SOME GLASS IS BETTER TEMPERED THAN OTHERS...

I got the tempered glass, which I used to create the chilly looking sky for this piece, from old refrigerator shelves and learned that some glass is better tempered than others! Other materials used in this piece include quartz slag and resin tile bars on 'environmental' MDF with sanded and non-sanded grout. Size ~ 5.5" x 10" (click image to enlarge)

Because it is free, facet-nating, versatile and found in so many places I tend to frequent, I use a fair amount of Tempered Glass — or "TG" — in my work. I have mostly used auto glass salvaged from the auto wrecking yards and am familiar with it's wide range of peculiarities and challenges. It comes in a variety of shades of blue, gray, green and occasionally black. It is many different thicknesses and some brands shatter in different patterns than others. Front windshields tend to be tempered AND laminated, which is not generally conducive to mosaic-making, and it's best to avoid windows with metallic automatic defroster filaments embedded in them unless you plan on making them part of the overall "look" of the finished piece. I can tell you from first hand experience, nipping those filaments out of the glass bits is t-i-m-e consuming. Shower doors are not too hard to find and can give a nice effect depending on what type of surface treatment the glass was originally given as a matter of "privacy decor". A few times I've been lucky enough to end up with someone's fabulous old TG plate glass window: they are clear and nearly colorless, usually break cleanly, are all one thickness and almost always have the advantage of NOT being covered in dirt, grease or soap scum. 

Because they were there (being there is half the game) and they were colorless (and colorless is not always easy for me to come by) and they were free (my favorite kind) and I thought they would be fun (fun is the other half of the game), I scavenged a few shelves out abandoned refrigerators in the discarded appliance yard at the recycling center. Part of the fun of using tempered glass, if you are fortunate enough to be getting an entire intact piece (like I had just scored with those shelves), rather than scraping it up off the ground or out of the back seats of junked cars, is the act of breaking it. There is something delicious about setting everything up just the way you want it then ceremoniously and oh-so-gently tapping the side of the glass with a hammer and watching it start to crackle and then spread, with a subtly satisfying little sound, from one side to the other until what was once a solid piece of transparent material with a strong specular reflection develops into randomly shaped and sized gem-like bits of pure sparkling goodness.

However, this is NOT what happened with my refrigerator shelves. I tried tapping them gently, then harder, then even harder — then so hard that they flew across the studio floor and landed, intact, under the big work table. I tried wrapping the whole thing up in a towel, putting it on my concrete studio floor and whacking it with a sledge hammer — the hammer bounced! The harder I hit it with the hammer, the harder the hammer bounced. I was flummoxed, I was fascinated...and I was growing frustrated. I climbed on my table and dropped the shelves. Stil wrapped in the towel, they bounced. I climbed onto the counter (a whole foot higher) and threw the shelves. They bounced and skittered, although one lost a sharp sliver of the corner — and it did NOT resemble safety glass. I gave up at that point, set them aside and began working on the parts of the piece pictured above, PERCH ON A BIRCH, that did not involve TG. 

A couple of weeks passed (I am, by nature, slow, and it was a tedious piece!) and then I really needed clear, colorless TG in order to finish that little cardinal's snowy realm. So I got out the refrigerator shelves and considered: a.) trying to use my big, wet scary tile saw on them; b.) put them on the concrete garage floor and run over them with the car; and c.) call my husband. But first I wanted to have one more go. I was going to video the awesome bounce of this TG for posterity's sake — who would believe it? And then I was going to double check to make sure the shelves really were composed of TG and not some sort of modern miracle plasti-glass product. To get warmed up, I wrapped one of the shelves in a towel again, put it on the concrete studio floor, grabbed my sledge hammer, stabilized my cell phone, started the little video camera on it and swung half-heartedly. Suddenly, the glass gave way! I could hear and feel it, and sure enough when I opened the towel, it revealed that the fridge shelves had cracked into REALLY tiny, absolutely separate pieces. No clinging clumps or larger bits to be laid onto the mosaic in interesting patterns, just teensy, tiny, nearly microscopic little pieces fit only for tweezers and magnifying glasses.

