Opportunities Knocking :: Credit River Art Glass

Julie Nordine of Credit River Art Glass is one of those artists that you can't help but love. Her glass work is bursting with the energy of her sparkling personality. I know because I am the proud owner of two of her amazing copper-capped glass acorns, and I have had the pleasure of meeting her in person at the Bead & Button show this summer.

Julie was gracious enough to grant me an interview even though I happened to pick the exact week that she was busy re-launching her Etsy site. And since Julie is a woman of many words (not unlike me!), I will let her tell you all about Credit River Art Glass.

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ABS :: I see that you have a background in Interior Design. How did you decide to start making your own beads? Did you take classes, go to art school or are you self-taught? How has that background helped you in your beadmaking?

JN :: I've always been fairly creative and knew I wanted to do SOMETHING creative with my life. With creative older sisters, I found myself in bead stores at a young age and would make macrame bracelets for friends and family (back in the 70s, when macrame was cool!). I took some jewelry classes in high school and loved it, but I didn't want to be a starving artist, so I went to school in Denver for Interior Design. I loved Interior Design. I'm really good at it because I have a strong eye for scale and proportion, color, too. Once we moved to Minnesota, I took a stained glass class and loved it. Took pottery, too, and loved it even more. I didn't do either once I started having kids.

I remember being in a bead store where this really cool young guy named Malcolm Potek brought in some of his fantastic fused glass beads and pendants. Around that time I also found a "do it yourself beadmaking kit" and saw someone on a morning show doing a demo of beadmaking. I really wanted to fuse glass like Malcolm Potek did, but I couldn't afford it. So I stuck with interior design and made jewelry for friends, popped into bead stores every so often, started a pearl obsession (anyone need pearls?) when I started noticing these really attractive lampwork beads. The really unique artsy kind, not the mass-produced kind. I found LampworkEtc, a forum for lampworkers and jewelry artists, scoured YouTube for glass beadmaking videos and then signed up for my first class at a local community art center. On the first night, we made those silly little donut shaped black beads (I think everyone starts with these little black beads!). I couldn't wait to try it myself! I jumped when I first lit my little Hot Head torch and when the cold glass rod shattered in the flame. But I figured it out. That first class gave me a really firm foundation to start with.

As I got deeper and deeper into glass beads and improved my shaping skills, my background as an interior designer kicked in. My eye for shape, scale, proportion and color have been a major benefit to shaping my style and moving me forward.

ABS :: There are a lot of romantic ideas about owning your own creative business. Do you do this work full time? What is the best part about being your own boss? What is the worst part?

JN :: I DO do this full time, at least I don't have another paying job.

The best part about being my own boss is that I get to torch when I want and be there for my kids when they need me. I'm home and should be able to maintain the household, but that has never been my strong suit. But dinner is usually on the table every night and I'm loving that I get to CREATE!

The worst part? I sometimes wish I had a studio away from the house because sometimes I get hung up on what there is to do at home and what I could be doing in my studio. When I neglect the house, I tend to feel guilty for 'playing' in my studio. It wasn't until recently that I got real with myself and started thinking about this more as a business that needs to be nourished and needed to be a priority.




JN :: I'm definitely inspired by other art... by shapes and little details that I see in everyday life. Motivation comes from loving what I'm doing and of course it motivates me even more when others live it as well. This has been really good for my ego.

ABS :: Glass is so intriguing to me. It is so fragile but yet so strong at the same time. Do you plan out your ideas, like sketching them, or do you let them grow organically when you are at the torch?

JN :: I've never been a planner... If I'm onto something and feel like I need to explore it further, I sit down at the torch and work it out. Sometimes I jot down notes so I can remember them, but a lot of what I do is just serendipity. I might be doing one thing and it completely gets away from me, so I sit back and look at it and take whatever direction it's already moving. A lot of what I do started out as me covering up mistakes! ;-)

ABS :: I love to see all the colored rods that lampwork aritsts always have in their studios. What color palette do you find yourself reaching for time and time again?
JN :: I love really rich colors mixed with organic colors and textures. If you look at the pictures of my beads soaking in water at the end of the day, I'm really heavily into cool colors -- green, blue, purple -- as well as really deep reds. I'll also pull in some rich oranges from time to time.

ABS :: I am currently hoarding two very precious acorn beads that I bought from you at Bead & Button. What is your favorite bead that you have ever made?

JN :: Hmmmmm...that's tough. I'm quite fond of my work ;-) But probably my favorite was an acorn that I made for my little sister when she was struggling through her divorce. Acorns represent strength, patience, potential... things she wasn't able to see in herself but I knew they were there. I asked her to wear it so that when she looked at it, touched it or just felt it hanging there, that she'd remember how proud I was for standing up for herself and her kids.


