Artist feature: Kathleen Hayward

Kathleen Hayward creates unique beaded jewelry and mixed media wind chimes using upcycled and found materials.

She became interested in "made objects" while working as an industrial photographer in the 1980s. Her passion evolved into the use of black and white photography and traditional lab development processes to capture man-made objects juxtaposed against a natural landscape setting.

Kathleen is still involved in photography but decided to pursue jewelry making in 1999. She uses her previous knowledge of free-flowing space and color to create new objects in the form of jewelry. She taught herself to create sterling silver jewelry and started adding beads to create one-of-a-kind pieces of wearable art. This led to new ideas that included wind chimes constructed from silver plated tea service, driftwood, silverware, upcycled and found materials, and semi-precious stones and beads. Kathleen also uses spoon and fork handles left over from the construction of wind chimes to create new objects such as spoon rings and bracelets with detailed embellishments.

Kathleen does most of her work in her home studio and takes custom orders, offering one-on-one design services to meet the needs of her clients.

She has participated in the Bizarre Bazaar for eight years and more of her work can be found on her website.

Artist Feature: Chelsea McKee

Chelsea McKee is a glass artist specializing in lampwork glass beads and jewelry. She works from a studio located in the back of the Rivendell Bookstore in downtown Abilene, KS. Chelsea has been doing lampwork for about six years, creating a wide variety of pieces ranging from individual beads and pendants to finished sets of jewelry.

 

Chelsea enjoys working with glass because it gives a great range of color and form to work with. This will be her first year at the BizBaz, and she's excited to share her work.

More of Chelsea's work can be found online in her Etsy shop or on Facebook. 

Artist Feature: Bill Collins

Bill Collins works with sterling silver, gold, and precious stones.  He began making jewelry in junior high and started winning awards in high school (including a national award!).  He graduated from KU in the metalsmithing department and went to work as a designer in Carmel Valley, CA. 

Bill eventually started his own business, creating pieces in a studio from start to finish.  Some of his creations include prairie inspired pieces and this will be his third year at the BizBaz. Find Bill's work online on Etsy or Facebook.

Artist feature: Betsy Keleher

Betsy Keleher is an artist who works with fabric, creating a variety of quilts, blankets and pillows.  She started sewing with her mother more than 50 years ago and continued to develop her skills as she got older.  About 15 years ago she started making pillows for graduation gifts and "just kept sewing".  Since then, she's expanded to quilts and blankets.

Betsy works out of her home, taking over the ping pong table in the recreation room as her main work station.  This will be Betsy's fourth year participating in the Bizarre Bazaar and she is open to taking custom orders. 

Betsy is working on a new website but can currently be reached via email at Bkeleher@swbell.net.

Artist feature: Cecilia Labora

Cecilia Labora is an artist who creates glass beads, components and jewelry. Her fascination with the beauty of beads and the opportunity they offer in creative expression began when she was a child. Cecilia worked in other mediums including batik, ceramics, drawing and pastel painting before making glass beads.

She took a class about 10 years ago, learning to work with the molten glass to create beads (referred to as flameworked or lampworked beads), studying under masters to hone her craft.

Cecilia creates from her home, working with soda-lime and borosilicate glass. She also incorporates metal foils, enamels and other glass embellishments to her beads. She then uses the beads to create one of a kind jewelry pieces, pairing the glass with metal chain and natural stones.

Cecilia takes custom orders and this will be her first year at the BizBaz. More of her work can be found online on her website and her Facebook page.

Artist Feature: Sophia Compton

Sophia Compton is an artist who creates wearable art.  She does silk painting that can be hung as artwork or worn.  She enjoys the brilliant colors the painting lends to the silk items and the creative freedom of the medium.  She adds that the receptivity of the silk to the dyes and its luster never ceases to amaze her. 

This will be Sophia's second year at the Bizarre Bazaar and also as a Lawrencian.  She is involved with the Lawrence Art Guild and Lawrence Creates.  Sophia loves being in Lawrence because she feels as though she is continually surrounded by the creativity of others.

She will be participating in several shows in the area this year - more of her work can be viewed online in her Etsy shop.

Artist feature: Desiree Warren

Desiree Warren is an artist who works with repurposed street sign vinyl on aluminum to make clocks and vinyl on found and repurposed papers and wood to make wall art.  She also creates stickers, vinyl decorated candles and vases, and greeting cards.

 

Desiree started creating this way while finishing up her degree in sculpture at KU, morphing into the work she does today over the last seven years.  She's been a clock maker since 2006 and works out of her home in Midtown KCMO. She loves to work with clients to create custom clocks.

Desiree adds that all of her aluminum is American sourced as well as her clock mechanisms.  EVERY PIECE of vinyl she uses is kept out of the waste stream because she shuffles through some very generous companies' scrap bins. 

This will be Desiree's third year at the BizBaz and she also sells her creations online, at regional art shows, and at m.a.s.h. handmade in the Westport area of Kansas City.  You can find more of Desiree's work on her website, her Etsy shop, on Pinterest, on Twitter (@EightyAcresArt), or on her blog, where she writes about her adventures in the Heartland, making art, and starting out as a 'picker'.

Artist feature: Kale Van Leeuwen

Kale Van Leeuwen is an artist who creates mixed media paintings.  He begins with photographs he's taken, edits them in photoshop, then prints them to tear apart and use in collages.  Once that is done, Kale paints directly on top of the collage and finally finishes them with a gloss varnish.