As I started to put the bits into their containers, mentally counting the hours I would spend laying those bits down to create the mosaic, I realized that underneath the shelf had been an old wing nut (and what's a good story without a good wing nut?), about the same color gray as the concrete floor, but fairly good sized. I can only surmise that the wing nut, by keeping the shelf from being flat against the floor, provided the extra stress needed to finally fracture the glass. So I did the exact same thing with the other shelf, which for some reason broke into the most beautiful, long thin strands of glass, some up to 3 or 4 inches long and only an 1/8th - 1/4" wide — not necessarily my idea of "safety" glass, but it looks super cool and I'm going to have some fun with those! And the next time I see some lovely, clear, colorless refrigerator shelves gleaming in the sun at the dump, I'm going in for them!

FEELING FALL IN A BIG WAY...

12" x 36"; discarded dishware, salvaged tile bits and mirror scraps on leftover 1/4" Hardi-backer board with thinset and sanded grout. Prepped and sealed for outdoor use in temperatures above freezing. By R. F. De Lorme, ©2011 (click image to enlarge)

Fall is fabulous in Vermont, but all too short so I made a tall tree to celebrate the season. This piece stands 3' tall and the trunk makes use of the backs (with the manufacturers stamps) as well as the fronts, of various shades of white, cream and grey plates. The leaves are hand-cut rounds, to give the piece a sense of fullness and volume. There are also a few slivers and bits of mirror in the trunk to give it a bit of twinkle when the light catches it. This panel was created on hardi-backer board with thinset and specially sealed so that it can be displayed outdoors in temperatures above freezing — or in a shower stall — or as a kitchen backsplash.

WORK BY STUDIO FRESCA SELECTED FOR NATIONAL MOSAIC EXHIBITION

Me with A WILD NIGHT IN THE HUNDERTWASSER WOODS — We'll both be attending the National Mosaic Exhibition in Falmouth, MA on Cape Cod! I'm really pleased and honored to part of the exhibition, which features 55 works by mosaicists from across the US and Canada. The exhibition, held at Highfield Hall, opens on 20th July and closes on 4th September. The opening reception on Friday, 22cnd July features a presentation by the one and only Sonia King. Planned around the exhibit are some great workshops and fun tours offering a multitude of mosaic experiences! For a complete schedule of classes, workshops and activities, or for more info: NMECC and for a closer look at A WILD NIGHT IN THE HUNDERTWASSER WOODS

MOTHERS HAVE A LOT TO ANSWER FOR...

 



MOTHER LOVE - Mosaic jewlery piece created with love for my own wonderful mother. Recovered vintage china, scrap stained glass, italian millefiore, recycled metal findings, glass beads and faux pearls, silk wrapped wire cording on gold-plated pewter metal pendant blank with unsanded grout.

As a daughter, a mother and a "wanna be" grandmother, Mother's Day means something more to me than just another corporate created occasion to send a greeting card. Mother's Day has a somewhat convoluted history and owes it's inception to a number of women who, over several generations and in several geographic locations, originally established the concept of a "special day" for mothers everywhere to come together to variously remember their children, promote peace, work toward women's rights, fight family poverty, show appreciation and gratitude toward one's own mother and celebrate the timeless bonds of motherhood.

Although many of us may not recognize the original intentions of early Mother's Day concepts in today's commercialized version, we have only to look toward our own mothers — and mothers all around the world — to see that the real reasons for celebrating Mother's Day have not changed. Mothers provide constant care for their children, they work to support them, they fight to protect them, they delight in their accomplishments, they strive to provide a better world for them. And it is my experience and strong conviction that, by and large, they do this not only for their own children, but for all the children of the world and that one does not necessarily have ever to have given birth to provide the mothering the world so desperately needs.

