Hello Blog. It's been a while. I put aside my mosaics while remodeling and painting my home, vacationing on the beach with my dogs (and other family), and a number of other distractions. But I'm back in the studio now spending several hours a day nipping & cementing. Flashback to 2008- my first marble piece I became frustrated with- I have now begun anew -I've worked through several problems, and it truly has been a learning experience for me. My goal is to finish it in time to enter it into the Mosaic International Competition sponsored by SAMA - the deadline is in Sept. I have no illusions that I will actually be accepted (I probably have about the same odds as winning the lottery- BUT- you don't enter, you can't win). I find that just knowing it will be entered in a competition makes me do better work (sad isn't it, I have to trick myself!) And I just think the whole entering process adds a sense of taking it seriously -- I'm going to have it professionally photographed also. I hope to have it completed by the end of this week and may post photos then- I still have a couple of places that I may need to rip out and redo. Ripping out has been one of my learning experiences. At first ripping out parts of my mosaic was disheartening & I really resisted - but now I find it a bit freeing! When I do not correct a mistake I find myself fretting over it every time I look at the mosaic or a photo. Learning to redo areas was not an "ah-ha" moment- but a "duh!" moment.

Anthology I --finally finished!

I still need to clean it up a bit-then it is on to the other 2 matching pieces that will make it a triptych. I really like this piece-- the materials are so wonderful. There area couple of things that I might have done differently (like the white marble) but not much.

This piece has so many different types of minerals in it- I'm not sure what they all are! I do know marble, iron ore, pyrite, chrysocolla, malicate. I don't know what the green colored stone is- or the black with crystals running through it. Any ideas? Anyone?

Below is a close up-- i love the areas with the mineral "dust".

Here is my latest -- all I have left to complete is the upper left background. This is going to be a triptych - it is a commission made for a friend-- the same one I made the table for- this will be for her father and brothers. I have great material to work with! I'm still trying to identify all of the rock samples she gave me. I do know that all came from a copper mine. I'm using marble in the background and the dark blue is smalti she brought to me from Murano. I also still need to think of a name.

Here area a couple of "side views" to show you the depth. The thing I love (and hate) about photographing my work is that when I look at the photo all of the flaws jump out at me! I'm also trying a new technique in this piece. I've been reading a book about Jeanne Reynal's work. She used the left over dust from cutting stone and glass in her mosaics. What I had left over was quite beautiful- so I incorporated areas in the mosaic where I tapped it into the thinset base.