Kale has been painting all his life and earned a BFA at Pittsburg State University in 2003, but started this collage process in 2008. He does most of his work in his basement at home. Since the birth of his son in March, Kale has started creating children's art as well and has even written a book featuring that work.

This will be Kale's first year at the Bizarre Bazaar.  More of his work can be found on his website, his Facebook page, and in his Etsy shop.

Guest post: Rachael Sudlow / Lost Wax Casting

Rachael Sudlow is an artist who has participated for several years at the Bizarre Bazaar.  She is a creative metalsmith who also teaches classes at the Lawrence Arts Center.

One of the techniques that Rachael uses is lost wax casting.  She has provided information to share the process and some resources below in a guest post.

The process is also demonstrated in a video here.
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Lost wax casting is how most typical commercial jewelry is created (most wedding rings are made this way!).  The piece starts as a carved wax model.  This is finished, smoothed and sized to perfection.  An example of some of my wedding bands can be seen being prepped here.

The waxes are then setup on a stick of wax called a sprue.  The sprue holds the ring in place and when the molten metal is poured, creates a pathway for it to flow into the design.  Many wax pieces can be cast at once. 

After the wax pieces are all mounted on a special rubber base, a steel jar is fitted over the setup.  The top of it is open and a special plaster mix called investment is poured in.  That it is left to dry out for a few hours.  The rubber base is then pulled off, revealing a formed pour spout leading to the waxes, which are now locked in place in the investment. 

The flask is put inside a kiln and heated up over a matter of several hours.  This burns out the wax, revealing a hole in the desired shape. 

The metal of choice (bronze, silver, gold, etc) is heated till it's molten.  At that point, the mold flask is pulled from the hot kiln, put on a vacuum table, and the molten metal is poured into the spout.  After a few seconds of vacuuming, the flask is pulled off, dunked in water and the metal piece is revealed.  The cast rings can be seen here.  LOTS of cleanup must occur after that. 

Those raw rings are then polished up and can be seen here.

Because of casting safety issues (we are dealing with molten metal and burning wax!), I do all my casting at the Lawrence Arts Center in their well outfitted jewelry classroom.  I teach jewelry classes there and am happy to share the process!

www.rachaelsudlow.com
http://sudlow.etsy.com

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Artist Feature: Troy Richardson

Troy Richardson is an artist who hand cuts and sets his own gemstones.  He's been a student of gemology for years and decided that rather than purchasing gemstones, he should make them himself.


Troy shares his process for cutting and polishing a gemstone:

Once cut, he sets the gemstones in a variety of ways:

Although Troy has been cutting gemstones for a couple of years, this will be his first year at the Bizarre Bazaar.  He enjoys working with customers to create special orders, adding, 'If you are not creating, you are not truly living.'

More of Troy's work can be found online at  www.excessdesign.com. 

Artist Feature: Mary Lynn Gress

Mary Lynn Gress creates upcycled jewelry from heirloom pieces like watches, brooches, and broken necklaces.  She also upcycles other items, giving new life to old cigar boxes and jewelry boxes and loves restoring items that already have a sentimental meaning.     

Mary Lynn works from her studio in her garage and loves to create custom orders to fit the personality of her customer.  

This will be her second year at the Bizarre Bazaar and more of her work can be found on her website and in her Etsy shop.

Artist Feature: Anna Walker

Anna Walker is an artist who primarily works with felt.  She loves the tactile nature of the fibers as they come together to form an unwoven fabric that can then be made into a variety of artwork.  Anna adds felt embellishments to her beadwork, wirework, and stitching.

Anna has been felting for about four years and started after she picked up a needle felting kit at Hobby Lobby.  Since then, she has discovered multiple tools, equipment and education to continue her work in felt.  She works from a bedroom in her home and enjoys creating custom orders.

This will be Anna's third year at the Bizarre Bazaar and more of her work can be found online on her blog, on Twitter (@FELTit), or her Artfire shop.  She also teaches felting classes in Topeka and information about those classes can be found at the Potwin Fiber Artisans website.

 

Artist Feature: Kara McKamey

Kara McKamey creates and teaches ceramics at Muddy Waters Studio in Lawrence.  She started working with ceramics by taking a pottery class her senior year in college and then studied under an artist in Vermont before opening her own studio in 2006. 

This will be Kara's second year at the Bizarre Bazaar.  More information about classes at her studio and her work can be found online on her website or on Facebook.

Artist Feature: Ripp Harrison

Ripp Harrison is an artist working primarily in colored pencil and watercolor paint (he also dabbles in ceramics and recycled metal sculpture).  He started working in pencil in college, doodling in black and white and has been doing this work for the last seven years.

Ripp creates his artwork at home with lots of input from his four legged editing crew and feels that his environment helps make his work entertaining. He takes custom orders and this will be his first year participating in the Bizarre Bazaar.

More of Ripp’s work can be found online on his website  or on Facebook.

Artist Feature: Laura Reaka

Laura Reaka creates artwork with acrylics on canvas.  She has been an artist all of her life, working as a graphic artist for 25 years.  She started LULU paintings four years ago and does her painting in an attic studio space in her home. 

Laura's favorite thing about painting is that people smile when they see her work and give her great feedback; she was once even told, "you made my day a little happier"!

This will be Laura's first year at the Bizarre Bazaar and she takes custom orders--more of her work can be found online in her Etsy shop and on Facebook.