The old adage has it that, "A Mother's Work is Never Done" and I believe this is true. We have such high ideals, expectations and hopes for what our mothers will provide. Once you are a mother, you are a mother forever. Given all they do for their individual children, and collectively for the world, mothers certainly do have a lot to answer for and for that reason I am delighted to take this opportunty to be grateful for, and appreciative of, all that my own mother, and mothers everywhere, have done for me. So in celebration of women yesterday, today and tomorrow, I wish everyone a Happy Mother's Day!

EVERY DAY IS EARTH DAY...

In recognition of Earth Day, a revisit of CHLOROPHYLIA, a piece created entirely from trash in celebration of chlorophyll — that magical, mystical material that works with sun, water and soil to make our planet green. Photosynthesis rocks my world!
CHLOROPHYLIA — Recycled slumped glass base with recovered dishware and vintage china with 22K gold trim; vintage recovered brooch; tempered glass salvaged from auto wrecking yard; fresh water pearls; iridescent glass paint; sanded and non-sanded grout.

My inspiration was the green vintage flower brooch on the corner, which was found in a bag of old jewelry. Using that as a beginning, I set out to make a piece that would convey the magic of chlorophyll as the life blood of green plants. The flowing tempered glass (from broken automobile windows) represents water flowing through the system and the dyed freshwater pearls (gathered from a broken necklace I found at a garage sale) are meant suggest chloroplasts, the cells responsible for photosynthesis. The vintage china with 22K gold trim is a reminder of the value of plants to keeping our environment "green".

BIDDING TO MAKE THE WORLD BETTER

The International Auction of Mosaic Art to Benefit Doctors Without borders / Médecins Sans Frontières is currently underway! View 127 amazing and diverse works of art created and donated by more than 100 mosaic artists from around the world. DWB/MSF is a truly remarkable organization and well deserving of our support so if you love art, this is a great opportunity to own an original piece and "do good". Click here to go directly to the auction site and behold all the wonderful works created in honor of the wonderful work that DWB/MSF does. Thank you and happy bidding!

A TREE FOR ALL SEASONS - my donation to the International Auction to Benefit Doctors Without Borders. For more details on the materials and meaning behind the design, please click here.

SEABA Art Hop in Burlington, Vermont on September 5th & 6th - The Little State of Vermont's BIG visual Arts Festival and Celebration!

An official Juror's Selection at the SEABA Art Hop Juried Show:

STEELING A WINTER'S NIGHT - From the Vermont Place Settings Series - Pique Assiette and Mixed Media Mosaic Landscape (direct method) created from salvaged boken ceramic pieces, hand cut dishware, scrap stained glass, rescued stainless steel flatware knife handle and soup spoon, discarded broken drinking glass with iridiscent coating; framed in salvaged aluminum channel and scrap wood molding



















CHLOROPHYLIA - A Green Piece (Shown here as a Work In Progress)
Pique Assiette, Tempered Glass and Mixed Media Mosaic Vessel (direct method, glass on glass) created from recycled slumped glass; tempered glass from car windshield salvaged at auto wrecking yard; reclaimed vintage dishware, rescued broken antique china with 22K gold trim; scrap stained glass; found vintage jewelry brooch; freshwater pearls; iridized glass paint; sanded and non-sanded grout

Working Backwards Works For Me

ON THE ROAD BACK TO KANSAS WITH A CUP HALF-FULL OF AHS... Mixed Media Mosaic and Pique Assiette Art Piece and Kitchen Organizer with stainless steel hooks for keys or towels, half-cup pocket for pens or cell phone, and magnetic message board. Created from recycled, reclaimed and salvaged dishware, flatware, ceramic spoon rest, old pie pan, scrap stained glass and hand-painted glass gems by craftystitchingcreations (turned into magnets).

I suppose I’m a bit backwards when it comes to my mosaic art. I start with the materials that I find and let them suggest a concept to create — rather than coming up with a concept then finding the materials to express it. This is my own process and the discipline I enforce on myself, to use at least 75% recycled, reclaimed and salvaged materials in every piece, is also my own. No one is making me do it this way, except myself, and while I see some rationale to my method (as well as some madness!) sometimes I do wonder why I do it the way I do.


















