and my lack of drawing skills means that I have started oodles of sketchbooks that are abandoned within weeks, if not days.

Nowadays, however, with digital cameras all around – even in your mobile phone – it’s easy to take your inspiration home with you and file it as you please.  What I would say though is that this doesn’t eliminate the need for a notebook; note down textures as well as what sprang to mind when you first saw the object you photographed.

The Materials We Work With

How you interpret your design will be influenced by the materials you use in your particular craft.  For instance, texture can be shown easily in, say, clay; if you’re into felting though, creating strong textures might not be so easy.  I can’t say for sure if this is true because my experience of felt making is limited to say the least – but you get the picture J

Historical Art Movements

Saturn Earrings by Di Sandland

I was astounded when reviewing a book on Art Deco Jewellery recently to find that many of my jewellery designs fit into Art Deco Design very well.  I was never knowingly influenced by the movement, in fact, I think I prefer Art Nouveau.  However, I do have a great attraction to the styles that were around between the wars – so 1918 to 1939 – and Art Deco style falls into this time frame. Sadly, the beautiful bracelet shown below is from the book – tis not mine.  The earrings are mine though, and they went on to inspire further designs, which will be available on the website very soon.  If you do go to my website, please take into account the fact that it is in serious need of updating (which is scheduled for this weekend).

Art Deco Bracelet

Signs and Symbols

Now, I love a bit of symbolism but as I’ve been reading the tarot for quite a few years, that’s hardly surprising! We are surrounded by signs and symbols and they are brilliant for kicking off designs when your design button has gone on holiday.  I have Rowena and Rupert Shepherd’s 1000 Symbols: what shapes mean in art and myth on my design bookshelf, which is an excellent resource, especially if you have been asked to create something symbolic as a commission. This book has, amongst others, chapters dealing with Heaven and Earth, Mythical Beasts, and Flowers, Plants and Trees.

Concepts

Is there a message you want to get across?  Do you feel passionately about something?  As an artist, whatever art form you work in, you have the opportunity to express your feelings.  I suppose that my necklace above could be classed as expressing a concept too. I find that museums are superb for learning about concept in art – particularly historic art.

Have you ever been to The British Museum? If not, well, you should!  Currently for instance there is an exhibition about Afghanistan as Crossroads of the Ancient World. Of course, not everybody can get there and if that is the case for you, Google them and try to get hold of catalogues of exhibitions.  Most towns also have a local museum; these exhibits would be particularly relevant to you – and items with a local flavour often sell well too.

I hope I’ve given you food for thought – it would be great to hear your views and experiences.  If you would like to post an article dealing with design on my blog do let me know; I’m happy to play host to guest bloggers and I will, of course, give you full credit for your work.

Midweek Memoirs

Whitechapel - home of Jack the Ripper et moi

Along with most native East Enders, I’m proud of my cockney heritage. But, I’m so glad that I didn’t have to grow up there; we would probably have been repatriated to a concrete and glass edifice with piss in the lifts and nowhere to hang the washing. By joining with a million or so native Londoners, we left behind the bomb sites, the slums, and the bed bugs for a better life in the country. We were part of the slum clearance programme.

What the planners forgot to take into account was the psychological effect of tearing us from our families and friends, and then plonking us down in a new environment where, let’s not beat about the bush here, we were not wanted.

I have no quarrel with the reasoning behind the mass forced exodus; obviously it was good to get out of the claustrophobic dampness of Pelham Buildings and as far away as possible from the meths drinkers who trailed along behind my mother and me on our daily walks in Victoria Park. And I have never seen another bedbug to this day. But the dream of a happier, more gracious way of life that the planners sold us lacked the grubby intimacies of our inner city life.

The Rural East End!

There were no corner shops or local “picture palaces,‟ no dance halls, and no pub on the corner. Neither was there any extended social network, those safety nets made up of family and friends and based upon decades of accumulated trust. We were truly enamoured with our shiny new homes and gardens but we missed the congested, commercial mish-mash of our inner city lives. Without mum or auntie a couple of doors away, young mothers brought up children in fearful ignorance; minor ailments that, in the past, would have been dealt with by a wise word from granny or aunty down the road now became major problems requiring visits to the doctor’s surgery. It seemed worse for the women, who were left at home to get pregnant and bring up the children while the fathers went to their work in the factories.

The men in our new community all worked for Vauxhall Motors, the company that had facilitated our relocation. Consequently, these men already had a stable network of associates, if not friends.

The key to a new life: Vauxhall's Dunstable Plant

True, they lacked a pub to get drunk in when work was over, but the cynic in me says that probably saved more than a few women from taking a good beating. Only on a Friday night, mind. In the majority of cases, the women were left isolated with no way to start building the social networks that keep the majority of us sane. And, certainly in our case, the original villagers were not well disposed towards the rough London incomers. It was against this, as yet unrecognised, background of social isolation that my parents became so excited about men playing cricket on the bloody village green.

We watched the cricket players from the back of the removal truck.

rural idyll?

“Oooh, look Jack, they’re playing cricket on the green!” We looked to where my mother was pointing and saw the local cricket team, dressed in full whites, moving around the village green in silent slow motion. The sound of leather on willow, a light breeze ruffling the leaves on the trees, and sun reflecting from the spotless whites of courteous young men. Dainty cucumber sandwiches for afternoon tea, crooked little fingers and bone china tea cups…”

What piffle.

Dad had bunged the driver a few quid to let us travel in the back of the van with our furniture; we couldn’t afford the train fare from London to Luton. There was certainly plenty of room as our few sticks of furniture took up very little space. My place was on the rolled up carpet underlay, mum thought it would be comfortable for me and would give me somewhere to sleep. I didn’t sleep though; concentrating on not being sick, I sat and watched as we travelled through small country towns and villages, the breeze blustering onto my face through the half-open truck door.

To help with the travel sickness mum had given me a barley sugar twist to suck. I’ve always hated barley sugar, but this twist was particularly vile, thanks to the thick coat of carpet underlay that it wore. If I choose to think about it, something I don’t do very often, I can still see those filaments of underlay stuck to my barley sugar and waving in the breeze; it’s a vision that makes me feel distinctly nauseous. In time honoured fashion, my mother scrubbed at my face with a spit-moistened hankie, each successive scrub becoming rougher. It would have been easier to throw the barley sugar away but she wouldn’t let me because, she said, it would stop me from being sick.  Right… I continued to hold it with sticky fingers. It became almost welded in place as more debris from the truck floor and the open door blew on to it. I was very close to vomiting when we pulled up outside a large, sulphur-yellow terraced house.

The Estate

Apparently we were home…