Lets try this again. Short and not fancy version

I am now in LA after a 2 hour drive

I am in Washington Heights at a place I found on AirBnB - try it you will like it

It is cool and peaceful here and it was 100F+ when I left Murrieta

Tomorrow at 9am I start day one of a two day workshop at Adams Forge.

I am going to post this and then have a nice scotch and read a book

Done. More tomorrow

When I was at Davide Bigazzi's studio, Diane did the Ginkgo Cuff. After we got back, I helped Diane start the Dogwood flowers, which I had done and she got me started on the Ginkgo's.  Today I finished it.  

Along the ways I started to look at other Ginkgo leaves - actual and those done in metal and i was not happy how mine were looking so I took a week's break having only chased three of them so far.  When I was done with my investigation, I redid my original three leaves and then finished up the remaining 6 leaves and the branch/stems.   

Today I took the cuff out of the pitch and removed the extra silver. Then it was time to file and sand the edges. After that I did three good polishes thinking that I would keep the area around the leaves a bright shiny silver along with the high points of the leaves and the patina would be in the shadows and texture I had done around the leaves and within the grooves of the leaves. 

After all the polishing I then bent the cuff into shape, did a final cleaning to remove any remaining polishing compound and then mixed up the patina.  

After the initial dunk and darkening in the patina I took pumice to the silver and as I did that, the "background" had a nice matt pewter look to it which I found interesting but I was still leaning towards that bright silver look.  I rinsed off the pumice and went back to the patina again and suddenly I got this amazing gold color in the background; pale browns, blues and raspberries in the textured areas next to the leaves and darker gold/browns in the grooves of the leaves.  I knew I had to stop then and there. 

I then rinsed and took my steel wool and started to knock back the patina on the high points of the leaves, stems and branch leaving the color in the grooves and around the leaves.  It is a stunner!

Give me a few days to admire it but this one may be up for sale. 

As usual, below are some process pictures. Enjoy. 

Many people have told me that they like reading this blog because I show lots of process pictures thus allowing them to see what ever it is, being made. 

But what about actually documenting the work??

DaVinci kept a note book but that was more of an idea book and many of us have those. 
The documentation of antiques that were originally bought, repaired, sold again and again is called provenance.
And art historians will try to document a piece of art - a painting perhaps, by building a file on who the artist is, where the painting was done, the subject matter, and the materials: canvas, paints, frame, etc. 

BUT DO YOU:

• Take not only process pictures but a final picture; 
  
• Write down the materials used; 
  
• Keep design drawings; 
  
• Track how much time it took to create and to finish the piece; 
  
• And what all of that cost?; 
  
• What it was sold for; 
  
• And most importantly who you sold it too? 
  

I know many of us will never have our work in museums or have it appear on the Antiques Road Show as a great piece of art; but what if it did... possibly some time later a descendant might appear with your documentation and then finally all your work would be revealed and unknown items identified around the world as lost works of art!

Here is what I do.
I have a project sheet that I can print out and fill in with: 

• Start and End Date; 
  
• Title of Piece; 
  
• Materials Used; 
  
• Task List with task name, start/stop times; 
  
• A place for notes. 
  
• I then have places to add up costs - material and labor (which is time multiplied by the hourly rate) plus overhead
  
• Places to calculate the wholesale and retail prices base upon the total cost.  
  

I then staple a few pictures to the project sheet which I then slip into a glassine sleeve which is put into a notebook and when it sells I add a copy of the invoice to the sleeve.  

I also keep all of my process pictures on an external HD with each project having a folder named Year-Month-Title. This is so IF I need to refer back to any pictures i can easily find them. 

I now have a complete set of documentation.

I shall confess that in the beginning I only took pictures, then I started the project sheet, I then added the pictures and recently I have added the costing bit and attaching the invoice. Some pieces I have made and sold I have no record of at all but hopefully in the future, since my makers mark is on it, it will appear on ARS and be noticed as a lost piece of art that has been found. 

Last weekend I was in Denver for the opening of the 1st International Chasing & Repousse Exhibition. 
It was an amazing trip. 
I traveled with Lisa Kim of Lisa Kim Fine Jewelry  Lisa also has work in the show and since we have become friends, having met in some Chasing & Repousse workshop, we decided that a way to save some money was to split the car and hotel expense.  

At the exhibition we met many of the other artists in the show as well as Sudee (Outnumbered Gallery owner), Fabrizio Acquafresca (judge) and Nancy Meli Walker (judge).  


The gallery had 60 pieces on display form 29 artists.   I am not going to post any of those pictures (sorry) as I don't want to violate any of the other artists copyright.   Instead I am posting some links to THEIR website so you can see much more of their work. I am posting (below) those I have been able to locate and this is not a reflection of my favorite pieces or artists.

And then while I was there, the San Diego County Fair posted the judging results and I took FIRST PLACE in the Chasing & Repousse category of the Jewelry competition!

Fabrizio Acquafresca (judge) 
Nancy Meli Walker (judge)

Liza Nechamkin Glasser
Susan Amador
Nancy Megan Corwin
Kathleen Krucoff
Logan Woodle
Henry Spencer
Lisa Kim 

Sage Reynolds
Linda Priest
Avery Lucas