So on the polymer clay-as-glass sculpture project: after searching around for a few mildly related things, I finally re-discovered this artist that put the idea in my head in the first place. James Lehman! His website, here, which doesn't seem to have been updated very recently (I don't know if he's still doing the art, is what I mean. I came across another polymer clay website that went on and on about how excited the artist was making all these clay lamps and how it was totally his thing, but in a text box at the top of the page was an update saying that he didn't make any clay lamps anymore and that the site was more of an odd curio marker in his life from when he used to work on those projects. I wonder what happened in his life to make him stop so abruptly, but I guess we all outgrow everything...).
This is a picture of one of Lehman's pieces, which isn't as "glassy" as the one I saw at the library, but is pretty damn close to what I want to do, conceptually. I will say that upon seeing more of his work, I like the forms but not really the colors or patterns. I'm still going for more of a Dale Chihuly-look, but I had to look at a lot of different pieces to understand what that really meant. As it is now, I'm thinking that I might do a series of three round balls, one each in red, yellow, and blue, and they would run along a clay track that would undulate and wind around. Hopefully it would be big and look cool, but I'm still not sure where I'm intending it to go, so perhaps I'll change the piece to something more wall-friendly...
I might try and do something illuminated (putting a light in or under it...), but I'm not sure about the clay's density and whether light will permeate it like glass. I sort of doubt that it will, actually.
The other thing was that on Lehman's website, he said that regular gloss finish (sprays, I'm assuming) don't dry on polymer clay properly and that he uses a special water-based hardwood floor finish to lacquer his work, which is fairly vague. I'll do more research, but I ended up biting the bullet and just emailing him at his 5 year-old address, just straight up asking what he uses and how he uses it. Hopefully I'll hear back with some info, but I would assume that I won't. Glad I didn't just go ahead and fuck up a whole project by going into it half-cocked, but that still doesn't really help if I never find out what I do need to use.
More ahead.
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