The other thing I can do is give them work to auction off. So if you are looking to expand your art collection while helping this museum mount its valuable programming, I encourage you to have a look at their auctions.

The reception takes place September 18th from 5 to 7pm with a gallery talk by Natalie and myself at 5:15. The show is up through October 16th. It was also featured in Glasstire’s Top Five Art Events in Texas this week. We hope to see you there!

The workshop is Stitch and Dip. We will create volumetric forms by sewing together very thin copper sheet and stabilizing it by applying liquid enamel. I never know exactly what people are going to do with this technique and the results always open my mind to more possibilities.

My conference presentation is going to be a standard artist’s talk followed by a quick demo of the workshop techniques. There are day passes if people cannot make it to the whole weekend, and many other fun side activities planned (Trivia Night!).

The exhibition explored health, healing, and spirituality, anchored by Valley and Shadow, a twelve-panel series by the late Martha Banyas reflecting on her journey with cancer. The accompanying enamel quilt was created by artists worldwide, many of whom were inspired by Martha and honored their connection to her through their work.​

All proceeds support the creation of the new Fine Metals Studio at Overton Park, expanding opportunities for artists and students. By purchasing a tile, you help shape the future of the Metal Museum.

Here's how it will work: each Sunday, any unsold tiles will be marked down. The sale ends on August 3, or until all tiles are sold. Please remember that every tile is unique, and once it’s gone, it’s gone.

Tile Pricing Schedule:

🗓️ Week 1: July 7 – July 13 — $500 per tile

🗓️ Week 2: July 14 – July 20 — $250 per tile

🗓️ Week 3: July 21 – July 27 — $100 per tile

🗓️ Week 4: July 28 – August 3 — $50 per tile

This is your chance to own “Rocks Don’t Die” or any of the other beautiful tiles by artists such as Harlan Butt, Jan Harrell, Jeanie Pratt, Judy Stone, and the list goes on and on.

You can read more about Rocks Don’t Die here.

Snapshots of Japan.

This summer I have two such opportunities, and I invite you to consider coming along for the ride…

June 22 - 28 at Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts

Join me for a week of play in the foothills of the Smokey Mountains this summer as I lead the Mad Scientist's Enameling Studio workshop at Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts! In this workshop, students will learn to create dimensional forms in sewn copper foil. Using liquid white enamel as a base, they will experiment with additives to achieve a variety of colors, textures, and finishes: ceramic stains will be employed for color effects; the addition of CMC will allow for dimensional extrusions to create enamel “Puffy Paint”; Silver nitrate fired with raku will generate metallic effects; and MAP gas post-firing coloration will create selective surface enhancement. The emphasis is on creative play and exploration. No prior enameling experience required.

July 15 - 17 Colorado Metalsmithing Associate Pre-Conference Workshop in Denver

Stitch and dip! Using paper pattern-making techniques and cold connections, students will construct volumetric forms from copper foil. We will then add liquid enamel that may be used to both strengthen and decorate. The immediacy of this technique provides a means of quick, dimensional construction for those who may not have access to forming tools.

The Arrowmont workshop is longer, a little pricier, and includes more information about color and surface effects with liquid enamel. Each starts with sewing copper foil and stabilizing with liquid enamel. They both include an structor with purple bangs at no extra charge.

If you are in the area, please come out to the Fuller on Saturday February 1 from 2-5 for the reception. Brian and I will be talking about the background of the exhibition and our research into the fascinating, liminal bolo tie during at public presentation at 3:30.

To whet your appetite, you can read a wonderful article by Andrea Valluzzo that just appeared in Antiques and the Arts Weekly.

Once upon a time, there was a very young girl whose daddy was in the hospital. When it was time to visit him, she wanted to bring flowers. She asked her mother if the flowers would die. When her mother said 'yes,' the very young girl asked if rocks die. When her mother said 'no,' she decided to paint a rock for him and take it to the hospital instead of flowers. The daddy got better and came home. Our Rock People stay alive in our hearts.

I was honored to be invited to participate it the Missing Twin exhibition at the Society of North American Goldsmith’s Conference in San Diego. This was caringly curated by Erica Meier. The premise was to use an earring that had lost its match as a starting point. The created “twin” could replicate or riff off the original.

