The newest piece, and how it all transpired

The following sequence of images will bring you on a tour through the making of my newest neckpiece, entitled "REPETITION / CHANGE." The beauty shots of the piece will be posted on my website in the coming day or two. Hope you enjoy.


The object of my affection: Angering classic cars buffs the world over, I prepare to gut an early 20th-century automobile radiator gauge


The double-sided glass bezels are hard to resist


The thermometer, lodged firmly in place by century-old ossified rubber


Intact - phew - and put aside to be used some other day


As it's quite a heavy hunk of metal, I give it some consideration, trying to see what it can live without


Testing out the new cordless Sawz-All (Pocket Review: It rocks)


Sawn, and


on to the interior...


Sawing out needless weight


Tough work.

Too tough. No worries, panic averted as I realize the piece will be held together with screws on both sides, remember?

Nut, shaped and tightened, so I can hang an element from below


Miles & Audrey on the studio steps, making sure dad's doing it right


Beautiful Victorian key, ready to be sacrificed for Art


Keys soldered square brass wire


Balling up some copper wire

Copper wires run through the brass and

forged


then folded down into hooks, small brass wire being threaded through


finishing the wire outer structure


and the main housing ready to be occupied.


Money well-spent in Port Gamble, Washington


Beheading the subject - a steel-point engraving from 1845


Mid-bling: tiny silver balls dropped into the starfish legs, to be finished with a tiny opal in the mouth


Starfish set, and the resin being colored

Beautiful little seed 'cups' scavenged in Hall's Gap, Victoria


Filled with pearls


and placed.


As is often the case when trying to seal chambers full of resin, airbibbles appear the next day after it semi-sets. Time to inject resin into the bubbles. Luckily there is a tiny gap between the glass crystal and the metal, or I'd have been out of luck.


Had to make a custom hypodermic out of an insulin syringe and some stainless tubing (the original syringe was too tiny to suck up the viscous resin)


Fixed.


Couldn't resist adding some sailor's touches...





The copper elements of a swivel-connection to go between the pendant and the cord


The assembly riveted to the key and patinated



Choosing lovely little keys to hang the piece from


Riveting key to cord


A lovely old wooden dresser knob to hang underneath


Tapping a thread into the knob


Voiding the warranty on said knob


Drilled out


Sanded and painted.


A miscast glass pebble becomes the best of the bunch for me


The pebble ground down to fit


A beautiful symbol from a 16th-century book to be refracted behind the glass pebble


The chamber gets a resin assembly


The piece is signed (KL •9•), waxed, and readied for


photographing.