Etching

Made this sample of photo etching this week. It's a fairly simple process with a lot of possibilities. I think i'll use this process again.  

Assembling the Pieces

I need to assemble the pieces to a lot more than just this project right now... I have about half of these soldered. I initially tried soldering them with copper solder. I learned that copper solder isn't very strong... And had to rodo them with silver solder. 

Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming...

Dyes

For a production project I chose to use a hydraulic dye press to create the same shape repeatedly for a series of ear cuffs. I did this process a few weeks ago and have found it to be an effective way to create dimension in an otherwise flat piece of metal. The pieces were then all cut to size. Over all stamping the pieces out took me about 10 hours, but I definitely think I would become quicker the more often I used this process.

Value

Allow me to procrastinate a midterm paper a little longer by blogging. The paper I'm supposed to be writing is dealing with the jewelry works of Salvador Dali. Dali often challenged the value of precious materials with thoughtful designs and precise craftsmanship. At first, I didn't understand how he was protesting societies value of precious metals and stones because he uses all precious materials. If he was trying to challenge value why wouldn't he work with materials that are less desirable? What makes a river rock or a scrap of steal any less impactful if the designs are well developed? Then, I realized that so often commercial jewelry uses the value of materials and the ignorance of society as a crutch. Many people (not all, but many) are like fish, they are attracted to shiny and sparkly things. A ring could have absolutely no design at all, but people are drawn to the sparkly stones and shiny metals. Maybe they're not even drawn to the stones themselves, but the "value" and social status that is associated with them. Often times, commercial jewelry lacks design.  Ultimately, Dali's greatest protest is thoughtfully designing and then still choosing to work in gold. The value of the jewelry is not in the rarity of stones or the purity of the metals but in the meaningful designs, carefully selected details, and the attention to craftsmanship.

Ironically, I feel like writing this blogged actually helped me organize my thoughts for my midterm, so maybe I'm not procrastinating after all.