The Summer of Solder

How did I spend my summer, you ask?   Soldering and sweating, I answer.  It’s all about heat, baby!  When I’m not behind a torch, I’m in front of a fan, trying to ward off either the honest hard-earned sweat of work, or the devious annoying sweat of a hot flash.  Torch, fan, torch.  Repeat.

Early in the season, maybe even in the spring, I took a class in texturing metal.  It was great fun, even though from the moment I registered, I felt like an imposter, a sham, a pretender, a massive loathsome blob in the cozy glorious world of real metalsmiths.  In fact, I absconded with a few secrets. 

For the a process called Shibuichi (hold the wasabi), we melted down scraps of copper and fine silver in a small crucible to make one big scrap.  Already an exciting development, but it gets better; then I found out that if  you heat silver to a point just before it liquefies you can break it into these fantastic jagged edged pieces.  By soldering those jagged pieces together you can make something really interesting. 

Shibuichi (with Wasabi)

Well, you can make something really interesting.  The process was so cool and simple and inspiring and awesome that I had to put it on the back burner.  Instead, I have been trying like a melting fool to become a “master” solderer.

Django Jingles Necklace

Nestled Necklace

Yeah, well, don’t call me Master just yet.  Yesterday was a soldering bust.  Nothing I touched with a flame worked the way I wanted it to.  I’d been boldly bonding all summer and suddenly I had to pay some unforeseen toll—the toll of abrupt inexplicable incompetence.  At least this time it did not involve lighting my arm on fire. 

New hand wrought clasps

 But the nice thing about life is that today is a whole new day.  With new energy and enthusiasm, and a shimmer of fresh sweat, here’s what I am working on today.

Today's experiments are tomorrow's treasures!

And before you go, don't forget to check out the new work in both the ETSY shop (just click on the picture of the door) and behind the Gallery door. Leave the door cracked and the light on, somebody else will probably stop by. Try to stay cool and thanks for coming by.
 

Fire is Your Friend

Metalsmith Boot Camp

Episode 1  

Fire is Your Friend

A few weeks ago, I won the lottery !!!!!!!  No, not the Powerball; a spot in the “Surfaces” workshop, presented by HMAG and taught by Seattle metal artist, Andy Cooperman.  It’s crazy, I know – a three-day workshop on metal surfaces.  I went in thinking that it would be all fun with hammers and sandpaper, and came out understanding more about soldering, rolling mills, “pyrometalurgy”, and an exotic metal alloy called shibuichi (no, it’s not a sushi sandwich…technically….well, hmm, let’s talk about that later…………).

The icing on this lottery-cake was a trip, the very next day, to see and work with my precious and talented friend, RR, who showed an immense amount of patience with me while sharing an equally extraordinary amount of knowledge.

There’s a lot to tell about my Metalsmith Boot Camp, but let’s just talk about pyrometalurgy for a minute.  Have I mentioned before that I am not all that crazy about FIRE?  Well, now I have good reason.  A couple of days into the Surfaces workshop, I pulled myself up off of my uncomfortable stool, having decided to speak frankly with this Cooperman fella.  Early on there had been a short discussion on being intimidated by one’s torch.  As you might expect, I kept my mouth shut because now I was intimidated by the conversation about being intimidated by your torch, as if all eyes were on me.

But I had to come clean:  “I am so afraid of my torch that I have not hooked it up yet. I bought it in December and can’t even open the box.”  Cooperman’s response:  “Why?  What are you afraid of?”  Me:  “I’m afraid of setting the house on fire, and myself for that matter.”  Cooperman:  “Don’t worry, you’ll get over it.  Hey, that’s a good-looking torch.  Ok, now go anneal that ingot so it can be rolled.”  Me:  “Ok, sir.”

24 hours later, I was on the plane to see RR, torch in tow.  I was feeling good about the whole fire thing.  As clouds parted and angels sang, we took my torch out of its box—it was approximately 12 pm EST.  I worked all afternoon with this good-looking torch, “fire is my friend” my new mantra.  [Sidebar: my torch felt a little hot.  Later, when I described the events of the day to the purveyor of said good-looking torch, he assured me that “a little hot” was a desirable feature of torches.]

The report must read:  At approximately 4 pm EST, RR walked up behind me and was heard to say, “You know you’re on fire?”  Me:  “Huh?”

The hose at the connection to the propane canister was in flames!!!!! Leaping flames!!!!! Hello, this is why I am intimidated by my torch.  Cooler heads prevailed and in a few turns, the canister supplying the propane was turned off and running water had been deployed to extinguish the flames billowing out around my right arm.  We multi-purposed a cold glass jar of strawberry preserves to minimize any blistering, and we called it a day.

The next day I learned to make tiny silver dots. 



Oh, and fire is still my friend.