Fae's Dreams Journal

Hello everyone! 

Today I would like to share my newest journal with you which I named "Fae's Dreams".

You all know by now that I do love making concepts for my art, so that behind each artwork is a story. This time my client had requested a Fae, but not your regular cutie one with wings, but a wicked one, a special one. 

Perhaps some of you know already, I am not very good with sculpting faces, and so I was very skeptic about this order as I felt like I will make something very average and won't be pleased at all and neither will be a client. But recently I have purchased a lovely set of face moulds and so I decided to give it a try. 

My client wanted to have a fae with the open eyes but my moulds all had closed eyes. I took the challenge and begun to practice.

It took me 3 attempts to make her face and you can see from the small picture that the first two looked comic and one of them had to deal with my anger management problems! LOL! Yes I smacked her with the fist and poked the face many times with my ball tool. Don't make the duck angry! Ever! Well I also did struggle to understand how to do the lips and really struggled with the nose. As you can see from the original first picture, the nose had changed drastically from the original mould. So I did add a lot of my own sculpting onto the moulded base, including eyes, eyelids, completely new nose, more volume over the eyebrows and so on. It was really a process, which we Russians call :"The eyes are scared, but hands are working!", meaning that I was petrified from where I am heading with this and I was very happy with the result of the third mould. The nose turned to be more like an animal one, not because I wanted to, but because I couldn't do the normal human nose. Here, now you know all my weaknesses! 

Another cool thing about this project which I have discovered in the process of it's creation was how to make human hands. I know mine ones are far away from the realistic ones, but still I am so pleased with the progress as I never did hands before! So first I made one that was too small, then I realised that the palm should be the size of her face and made another hand that did match the proportions. 

The third cool discovery was when I decided to choose a labradorite stone for the project. I have a small collection of them that always grows as I like buying more of them as they run out. So while selecting a perfect stone I found one that had an amazing scene in it. You must remember the game we played on Facebook named "What do you see?"

So as soon as I saw this stone, the story was born in my head.

Please switch on your imagination and go with me on a journey to the forest, where our little Fae (a fairy named Fae!) lived all of her life.

Fae was a little tiny fairy in her forest world and her life was so simple and everyday was the same as any other day. But one evening she was traveling next to the river and she saw a beautiful man standing next to the river fishing. He stood right under a huge willow tree and the light of the sun, that was beaming through the branches of the willow was lighting him up beautifully. never saw a man before and she was fascinated by his size, how strong and powerful he looked, so she fell in love with his beauty instantly. But of course, there is always some drama in every good story and as you all get it, Fae and human can't be together. She knew it from the start, but she kept coming to the willow every day to see him no matter what. One day the willow tree whispered to her through the voices of the leaves. Nobody could hear it but fairies and as she was the only one there, she was the only one who heard it. The willow said, that she observed the man for a long time and that she has noticed him being very sad. Once the man was even talking to himself, as there was no one around, but the willow was listening. 

Willow had told the Fae that the man was very lonely and he carried a very deep scar from loosing a loved one once before and he had given a promise in front of the Willow, that he will never love again. When this was said, the willow cried and her tears started to fall down and few had dropped on the man, too. He didn't take a notice, but the Fae had picked one up and saved it. With time it turned hard and became as strong as a glass, but it preserved a memory of what the willow tree saw that day. Fae knew that she and the man will never be able to be together, but she was so pleased to have a vision of the man in the teardrop "memory stone" she had picked up under that the willow. In few months the lonely fisherman had stopped coming to fish under the willow and so the Fae was only left with her dreams and a teardrop of memories.

So that's the story! And that's the pictures of the Fae and her precious stone!

Thank you very much for reading, 

Love & Peace, 

Dark Fantasy Jewelry Collection. 2nd Edition.

Hello everyone and thank you for stoping by!

