Bonnie Bishoff Workshop

I've just spent 2 days on Zoom with Bonnie Bishoff at a workshop she taught through the Kansas City Polymer Clay Guild (KCPCG). It was an excellent workshop. Bonnie is very creative and her demonstrations and explanations were clear and easy to follow. She spent the first day teaching us how she does marquetry - also known as inlay. She is a wizard with the Exacto knife and creates very intricate pieces. On the second day, she helped participants learn how to join their pieces into jewelry in which the individual sections moved freely against each other. This created necklaces what were fluid and comfortable. I enjoyed the class, and really appreciate that KCPCG arranges these excellent learning opportunities via Zoom. Below are some other pieces I made.

Marquetry Sets

I really do like the way marquetry looks in polymer, and I like creating it even more! Here are some pendant and earring sets I made for the Westerly Gallery.  I like the more delicate look of these pieces.
Sometimes, as in the blue/purple set to the left, I use a Skinner blend for the background, and cut shapes from canes or sheets with complimentary colors.

This set has a feathered background, so the inlay pieces are less patterned than in the set above.

The background on the green and brown set is a striped Ikat.

Maquetry with Polymer

These earrings are made using the more detailed and refined techniques that Bonnie Bishoff shared at the workshop.  In addition to using the marquetry approach, I also decided to go big!  I realize these earrings are not huge by some standards, but they are the largest I've ever made, and it was fun to push my own self-imposed boundaries.

Relatively Simple Inlay

As you may recall, back in October I had the opportunity to learn a detailed and precise method of marquetry from Bonnie Bishoff.  I didn't get back to this art form for a while, until January approached.  As one of the two featured artists for the January show at the Westerly Gallery, I decided it would be fun to develop some new pieces for the show.  I have several different pieces to share with you.  In this post, I'm just going to show some pendants with what I have always called polymer "inlay."

These pieces are not an intricate, nor as tricky, as the finer marquetry that Bonnie taught us.  I do love the look of these pieces, and had fun cutting and replacing.  I used some of the Accent colors from Premo! for the background, and a skinner blend from purple to coral for the inlaid shapes. Next time, I'll bring you more detailed pieces using some finer marquetry techniques.

Bonnie Bishoff - Another Great Class!

It seems I've been taking a lot of one and two-day classes over the past few months, and September was no exception. I am so pleased that the New England Polymer Artist Guild hosted Bonnie Bishoff a couple of weeks ago.  Bonnie shared with us her method of doing marquetry, also known as inlay. The designs and patterns she creates are lovely, and the way she shares colors amongst the pieces gives her finished necklaces a real harmony.  In addition, she has developed some incredible methods for linking polymer pieces together.  Her necklaces have form, grace, and movement.  All the participants just soaked up as much as we could, then worked at applying her many ideas and tips to a piece of our own.



The photos here show the pieces I developed, the necklace in "raw" form, and a close-up of a portion of the necklace.