TWILIGHT IN TAHITI - 14" x 14" created from recycled and retooled aluminum dish, vintage Nippon Lustreware china, broken dishware, scrap stained glass, iridescent glass chips, iridescent glass seed beads, charcoal grout

I love art of all kinds and spend as much time as I can indulging myself in art in galleries, in magazines, in books, in shops and on-line — way too much time on-line! I see these brilliant, engaging and fascinating concepts, visions and viewpoints other artists manage to convey with a myriad of materials and methods, and I think to myself if only… I let myself buy a few new sheets of glass, a few boxes of new smalti, a few boxes of new tiles — and a few bits of lots of other new stuff that catches my fancy, then I, too, could start with a concept instead of just starting with stuff. Then I spend a few minutes thinking of all the ideas, concepts and visions I’ve had that I would like to translate and express in my art and I am overwhelmed. It would take me several lifetimes and many versions of each concept because as I consider all the options available with the endless choices of new materials, I realize I’m not sure where to start.

It probably stems from some unresolved childhood trauma, but I remember so many instances when I was given a brand new box of paints and a clean white canvas, or an unopened carton of pastels and a blank piece of paper, all of which thrilled me to no end, only to wind up sitting and staring at the empty paper and the endless array of color choices, unable to summon the one idea that was worthy of those marvelous new materials and that one piece of brand new paper. In the end, I always found something to fill the page with, but I was rarely satisfied with my efforts because I never seemed to be able to quite capture what I saw in my head.

With my mosaics, it’s totally different. I find the stuff first (or it finds me!) and it all seems to come together so much more easily because the stuff has a life of its own. It talks to me — sometimes right from the moment I see it I know what it wants to be turned into and sometimes not until I have collected other stuff do I realize that it is absolutely meant to be with stuff I already have. There are no blank papers here, no unused palettes of colors. This stuff has already been used and all it needs is a little creative recombination work to shine again.


When I work this way, there is no hesitation, no uncertainty — just a new adventure for me, and the stuff that comes my way. So for me, working backwards works!

There's No Tool Like an Old Tool

Work In Progress - FALLING TO PIECES IN VERMONT from the Vermont Place Settings Series - Pique Assiette mosaic from recycled dishware on "green" MDF board. Some of the tesserae (grass and tree leaves) have been cut, placed and glued. Still needs to be finished, grouted, sealed and framed.

I have a life long love affair with tools and technology. I grow truly excited by any and all contraptions — large and small, simple and complex, old and new, fancy or mundane — that promise to do something, (anything really!) that will make my work better, my day easier or my life simpler. And while I do find myself instantly attracted to tools and technology out of hope that they will deliver on the promises they make, honestly, I’m into them for the novelty, the curiosity and the wonder of it all.













A Few Good Tools - Cutting (rather than breaking) old dishes into tesserae requires (from right to left) gloves, goggles, tile nippers, my favorite leponittes and p-a-t-i-e-n-c-e. (Wearing shoes is always good, too!)

Whether it’s old tools at garage sales and flea markets that perform some function no longer a priority in today’s society, or old technology discovered in the back rooms of thrift stores and found discarded at the dumps because it has been replaced by something a million times faster, or the very newest, latest and hottest techno-tool trends, I want it — or at least the chance to play with it.

I find the tools and technology beautiful to behold, fascinating to contemplate and wondrous to feel in my hands. I not only want to own them all, I want to use them all; try them out, stretch their boundaries, take them apart and see how they work — then leave my husband to put the peices back together again... I derive hours of entertainment and frustration from this preoccupation because the reality is, that as fascinating as new technology is, I really do quite well with my work, and usually in my life, with what I already have — a few very simple tools that work remarkably well and some moderately current technology that, as it tends to find some balance point between causing me utter frustration and providing me with complete bliss, I continue to use rather than replace.