Today I would love to present you with some progress of my ongoing creation of the Dark Fantasy collection. It is a second edition so far. I love making these things!! :) I love working with black clay, labradorite stones and metallic elements.
So far I have made 3 pieces, but I am planning on making more. It's too hard to resist working with these. So therapeutical. Every time I feel tired and can't seem to be at ease, that means that another necklace is coming. It may sound weird, that on the verge of exhaustion I always end up making something interesting. And it's not like these pieces are full of negative or ill energies. God no! I dedicate all my positive energies into making these pieces or any other pieces, it's just I always feel that I need to come to some sort of a breaking point to make something. I can be walking around a journal I need to make for 2 weeks and then randomly make a collection of necklaces in between as if I am overstuffed with inspiration.. even if the actual journal is just NOT COMING OUT!! :)
I guess I am just weird and I guess for every artist the creative energies come and go to their minds, hearts and hands in all sorts of ways. Some need alcohol, some need a cool movie, some needs an adventure, someone is like Walter Mitty and all his/her adventures are happening in their heads only.
I have so much going on in my head constantly, sometimes I feel like the head is about to explode, but it seems to me that the "Creative Birth Giving" process is a hard thing to master. Or maybe I am just driving myself to the bone and asking too much from myself. Who knows, even I myself hesitate to answer this question.
So! 3 items so far! Please enjoy! All are still available in my store: https://goo.gl/xAOw7D

Thank you very much for reading this post, 

Love and Peace!

Red & Black Dragons. Cake Topper.

As the winter is starting to die down, many people are already starting to plan ahead their holidays, birthdays and weddings. It is a nice feeling! Closer the spring is coming, more revived I am starting to feel, too. It's like we are almost through the darkest night and the first rays of sunset are about to show over the horizon, making the colours of the sky brighter, lighter and warmer.

This time I would like to indulge your curiosity about the new things I made with some photographs of my newest work, the Red & Black dragons cake topper. 

This cake topper took some time and practice to make, as I am not a figurine making professional. By saying this, I still did the job well, but all I wanted to say, that I do not specialise on 3D figurines like that, so it was challenging to make a carcass, wire, foil and all that. 

My customer wanted to have black and red dragons as these are their wedding colours, she said. 

Of course red and black would have gone greatly with gold and shimmery crystals, so I decided to make it exactly like this. In the beginning I was planning to make clay wings, but when I tried on the metallic gold plated ones, I really loved the effect. I know they are not big enough for the dragons to fly, but when making an artistic figurine like this, all that matters is that it looks good and lovely. They are here for loving and hugging anyways, not for flying. So tiny little wings add more cuteness and softness to their silhouettes. 

When working on this project, I made the dragons first and then the round base. It was quite a challenge to understand how I wanted them to be positioned as the base was sticky and every time I placed the dragon on it I was scared it will stick to it. Therefor I covered the base with cling film and then I was playing with the dragons until I was satisfied with the placing. Miraculously their tails entwined together as if they were forming a top of the heart and so it was only obvious that their hands need to be joined together at the very bottom, to form the bottom of the hart, the sharp peak of it. So this came as a complete surprise for me. I felt like some miraculous powerful and loving force was guiding me. 

After the main composition was established, I have placed the dragons on the base permanently and started working on the textures of their skin first. It took me a few hours to cover the whole of their bodies with the scales, but with the help of DOTIES it was so much easier. Dotties saved my life million times when it comes to dragon skin.

After that I used an extruder to make the multiple amounts of swirls that formed a wonderful armour like back decor. For the legs I used extruded and hand rolled fine and thin swirls. Was quite a challenge too. But it wouldn't be interesting otherwise, right?  My client also wanted to have some orange colours on the red part,  but I didn't feel like adding orange clay or painting some parts over. Therefore I decided to add subtle effect of "orangey-ness" :) by adding orange or fiery crystals and gold. Gold is yellow and it will automatically soften and make the red colour warmer to appear as more orangey. 

As you can see I have also used the ultimate Mandarin Duck Stamp (Organic) as it is perfect for larger scales of dragon skin or pebble looking background. I can't tell you how many times I have used this stamp! This one is definitely a keeper for me, for you and for the next upcoming collection. 

Anyways... The sweetest part of this journal I think are the two little hands that the dragons are lovingly holding together. It was important for me to show the tender and sweet connection between these two dragons, just like the real personalities behind these characters, they are deeply in love with each other. 

You can see more photos on my Flickr Page. 

