Workshop With Julie Picarello

Recently, I had the opportunity to take a workshop from Julie Picarello. Julie is an outstanding presenter, and one of the foremost polymer artists using the Mokume Gane technique. Mokume Gane is a traditional Japanese method for laminating various colors of metals together and manipulated them to create patterns that resemble wood patterns. Polymer clay lends itself perfectly to creating patterns from layers of oven-baked clay, manipulating them, and removing slices. Julie has developed a couple of new approaches to this technique, and I really enjoyed learning about the new processes. Since Julie is currently teaching these new techniques, I can't go into detail about how the effects are accomplished. However, I'll share images of some of the pieces I've made. I'm really enjoying using these new ideas. If you get a chance to take a workshop with Julie, I encourage you to do so.

This first photo shows several jewelry pieces all derived from the same prepared sheet. This pattern is from the technique Julie is calling "Faded Tapestry." The effect really does make the pieces look older, and the designs appear softer and more muted.

In this next image, I put 2 pieces from the same faded tapestry sheet. The piece on the left has a matte finish. The surface was lightly hand burnished, but there is no other additional material on the surface.The piece on the right was covered with Magic Gloss resin. As you can see, the matte piece looks much more muted, while the piece to the right shows more color density, depth, and lots of shine. In my next post, I'll share some pieces from one of Julie's other new techniques, adding mesh with mokume gane.