What I have always known about my work, regardless of the latest techno trends, is that my most useful tools are my hands. Simple, (and rather small in my case!), multi-jointed, five-fingered hands with clever little opposable thumbs and calluses tough enough to stop a leponitte blade. It’s true my hands are growing ever so slightly clumsier as I age, and lately I have noticed they are occasionally sore in the mornings after I’ve spent the previous day cutting up tiles and tesserae. However, they are the most amazing and fascinating piece of technology I have access to, as well as my most valued, most favored and most often used tool — and one look at them will prove it!


WORK IN PROGRESS - (detail) FALLING TO PIECES IN VERMONT from the Vermont Place Settings Series

Despite the fact that I have several pair of work gloves, various nippers, tweezers, probes, sponges, scrapers, etc. , and that I do actually understand all the safety ramifications, when it comes to getting my work just the way I want it, I seem to need to feel my way. So, I strip off my gloves, set aside the nippers, tweezers, probes and files, drop the sponges and dig right in with bare hands and naked fingers. This is, of course, why my hands look like they’ve been through several medieval wars. They are covered in scars, often full of glass chips (it’s hard to feel them with all those calluses) and the nail beds are perpetually stained by whatever color of grout I used on my last project. The point is, I have the tools, the technology and (presumably) the intelligence to use them safely, but I just don’t. I like the feel of my fingers on my art work and to me it's just not my art without that part.

Breaking Points & Exploding Plates

Everything (and, everyone!) has a breaking point. As a mosaicist who cuts my own tiles and tesserae, I am constantly reminded of this. Sometimes I reach MY breaking point before I locate the best "breaking point" of the materials I am trying to cut.



RHAPSODEEP IN BLUE from the Fish Hook Series - showing various tesserae made from dishware and mirror, some of which was broken and some which was hand cut.

For tiles and tesserae, the "breaking point" can refer to either the pressure required to cut, nip or break the material OR to the exact point on the material (such as the edge of a plate or center of a tile) where, when the correct pressure is applied, the material breaks along the lines the cutter intends it
to. With these types of materials, a silly little millimeter or fraction of a ppsi or even a flick of the wrist, can make all the difference.

There are times when cuts just go well. You get the feel for the material, you find the right rhythm, you know exactly where the sweet spots are and how much pressure they need, and maybe you have newly sharpened wheels on your Leponitt (a cutting tool, somewhat similar to scissors, but which uses two opposing razor sharp wheels instead of blades), or perhaps you just get plain lucky and it all feels g-r-e-a-t.


The ever useful Leponitt!

The more cutting I do, the better able I am to evaluate materials that come my way so that while it is always something of an experimentation with those first few cuts on newly acquired materials, I usually have some feel for what to expect from past experience with all the different substances I have used. However, the fact that I use old, recycled, salvaged and damaged materials for most of my work, provides an added dimension to the "breaking point" game.

Like the exploding plate I encountered last week. It didn't break, crack, chip or crumble when I applied my Leponitt. It EXPLODED. Yes, really exploded! The minute I put the Leponitt wheels to it, this lovely little black saucer I found at the dump exploded (with a sudden, soft sigh) into thousands of micro-sized shards that flew several feet into the air and then cascaded throughout the studio like sharp bits of ash. I've made plenty of bad cuts, but I have never actually exploded anything before — which leaves me wondering what that saucer was made of and what had happened in its life for it to have that kind of "breaking point"!

PURPLE PASSION FISH from the Fish Hook Series - showing tesserae of stained glass, tile and dishware that was all hand cut (not broken)

The problems inherent in trying to cut, nip, break or grind, old, weathered, chipped, cracked and broken materials into exact tesserae, identically proportioned tiles and accurate shapes, has, along with the fact that I recently celebrated a "milestone" birthday, gotten me to thinking. And thinking too much can be hazardous to someone brandishing a newly sharpened pair of Lepponittes...