Thank you very much for reading, 

Love & Peace, 

The Secret of The Death Valley - Treasure Box

As many of you know, I love to work a lot with polymer clay journals and create one of a kind books. Though sometimes I like to divert from this route in order to create something very special. Some ideas just don't fit on journals any more and they are eager to break out of the 2.5D into a 3D space. 

This time me and Ashley were brainstorming about where does my art career is heading and I was feeling quite lost really, stuck up in custom orders without having much space to breathe and give life to my own creative ideas. It did happen like this couple of times before and he was always there to support me and push me towards the right direction. It's true they say that behind every successful man there is a wise woman. But I can also say that it's a complete Ditto! It works both ways as well! 

So while brainstorming and having a bit of a creative argument, as we both are very artistic minded people with strong characters, we came up to some sort of agreement on what we wanted to create. 

The plan required some good crystal hunt and so we went to my favourite crystal shop in London, Merton. I like going there as I never seen a place with more crystals anywhere else. I have selected a good set of stones for this and some other projects in future and I was very pleased with the hunt. You can see on the picture on the right the large beautiful labradorite which I used in this project. 

I started this project with a great desire and a wish to complete it, although I knew it will be quite challenging as I never worked with wire before to support the elements that are very thin and are not attached to the actual base of the artwork (like it is in journals). 

So the challenge was there and I think I had to bake the actual head 3 times before I actually attached it to the base of the artwork. Then it was easy and I was completely in peace about working on the base for as long as I could without baking it. I think the second time I baked the deer's head, I actually burned some antler parts, but it looked so nice, that I decided to use it as if it was supposed to be like this. 

It was also quite interesting to work on the actual background as I wanted to create a scene of the deserted place, where it is so dry, that even the earth is cracking onto millions of shingles. To imitate an effect of sand, dry earth, cracks and dirt, I have used a needle tool to draw the outlines of the cracks and then I worked around them, inside them, outside them and everywhere else with the Dots & Scratches tool to create an amazing effect of a crumbled hardened sand and clay. I do always use this tool for this effect as I find it's the best way to do it. 

As for the small thin and thick root-a-like strands, of course I used an extruder as I had to apply way too many strands.

I also very much  enjoyed working on tiniest details of this project like the little old snake skin on the back of the deer skull or the actual special feature of this journal, a tiny little iguana lizard with some microscopic spikes on it's back or the thorns in the dead branches. 

Unfortunately thought the majority of them just fell of while I was painting the artwork afterwards. Perhaps I should have used more liquid clay to support them. But anyways, here you can see how the iguana looked like before it was baked. It had so many miniature little spikes and thorns on it's face and back as well as it had every little toe on it's legs, nostrils and eyes. 

The actual idea from the very beginning was to create a huge Art-Necklace in a shape of a stag with very large and branchy antlers that look like two trees. The actual timber was supposed to be very dry and full of texture and the roots of these trees would go around the head crystal and would worm the shape of the deer's head. But when I started working on this project, I understood that it will be very heavy and brittle to wear, even if it's just for an artistic photo shoot and not for an everyday wear. 

I decided to use it for a treasure box project. I had these wonderful great quality leather boxes which I wanted to use for a while and so this was the time! 

The name of this Treasure Box is "The Secret of the Death Valley". I wanted to show that even in the most deadly and dry hopeless places, there always can be life found. So the thorns, branches, roots would symbolise death, thirst and where there are labradorite crystals, they would form a shape of a stag with antlers. A deer or a stag always meant to me something as beautiful as life itself. The symbol of a stag is always used in the most wonderful and spiritual ways, therefore in my mind it was a right symbol to use. Labradorite crystals do always associate with water in my head, so it was a perfect crystal to use. So, where there is death, there is death, but where there is water, there's always life. And all the living creatures are attracted to it. And this is the Secret of the Death Valley. The secret of the survival of it's living beings. 

So here is what I came up with in the very end. Enjoy and comment bellow to let me know what you think. 

This box is available for sale! 

Thank you very much for reading, 

Namaste.

Вопросы и Ответы на русском Nr. 8 от Утки Мандаринки. ГЛИНА, ЛАКИ и КРИТИКА!

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Thoughts and Doubts

Hello everyone and Happy New Year!