ABS :: As a creative, I am sure that you are brimming with new ideas all the time. Any you care to share with us?

JN :: My most recent was the addition of copper etched oak leaves to go with my acorns and they have been a HUGE hit. I'm really hoping to begin incorporating more metals with my pieces. Skeleton key beads are new for me and I'll be learning some new silversmithing techniques in an upcoming Kristina Logan class.

ABS :: What is next for Credit River Art Glass?

JN :: Continuing to push myself to make my work unique and TEACHING! I'm so excited about this prospect. I'm just delving into teaching. I'm so excited about it! I need to get my studio cleaned out so I can start having some one-on-one sessions and I'm also looking into setting up some studio space away from home. I've been asked to teach at the Midwest Glass Experience in February. And I've been contacted by a friend who is opening a studio and wants me to one of their first national instructors early next year. How awesome is that? I'd love to travel around the country and eventually around the world and teach others. Nothing is more exciting to me than to see someone 'get it', to see the excitement in their eyes.

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Thank you Julie, for taking the time to share your inspiration with all of us!

Do check out Julie in the following places:

Julie Nordine
Credit River Art Glass
Website: http://www.blogger.com/www.creditriverartglass.com
Blog: http://creditriverartglass.blogspot.com/

Enjoy the day!

Erin Prais-Hintz writes about all things that inspire her at Treasures Found::Inspiration Is Everywhere. Her jewelry designs are one-of-a-kind made one-at-a-time. She collects quotes and dust and invites you to send her your favorite (quote - not dust!) to enjoytheday@tesoritrovati.com.
Check out her brand spankin' new website at Tesori Trovati.

Opportunities Knocking: It Pays to be First

And the random winner of a one-of-a-kind set of art beads selected from the truly one-of-a-kind "Inspired by..." exhibit is...

EB Bead and Metal Work!

(Didn't I tell you that it pays to be the first to comment!)

Here is what EB Bead and Metal Work had to say about my questions regarding collaboration:

Thank you Erin for sharing your video story of your "Inspired by..." work! This was truly wonderful to watch and see what was created from the beads you collected based on the art work.

Mom and I have never thought about doing a collaboration before, but I have been toying with the idea of basing our jewelry off of some of the most wonderful watercolor paintings by our favorite artist Rena Bruwer here in Indiana (we have our own art gallery of her work). I think this would be a fun thing to do, but I am not sure we would be ready to do something like that on a large scale, but this is something I would love to do in the future.

I would love, love, love to have Juls, from Julsbeads, collaborate with us along with Kelley from Kelly's beads, Melanie Brooks from Earthenwood Studios, Dora Schubert would be wonderful to collaborate with (love her stringer work), Laura from Beads by Laura, Barbara Lewis for her wonderful enamels, Donna from Beadology, My Life & Times. Oh, the list is endless!

Swag Alert! Here is an assortment of custom made art beads from my Gallery exhibit just for Beth and her mother to play with!
Kate Clawson, Melanie Brooks, Barbara Lewis, Christine Damm, Julianna Cannon and Heather Powers are all represented here.

EB Bead and Metal Work...please email http://draft.blogger.com/enjoytheday@tesoritrovati.com to arrange for your special prize to be mailed!

And do check out this mother-daughter team's blog. Beautiful things this team creates!

I am so thrilled to hear from your comments that maybe I have inspired you to seek out collaborations. And I do hope that you all get a chance to participate in a collaboration...whether that be with jewelry or other art, of your own initiative or in conjunction with another who starts the ball rolling. It can be scary, especially if you are the one approaching another artist. You might feel that your vision as an artist is not strong enough yet. But it is truly a great way to stretch your wings and fnd out what you can really do. And I am almost certain that you will learn something about yourself and find that you rise to the occasion. I hope you all can be inspired to seek out collaborations of your own. And when you do, I would love to hear all about it!

Enjoy the day!

Erin Prais-Hintz writes about all things that inspire her at Treasures Found::Inspiration Is Everywhere. Her jewelry designs are one-of-a-kind made one-at-a-time. She collects quotes and dust and invites you to send her your favorite (quote - not dust!) to enjoytheday@tesoritrovati.com.

Check out her brand spankin' new website at Tesori Trovati.

Opportunities Knocking: Collaboration

"Let's you and I conjure together. You watch me and I'll watch you and I will show you how to show me how to show you how to do our marvelous human tricks together."

~Courtney Milne

I sell my work through a local art gallery called Gallery Q. They bugged me for months to put in a proposal to do an exhibit of my work. Truthfully, I balked at the idea that I would have enough of a body of work to fill a gallery show. {That might be also why I don't do more than one art show a year, coming in October.} I still can't believe that I filled up as much of this space as I did.

