4th Annual Challenge of Color

Mom and I are participating in Erin's 4th Annual Challenge of Color.  Erin allowed us to try two different types of color challenge - the simple challenge, use Colourlovers.com and peruse their palettes or The Twist Challenge. I went with the simple challenge - though I created two palettes in Colourlovers.com to use for our piece.

We tried to create two pieces for this challenge - because I created two color palettes - but we ran out of time.  The last two weeks I have moved into mom's house (FINALLY!) and we have been cleaning, painting, working in the yard at my house to get it ready to be put on the market.  Mom took 5 days of vacation, and I took two weeks vacation to get everything done (still have things to finish up) but I am so ready to go back to work tomorrow so I can relax.

So, only one piece was finished but I do have the second piece to show you to give you an idea of what we are working on.

This is the color palette I created called Ice Dragon.  I started off with white and then just added blue colors I liked.

Now, for years I have been wanting to created a pendant from this idea.  I thought this was a perfect opportunity for me to beg mom to draw something up for us to make.  I picked out several ideas and mom tried to make two of the ideas work but couldn't so she created this for me.

"Ice Dragon"

I have been collecting dragons since I was 17 years old. I have all the Dragon Riders of Pern series by Anne McCaffrey, and I love the movie How to Train Your Dragon.  I have so wanted us to create a dragon piece and like I said I thought this would be a perfect opportunity to try.  THANK YOU MOM for sawing this piece for me!!!!!

So, if you don't know what a dragon is:

A dragon is a legendary creature, typically with serpentine or reptilian traits, that features in the myths of many cultures. There are two distinct cultural traditions of dragons: the European dragon, derived from European folk traditions and ultimately related to Greek and Middle Eastern mythologies, and the Chinese dragon, with counterparts in Japan (namely the Japanese dragon), Korea and other East Asian countries.^[1]
The two traditions may have evolved separately, but have influenced each other to a certain extent, particularly with the cross-cultural contact of recent centuries. The English word "dragon" derives from Greek δράκων (drákōn), "dragon, serpent of huge size, water-snake".^[2]

If you want to learn more head on over to Wikipedia where I got this information.

Here is a close up of the beads - the lampwork glass beads are made by us and the accent beads are Sodalite beads.

Here is a closer view of the dragon pendant.  Of course, mom modified a pattern she found for the pendant.  Once the image has been scanned in for future pieces - it is then glued down to a sheet of copper.  I saw out the perimeter of the pendant and mom saws out the design.  Mom then files and sands the piece and hands it off to me for enameling.  I used a base coat of clear first and then I start adding my color enamels.  I used white and four different colors of blue - from lightest to darkest blue to get the colors I wanted in the pendant.

Here is the second color palette I created called Loud and Vibrant.  This was actually the first color palette I created but I couldn't think how I would use the colors on the pendant so that is why I created Ice Dragon for the pendant.  So, I asked mom if we could create a dragon plate from these colors - I have an idea on how I want to use the colors on the plate.

So, this is the second piece we are working on.

I can't wait to enamel this piece and share with you!

Here are both pieces together.  This gives you an idea of how big the plate will be once we are done with it.

So, that is our pieces for the 4th Annual Challenge of Color.  Mom and I want to thank Erin for allowing us to participate in her challenges - we love these challenges because it makes us go outside our comfort zone and try something new.  So - THANK YOU Erin!!!!!

To see a list of participants please go to Erin's blog and check out all the wonderful pieces.