I know, I know it's the 6th of January, but I usually still say happy new year to everyone I see up until the 10th of January. So there we are. 2016!

The first week of January had passed and I felt very creative and made some paintings, practiced my calligraphy and meditated on some deep feelings and thoughts that were starting to boil inside my heart. 

Some of you, who are following me for quite some time or even new followers and people interested in my art, might think that I never struggle with my creativity. You guys are saying that I can't stop amazing you and each of my next work is better than the previous one... This is all very pleasant to my ears but in reality I am absolutely not feeling this. In anything, I am feeling like I am degrading, instead of progressing. This kind of sensations can have a couple of reasons and perhaps I have figured out a few and am ready to tell you about them. 

First of all, of course it doesn't help if you see some other people's art. It can inspire you a lot and it can also suck you in and give you obsessions and put you so much off track. Especially if you haven't yet strictly figured out what your track is.. I don't think that many artist do know where exactly they are heading... Or sometimes you marvel at somebody else's creations so much, that you waste all your creative powers and powers in general from just doing that. Some of the days I feel like a mother who is 10 months pregnant and still, nothing is coming out! I can have an idea in my head and perhaps even a sketch drawn somewhere, but I just can't start.

I have noticed that starting a project is actually the hardest part. Once you are in it, it's an ongoing process and you just add up some more and more until it's finished. If you are very inspired or had too much chocolate, then perhaps you can spend the night adding that little something or nailing through the whole project with a speed of light. But starting it, God, this is so hard for me. 

I remember once i needed to make a raven journal and I would walk around my room, clean it, go for walks, come back to my studio, move things around and I actually ended up painting the walls in my room ( this was during 2 days time and it felt crazy intense).. and in all this painting decorative mess, with paint jugs and brushes still standing on my table ... you know what I did? I pulled out my black clay and created a great Raven Samurai journal in the middle of the night in 3 hours. 3 hours!!!

 I don't quite know when exactly the "Working Energy Gates" do open and the flow of energy, inspiration and crazy ideas start to flow out of them, but it seems like that my gates are rather spontaneous and they don't get a clue what "business", "time" or "being organised" means. 

Some days I can just look at photos and pictures online and offline, go through other people's work, catalogues, books, movies, and I create nothing for days. Then Boom! and I am sitting and claying out of the blue or I have this vision before sleep in all the colour and motion of beautiful things and next morning I wake up at 5am from an urge to work and create. 

Seasonal depressions don't help either and even if my ones are more of an artistic mood swings, they still kick you out of your track for good. I am not mentally ill, I am just very sensitive to weather changes and to nature life cycles. And so I struggle. 

For the past couple of weeks I did put all of my clay work away as soon as I was finished with my urgent orders. I didn't feel like claying.. I was writing calligraphy and painting. I couldn't understand why, but I felt like my art had reached it's peak and not in a good sense. I felt like there is a block, but not in ideas, but in my skills, the way I do things and tools and materials I use, shapes I make, dimensions I work with. All the works I was doing were nice, but nothing like the great ideas in my head. And so I had even spoken to Ash about this, saying that I don't know what is going on, but it feels like I am shedding some skin and something is changing inside me, something is trying to grow out of me, something new but it haven't gone through the surface yet, so I don't know what it is. We discussed that I should not stop claying, that just painting might not bring me what I want from life and so on... To be honest I went away from this conversation even more dissatisfied than I was when it started... but then I went to my studio and put some music on (Solar Fields).. This music always keeps me energetic and gives me the sense of concentration and in good working state. 

I went googling for inspirations after inspirations, collecting ideas, visions, characters and after I did come up with a sketch of a journal I am willing to make. Yesterday I was positive this is going to be an A4 size journal. But now I am in doubt if I want this journal to be large A4 piece or a super detailed A5. I want the actual journal to be covered in leather, with book corners and all of the details that will make this book look very professionally made. Later on when this project is finally done, I will show you and will mention all the inspirations I had, as this picture contains bits and bobs from a few photographs and digital paintings of amazing artists and so I would love them to be credited for that properly. 

So here ladies and gentleman in my latest sketch of something I am willing to make.