When I began to look around for lonely earrings, my mother was my initial port of call.
She told me she still had one half of her first pair of pierced earrings.

Eleanor “Eli” Lopez had her ears pierced by her best friend and roommate, Sue Larsen.
This took place in 1967, during their senior year of college at the University of Minnesota.
Pierced ears were becoming popular so Eli pierced Sue’s ears and then Sue returned the favor.
They used ice to numb the area and then pressed a needle through the lobe and into a potato that was providing support.

My mom sent me a picture of the earring before sending it to me. It was a simple gold ball on a post. Unfortunately, the postal service somewhat crushed the padded envelope and the earring arrived wrinkled. I decided to persevere with my original plan for the project. After all, who doesn’t get a little crushed and wrinkled over time?

The earring was digitally modeled as a replica of the original but with a needle in place of the post. This was then printed and cast in 14K gold. For an end cap, I made a 3d scan of half a potato, which I then hollowed out digitally and had cast in bronze. To make the half-potato receptive to the needle, I filled it with silicone.

In the fall of 2021, post-baccalaureate student Hannah Reynoso Toussaint approached me about making a series of bolo ties. They were the objects that her non-binary partner most enjoyed wearing. I suggested she do some research and when she was unable to locate much information, I went looking myself. I was surprised to find very little information on the subject. The best resource by far is an exhibition catalog by the Heard Museum written by Diana Pardue and Norman Sandfield entitled “Native American Bolo Ties: Vintage and Contemporary Artistry.”

But there was nothing out there about its adoption by the queer and non-binary communities. Respected museums with established fashion and jewelry collections had few bolo ties if they were located outside the southwestern United States. The field of art jewelry has put out books on chatelaines and tiaras, but no bolo ties.

This bothered me and bothered me until I decided that this gap needed to be addressed. I reached back out to Hannah and asked if she would be interested in working on a bolo tie project. She said she would. Then I reached out to Brian Fleetwood who teaches at the Institute for American Indian Arts and with whom I served on a committee for SNAG. He was interested. So the three of us got together on a video conference and formulated a plan to have an exhibition of bolo ties with accompanying catalog. We each invited ten artists and contributed bolo ties as well. The three of us provided essays on different aspects of the bolo tie.

I was fortunate to receive a University of North Texas (UNT) Institute for the Advancement of the Arts Fellowship which gave me a semester to focus on this project as well as funds for professional photography of the bolos and publication of a catalog. Additional funding has been supplied through the generosity of the UNT Libraries, The Bohlin Company and Deedie Rose. The UNT Art Gallery had an unanticipated availability this spring, which we were able to secure. We wanted the show to leave the Southwest and were able to make an agreement with the Fuller Craft Museum to have the show travel there in 2025. To help the participants sell their work, the final exhibtion will be at a commercial gallery, Hecho a Mano, in Santa Fe, New Mexico in the summer of 2025.

With an exhibition and catalog, the next step in my mind was a symposium. This would provide an opportunity to bring in more voices and perspectives. I was able to secure a College of Visual Arts and Design Flagship Grant to support a one day symposium. Brian, Hannah and I brainstormed about speakers and put together a very diverse and interesting lineup. Eventually, the recordings will be loaded into the UNT Library Digital Collection.

This is the speaker lineup:

• Ana M. Lopez: Welcome and Introduction

• Norman Sandfield: Bola to Bolo

• Brian Fleetwood: Meaning Making

• Hannah Toussaint: Reimagining the Bolo

• Jessica Metcalfe: More than Just a Trend

• Sulo Bee: Coloring Outside the Lines: Queer Fashion and the Genderless Bolo

• Annette Becker: West Dressed - Fashion Inspired by the American Frontier

You can register for the symposium here.

Recently, these two purveyors of opportunity reached out with an invitation to get our work together for an exhibition at the ECU Symposium. While I would rather be there in person, sending my brain children to hang out with theirs seems good too. So if you find yourself in Greenville, North Carolina in the coming month, please have a look.

Go fourth little wall vent, and make your mamma proud!

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Metal Museum (@metalmuseum)

Meet the Artists Ana and Natalie