Torchwood Studio - Polymer Clay Design and Creations

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During your travels here, you'll find interesting articles on my daily work with polymer clay, feature articles about the artists/artisans and their work that I find interesting and sometimes one of my rants about nothing in particular. Get a cup of coffee, settle in and enjoy your time at Torchwood Studio.

If your interested in purchasing any of my unique polymer clay art creations, please check out my Etsy Shop. 

Do These Colors Go Together? Musings of a Color Theory "Challenged" Artisan

From as far back as High School Art classes, I can remember being totally confused by Color Theory. Is this color considered a primary, secondary or tertiary?? Who had enough time on their hands to come up with monochromatic, analogous, complementary, split complementary, triadic and tetradic color schemes? And who the hell invented tints, shades, tones, saturation and hue? It's enough to give you a split complementary headache.

It's funny when you think about it though. At my "day" job, I can remember the section, subsection and sub-subsection numbers and letters to countless penal laws. I can instantly recall any number of criminal procedural laws and how they apply to any crime or violation you throw at me, but ask me if blue is a primary color and I start drooling and counting my toes, unsuccessfully. By the way, blue is a primary color. Google says so.

So what was I supposed to do when I needed a new color scheme for a project? Well, I could throw some  hot pink clay up against some neon green and hope for the best, right? Wrong, I tried it and I couldn't get that piece into the garbage fast enough. I guess I could refer back to my own post on Color Scales for Polymer Clay but, again, I've got no idea what colors go with each other. So where do I turn?

I was looking through some blogs one day and I came across one with a pic of this really colorful poison-arrow frog. As I was looking at it, I thought to myself, those colors really go well together. It was like a light bulb going off in my head. I started looking up more frogs and eventually progressed into butterflies and tropical birds. Did you know that there are approximately 17,500 different species of butterflies? That's 17,500 different color combinations alone to work with. I didn't need a color wheel anymore. All I apparently needed was Google Images.

After doing some more searching, I found COLOURlovers and a blog post on butterfly color palettes, showing the color combinations of 18 different butterflies. Who needs color theory when great color schemes are all around you just begging to be noticed? If your having trouble deciding whether that dark tinted, off-shade, bright hued magenta goes with that super saturated, dark hued, bright pastel shade of purple....start looking around you and notice the awesome color palettes right in front of your face.

Here's My New Celtic Knot Piece

Well, I finally finished it...whew! It took about 1 week to decide on the design aspects and the actual hands-on time but I think it was worth it.  

I started with a glass vase that I think was a wine decanter in a past life, frosted it with some Armour Etch (note to self: Armour Etch does not play nice with bare skin) and then went to work making the large celtic knots. I'm still trying to find a way to do some more elaborate knots but the process is eluding me at this point. After the knots were finished, I laid on the celtic knot stamped gold borders and then went to work layering the custom mixed dark pearlescent green to finish it off.

Once the whole thing was cured, it was time for sanding. Trying to sand something with curves and a thin neck is not as easy as it looks. As I like to have a glass smooth finish on all my pieces, sanding this all the way up to 800 grit and still have it keep a nice round shape severely tried my patience...lol  All in all, it ended up looking like the idea I had in my head and that's all I can ask for.

I don't know what it is about Celtic Knots that I like so much. I love working them into my new pieces. It might have something to do with the fact that I'm part Irish...lol...maybe it's a genetic thing. I've got it up in my Etsy shop now so take a stroll over there and you can see some better pics of it.

Taking My Art Another Step In The Handmade Direction

As most of you know, I typically use a store bought base to work my polymer clay magic on (picture me waving my arms and uttering dark magical incantations over a ceramic bowl...lol). Whether it's been glass candle holders or ceramic bowls, the bases have always been a mass-produced item with my handcrafted polymer clay designs over it.

While I have never been a big fan of mass-produced goods, this was the only option open to me (or so I thought). Well, after going over a couple of design ideas I had, I realized that the bowls and other store bought bases wouldn't really capture the effects I wanted to create. So, what could I find that would truly make my artwork unique? Original hand-thrown clay bowls, pots and decorative plates! I recently made contact with a couple of aspiring potters in my local area and suggested my idea to them. They seemed to like the idea as it would help to get their name out there and it would help to bring a true uniqueness to my creations :) A real handmade collaboration!