I admit that the “used” nature of these recycled resources often makes them quite difficult to work with because no matter how carefully I make my cuts, the salvaged materials have a tendency to break along old stress points, crumble in weathered portions and shatter along invisible (to me, anyway) time-worn fracture lines that defy my best intentions. But, while this is sometimes frustrating (and it certainly makes the process more time consuming) it does make every cut, score, nip and snap an adventure into the unknown -- sometimes to the point that where I started out thinking I was going with a creation is not where I end up due to the unpredictable nature of "vintage" materials.

BAHAMA BLUSH from the Fish Hook Series - Tesserae hand cut from vintage china, dishware vitreous glass and drinking glasses.

As much as I might be loathe to admit it, there are certain parallels here to my own life as I notice my body, and those of family and friends, begin to weather and age. The key, I have decided, is to adapt and enjoy the places that I end up, even if they are not what I thought I had in mind when I started this journey. After all, I am a creation in the making and the challenge of knowing how to make the best of those critical "breaking points" and still enjoy the "sweet spots", is part of the art of living — and giving old materials new life is infinitely rewarding.



RUBY TWO FINS from the Fish Hook Series - tesserae hand cut from china, fiesta ware and vitreous glass tile.

Scrounging Stolen Plates is an Old Art Form

FLAMBOYANT FLAMINGOS is created from broken dishware and mug, salvaged stainless steel spoon, venetian glass tile and discarded shards of mirror.

Pique Assiette just sounds so very...well, French!! And it is a term taken from the French to describe a category of mosaic art work created using tiles, tesserae, and shards from broken dishware, china, vases and pottery.

Like so many French words (even those indicating common root vegetables and the fungi that grow on them), Pique Assiette sounded, to my non-francophonic ears anyway — so… tres elegant, tres chic, tres magnifique! I first heard the term at a gallery opening when it was uttered, ecstatically, by the gallery owner rhapsodizing about about what she considered a particularly spectacular piece of work.

When I actually got a good look at the work of art in question, a large, round mirror surrounded by a huge, thick, bordering frame composed of a myriad of glowing bits of pottery, glass, tile and multi-colored dish ware, I could not help but utter several enthusiastic stanzas of "ooh la la". It was a fitting accolade to that artwork in particular, and to Pique Assiette in general.

The colors were vivid, the design bold, yet intricate and flowing free form around the center mirror so that it seemed to flow right off the edge of the frame and fill the gallery. The overall impression was astounding. The piece glowed like antique oriental carpets. It contained all the intricacies of an East Indian weaving. It boasted the same thick texture and cobbled appearance of an ancient stone wall. And, the piece was s-o-l-i-d, suggesting that it, too, could last several centuries, as did the famous mosaics of Rome, Greece and Turkey.

AFFAIRE D'COUER is made from broken plates, dishware, salvaged buttons and discarded stainless steel flatware.

I hung around, admiring the piece for half an hour, all the while locating deep within the design, a series of dish patterns familiar to me from my childhood. There were bits of Corelle Ware by Corning, bits of Homer Laughlin, bits of transfer ware and blue willow china, bits of fiesta ware, bits of stone ware and even bits of the same Spode china pattern my grandmother used for fancy table nights! I was intrigued. I was enamored. I was smitten. I began to scrounge plates!

As delighted as I was with my newly acquired love of "fancy" French Pique Assiette, I was amused (as are those who know me well) to learn that, loosely translated from the French, the term Pique Assiette actually means "stolen plate" or "scrounge"! C'est la vie... So Pique Assiette may not translate as fancy or elegant, but the term does fit me particularly well. I am passionate about recycling. I delight in discovering discards and turning them into art. I live to dig in the dump, scavenge among the salvage yards, traipse through the thrift stores and garner goodies at garage sales — all in search of those elusive treasures that, with a little appreciation, still have life and beauty to offer.

Pique Assiette is considered a true "folk" art in that has been available to the "common people" for hundreds of years and examples of Pique Assiette, both ancient and modern, can be found in museums, antique stores and people's homes around the world. As long as there has been pottery, broken dishes have been readily available. As long as there have been people, they have created, decorated and adorned themselves, their possessions and the world around them.

Pique Assiette, the mosaic art of the people, is definitely ooh la la!