With wire

Yesterday, I coated the decoupaged bases of the candle holders with two coats of polyurethane. Late today, I gently rubbed the dried bases with steel wool. This takes away any bumps or imperfections in the polyurethane coat and makes it smooth to the touch. Tonight, I just couldn't stop. I measured out several ten-inch long pieces of black wire and adhered them to the upper part of the candle holders. I purposely left them long on the base to draw from the mathematical artwork up to the candles themselves... like thick crazy, non-linear lines creeping out of a seaof math formulas and order. These pictures don't do them justice, but it gives you an idea of what they are shaping up to be.

I'll do the write-up and photography for the Esty posting later this week and get these out there. I have about four other pieces coming along, but my next series of blog posts will cover a commission piece requested by my friend Andrea.

Math and more math

The candlesticks are coming together, despite a crazy month with work travel and an urgent family matter. I've cut dozen of pieces out of the geometry book and have three of the sides done and the fourth is in progress. Tomorrow I'll start with the wire. At some point in the craziness of the last three weeks I dreamt up how to fasten the wire to the base. I think I'll use an interesting black steel wire, six pieces vertically and three anchoring them horizonally. Tough to describe. Here's a picture of the math work going on.

From to simple raw beauty to more complex art

I had two candle holders on my site for months (pictured) and while they had gotten more than 229 views and had a few "favorites," they just weren't selling. When items are listed on Etsy, they have an expiration date. You can easily re-list the items and I had re-listed these twice, the cost is minimal. But, with these candle holders something just bothered me. I personally thought they were just too plain, and honestly, kind of boring. So, when they expired this time, I pulled them out completely.

Today I started to really look at them and found a cool way to embellish them a little, to really make them more "art" and less "houseware" type pieces. I've decided to cover the bases with some wonderful little scraps of paper from a vintage geometry book, titled "Practical Mathematics, Part III, Geometry" circa 1912. The book has wonderful little drawings and formulas through out it. I'm designing a collage of miscellaneous math to cover cover the bases of the candle holders. Above that, I'll take some great black wire that I recently acquired and embellish the upper, curvy, portion of the holder. The wire will come up above the top and somewhat encase the candles themselves. Can you see it? It's going to be cool.