I'm still waiting to hear from them and, hopefully, they decide that it's a good idea. Of course, I'm still looking around and trying to find other potters that are able to craft the kind of items I'm interested in working with. I would much rather use an individual persons creation to do my designs on rather than some mass-produced bowl. Wouldn't you? It helps to further their art and their name and that's what it's all about as far as I'm concerned. If this all works out, then I can truly say my creations are 100% handmade.

Funny note :) When I was talking to one of the potters about my polymer clay creations, he asked me where I sell my art at. When I told him that I sell over at Etsy.com, he got this big smile and said, "I was just gonna ask you if you knew anything about that site. I was thinking of putting my pieces on their." So, sign up one more future Etsian with incredible handmade art!

You really do this stuff??

Well, this is it! My very own blog! For those of you that don't know me, this should be an illuminating journey into the machinations, contradictions and art that is me....Todd. I am the owner, operator and sole artist of Torchwood Studio. To be honest, it's gonna be illuminating for those of you that do know me too. 

First, a little bit of background on me. I'm a 38 year old guy/cop/polymer clay artist living in the Central NY area. I just recently started working with polyclay and luckily, some unknown hidden polyclay gene apparently kicked in. I have never considered myself to be very artistic. Matter of fact, I do believe that I failed every single art class I ever took. Now, was that because I absolutely had no artistic talents or abilities or was it because my teachers just couldn't comprehend the hidden meanings, complex layers and genius level I was working at?? In my heart, I think it was because I had no artistic ability...lol

Now, I know right away that someone is looking at the cop/artist declaration up there and going, "What??" A cop that considers himself an artist? Like I said, welcome to the contradictions. I work full-time as a Law Enforcement Officer and I use the other 128 hours I have left over each week to work on my polymer clay creations (plus or minus a few hours sleep here and there). For the last 13 years or so, I've worked as a Military Police Officer, a Gang Intelligence Officer and a Law Enforcement Officer. If the job title had the word "Officer" in it, I probably worked it. But, this blog isn't going to be about my life as a cop. Rather, I'll be talking about my polymer clay artwork, the amazing artwork of other artists I've had the pleasure of meeting on-line or in person and about anything else in between that happens to catch my attention.

So, back to the title of this blog. When people who have known me for years find out what I'm doing with polymer clay, I invariably hear this coming from their mouths, "You really do this stuff??" I invariably answer the same way every time, "Yea, I really do that stuff! You got something to say?" Please remember I'm a cop and I have an innate need to act aggressive at times. Seriously though, I usually just say "Yup, I do this stuff. What do you think?" For the most part, people just look at my art and then look at me and then gush with adoration, admiration and several other "a" words that I can't think of right now. Some of the guys I work with just look at my art for a few minutes and then look at me with this "You do this girly stuff?" kind of smirk. Of course, within 60 seconds the knowing smirk fades and then they're sitting there giving me suggestions, ideas and the best color combinations for new pieces. Who knew there was a little bit of an artist in all of us. 

So, for all those people who have yet to ask the above question....Yes, I do this stuff and I love doing it. For a very long time I tried to figure out what kind of artistic talent or ability I might have had. It only took 38 years but I'm damn glad I finally figured it out.

Please check back often as I'll be introducing all of you to some of the most incredible independent artists that I've come across. Whether it's polymer clay artists, painters, sculptors, photographers, jewelry makers or the ever elusive all-around artists, you will find them in this blog being reviewed, critiqued, admired, adored and appreciated. Hey! Appreciation....That was the other "a" word I was looking for. Well, just bookmark this blog if you want to get to know some of the best up and coming independent artists out there! Then again, don't bookmark it if you don't want to...just remember, if you don't, I definitely won't give you a break on a ticket when you come speeding through my patrol zone. Well, maybe I will... but why take chances :)