Home Made Plastic
I am interested in trying out this technique and seeing if I can make beads from the bio plastic. I have been experimenting recently with my papier mache beads using different papers and fabrics so they are not just made from paper. This just an idea so far but has potential. I have been wrapping and melting Tyvek
to almost oblivion with a heat gun. If you try this please be sure to
do it outside and do not breathe in the fumes. I read on someones blog
that it was non toxic but I still get a headache if I do not work
outside so take care. It may well be that I am over sensitive. I love the shifts of light to be found in iridescent tissue and in certain combinations of paints, mediums and colours such as liquitex interference colours and daler-rowney acrylic mediums They help to move colours into another dimension where the imagination has more room to roam and discover.
With this in mind, I tried cutting strips of the iridescent tissue, which I have used for years when making papier-mache jewellery by simply gluing it to the surfaces I'm working on and combining it with silver, gold leaf and water-colour to play about with the effects. Now I am wrapping it around the melted Tyvek with a heat gun. The results are beautiful and convey just what I wanted which is a bead that reminds me of the the chrysalis stage of butterflies and/or of an imagined strange and magical seed from the ocean that could be found when beach-combing at a full moon - perhaps! These images come from writing poetry and stories so I like to follow them through into jewellery that can be seen as a talisman of transformation. Here are a few that I have made.
I have started making my own silver earring hooks as the off the shelf ones simply will not look right on these beads. They need a hook which is in sympathy with them.