While working my shift at the Gallery Q one day I realized that I was vastly inspired by the artists whose work was hanging on the walls all around me. There were landscapes and still lifes. Watercolors and oil. There were sculptures and pottery. There was saturated hues and stark contrasts. This was the seed of inspiration for my show.

So I took the plunge in January and put in a proposal {and that is a nerve-wracking event in and of itself}. But it was contingent on getting the other artists to collaborate with me. And that took a lot of trust on my part. Trust that the Board of Directors would want to give me this space. Trust that the artists would be intrigued enough to surrender a piece of art for my show that was eight months away.

This was a huge leap of faith.

Any good collaboration starts out this way. You might not know what to expect from the person who approaches you and you don't know if you want to give up control. What if you don't like what they make in the collaboration? A great part of collaboration is learning to let go, to trust the other person, to believe that they will do great things in this partnership. I am well aware of collaborations that can go horribly wrong. I have been in them. But if you trust and believe, I think a collaboration can be a truly liberating growth experience.

There were seven local artists who gave me eleven pieces of their art to be inspired by. Then in turn I took a leap of faith and sought out bead artists from around the world and asked them to be inspired by the paintings and art that I chose. This was another instance of blind faith.

I did not tell them what to make for me - what color, shape, size, amount - because if I did, that would only be a straight commission and then they would give me exactly what I asked for. I was hoping that they would be inspired by this collaboration, to give me more than what I asked for and the fact that I put no limits on them led to some outstanding works of beady art. And if I was going to ask the local artists to collaborate with me and trust me, I had to do the same with the bead artists. After all, they are all tops in their respective mediums: lampwork glass from Kerry Bogert, Dora Schubert and Julianna Cannon; ceramic from Melanie Brooks, Nancy Schindler and Jennifer Heynen; polymer clay from Heather Powers, Kate Clawson, Lynn Davis and Christine Damm; enamel from Barbara Lewis; metal clay from Beth Hemmila; mixed media from Mary Jane Dodd. So I trusted them and their creative instincts. And what I got from these 13 artists was nothing short of brilliant.

These bead artists told me that this collaboration pushed them in new directions. Some examples:

• Kerry Bogert pushed through her doubt and came up with a new technique to add those bubbles to the hollows. Each took her 45 minutes to make.
• Dora Schubert normally doesn't take custom orders. But she was inspired by what I was doing and wanted to challenge herself. The results are breathtaking.
• Julianna Cannon made me five sets of beads based on the inspiration monoprint. Each different from the last.
• Heather Powers told me that she was seeking some new inspiration for a fall botanical motif and found it in the bittersweet vines.
• Mary Jane Dodd knows just how to pick the right words for any occasion and selected some very poetic ones for the two inspiration pieces she interpreted.
• Christine Damm tried out a new technique with inks to add depth the the color palettes of her clay beads.

The fact that I could inspire them is a wonder to me.

I thought that I would test out my mad skillz at videography and take you on a virtual tour of the Gallery Q and my exhibit and point out what I learned through this collaboration. {Note: I have quite a loud voice, but in this video I am very soft spoken. Must be my inner librarian coming out to play. Turn up the volume a tad!}

The best part about collaborations for me is the fact that by letting go you can fly to heights you may never have imagined. When you allow yourself to relinquish some of the control you have the capacity to transcend what you even thought possible, to do something better together than you could have done apart.

I would really love to hear your thoughts about collaborations.

Do you seek them out?

Or do you shy away from working with other artists?

Would you like the chance to do something like this in your own community?
What's stopping you?

If so, what art bead artists would you most like to collaborate with you?

Do tell!

How about a giveaway? For each comment recorded here - one comment per person please! - I will draw a random winner to receive a few of the art beads that were created just for me for this exhibit, some of which were made expressly for me and exist nowhere else in the world! {Deadline: August 25}

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Erin Prais-Hintz writes about all things that inspire her at Treasures Found::Inspiration Is Everywhere. Her jewelry designs are one-of-a-kind made one-at-a-time. She collects quotes and dust and invites you to send her your favorite (quote - not dust!) to enjoytheday@tesoritrovati.com.
Check out her brand spankin' new website at http://www.tesoritrovati.com/

Opportunities Knocking: Measuring Up

“When nobody around you seems to measure up, it's time to check your yardstick.”
~ Bill Lemley

I don't know about you, but I have a problem with measurements.

It is not even that I am stuck in ye olde British way of measuring with yardsticks and I am trying to convert myself to that newfangled metric system {I think I am too old of a dog to learn that 'new' trick}, I just have a problem with making my jewelry come out to the length that I think it should be. Long necklaces are too short. Short necklaces are too long.

Bracelets are the trickiest thing for me. I know they should be easy. They are far shorter than a necklace, but I just find them a challenge. I always tend to make them too long or too short. I want to be all Goldilocks with my bracelets. Just right. I try to make them adjustable and that can sometimes work. I guess bracelets are just not my thing. Doesn't mean I don't make them, just that I have to tell people you get what you get. And custom orders....fpppt...I have had to re-do more of them because everyone wears their bracelets at a different comfort level.

But I digress. {Or are you aware of that by now?}

I rely on my steel ruler. I use it to cut lenths of chain and beading wire...to deside how much wire to cut for doing a nice wire wrap on a bead {I find that at least 3x the size of the bead works best for me}...to slap someone touching my beads {No. Not really. But I've thought about it!}

Sometimes when I am at my work table, I lose my steel ruler. And then when I am at my computer writing up the instructions for a publication I am always looking for a ruler. If I decide to move my production to the family room to actually be with the family, I am at a loss without my ruler. When I am out on the road and I take a goodie box to create with, I wish I had my ruler.

One day when I was at Michael's I decided to go up and down all the aisles, not just the jewelry ones. And it was in the sewing aisle that I found just the thing: an adhesive ruler tape used by quilters and seamstresses.

Brilliant! Now I not only can have my ruler in all these places, but it will stay put, it is yellow so I won't 'lose' it, and if I need a new one I can just whip out the roll. I am sorry that I don't have the original packaging anymore, but I found a few like it on the internet by searching for "adhesive ruler".

Pro Tape Pro-Measurement Ruler Tape

Starrett Measure Stix Tapes, 12 feet, steel

So that got me thinking about other tools of measurement that might be just the thing for a jewelry designer like me {or you.} Here are a few others that might be worth checking out:

Crayola Total Tools Audio Ruler

I am not sure how I would use this, but I think it might be fun to try. Maybe I can get the kids involved in the measuring for me! It only goes to one foot, but if you were a blind beader it might be just the thing! {Or maybe I would wish for the days when rulers only made a sound if you slapped your sister hard enough. Not that I ever did that. Not that you can prove.}

Inchie Ruler Tape

According to the product description: "Use these handy, repositionable adhesive measuring strips to perfectly align machine-quilting designs, hand quilting, or embroidery stitches, beadwork (!), papercrafting elements, stencils, faux painting patterns, and more. Removable adhesive is safe to use on fabric and most papers. Package contains (10) 8-1/2" x 11" sheets of 8 peel-off 1" x 11" paper rulers which are marked in 1/4" increments to make measuring easy." Which I guess is handy if you want to measure in 11" increments. But it would work in a pinch.

Bead Bed

How cool is this? I stumbled upon this new {to me} tool. {Maybe to you, too?} It has foam around the sides of the tray so your beads don't roll away {which happens to me daily} and your hands are cushioned {which would be welcome relief}. It has measurements built right into the tray, including handy bead diameters. I want one of these. I could see all sorts of mobile applications, like Kiersten, the Cerebral Dilettante beading in her car. My birthday is next month and I wish my husband read any of the blogs I write for, because I am SO hinting at one of these! HINT! {But since he doesn't read my blog - that I know of - I guess I will just have to buy this myself. This and the entire Glee season on DVD and CD! Anyone else with me? Maybe I can use this to design a line of jewelry based on the characters of Glee. Hey...not a bad idea! I just might do that!}

EZ Bracelet Sizer

But this? This takes the cake! This pop up EZ Bracelet sizer from Gossamer Wings designs is just what I am looking for.

According to the description on ArtBeads.com: "Have you ever made a bracelet only to find out when it is clasped it doesn't fit? That is because the diameter of the beads affects the final measurement, so it is impossible to measure a flat strand and gauge the final inner diameter. Put an end to the confusion with this bracelet sizer. Simply slide your bracelet over the cone to measure the inside diameter. "
Wait just a gosh darn minute...I have one of these! It is trapped in a box in my garage along with the EZ Necklace sizer since I moved back in December! {And it really does work, too.}

I guess I need to go 'shopping' in my garage more often before I buy another one!

And then I will have no excuse not to make bracelets. Because size really does matter ;-)

Enjoy the day!

Erin Prais-Hintz writes about all things that inspire her at Treasures Found::Inspiration is Everywhere . Her jewelry designs are one-of-a-kind made one-at-a-time. She collects quotes and dust and invites you to send her your favorite (quote - not dust!) to enjoytheday@tesoritrovati.com. Check out a gallery of her work at http://www.tesoritrovati.com/ (but don't laugh too hard because she is working on a new website!).