Trapping Spirits in Dolls

 

Holiday Fun and Doll-making

    Happy Christmas to those who celebrate it!  Also happy Yule a few days late!  I celebrate both, so if I ever have kids they probably will get to too. . . this would mean more presents, so I can’t see them as having any problem with it at all.  I got more cool things today than I was expecting, including a huge cage for Brown Jenkin- my rat, one of the Pendergast Books, a penguin pillow pal thing . . .and a pair of Nepalese Wool Glovemittens!  I’ll keep the holiday updates brief though so that I can get to what I’m really blogging about - Dolls!

    I have recently begun making Art Dolls to sell on my Etsy.  I have been sculpting them with Paperclay which is - for those of you who don’t yet know - an air-dry clay made from wood pulp and volcanic ash.  It’s sort of epic!  They are going far better than I had originally expected, and they’re super fun to make!  For now I’m just making little Fae dollies such as The Scare-you Crow, and Freddie the Key Thief.  It is my hope, however, to begin making and selling Ball Jointed Dolls made from resin eventually.  First of course though, I will make them with the Paper-clay so that I can get good enough and then make the master dollies to cast the molds the same way.

    I have been looking up tutorials on this, and I will include several links of note here.

    A Russian Site which is translated with Google Translate
    A series of You-tube videos where an artist is sculpting a head
    A step-by-step tutorial on making and casting the molds and resin
    And another English site which deals with hands. <3

    I seriously can’t wait to get started on these guys!  I may need some tools I don’t have yet, and I’ll definitely need to get a proper job so I can afford the sillicon or latex for the molds, but for the time being I happen to have a good 15 lbs of Paperclay at my disposal, which means a good amount of BJD’s depending on the size.   (The Non-Ball-Jointed Art Dolls so far only take about an eighth of a lb each.)

    I’ll post some more fun and interesting tidbits as I learn or find them, and probably some photos of my journey along the way.  Hopefully the faerie folk will get more and more epic as I go! Currently, I am working on developing wing-making technology. 

Body Parts Strewn on the Kitchen Counter

So, the latest fun things going on in the Tatterpunk’s life . . . .include body parts all over the kitchen counter, Art, Winter Solstices, and teeth!

Some people are Crafters, some people are Artists. It is interesting, talking to so many people on Etsy, because it has really let me see the difference between artist and crafter. I for instance, consider myself an artist. I make things because I need to make them, true they are multimedia works, or accessories, or generally things people would consider “crafts” but it’s all about the approach. I don’t do it to sell them. If I did, I think I might have gone crazy and quit by now considering I’ve sold all of ONE pair of glovies (though in one month, that’s pretty good).

I make things because I have to make them. Because I want to create some sort of illustration of the things going through my bizarre and insomnia-addled mind. I just happen to have a shop where I sell them. Therefore I don’t care if they’re marketable pieces or not, or if they scare the crap out of everyone who sees them (in fact that would be awesome).

I think that many folks who still consider themselves “crafters” are probably also artists, but I think the difference lies in the approach. What I consider a “crafter” is someone who makes things to sell specifically, lots of the same thing maybe. Thoughts?

I bring this up, because recently I began using teeth in my pieces. Specifically the Spirit Medium Ruff ( the Ruff ) and the Jenny Greenteeth cuffs ( The Cuffs ). I love these pieces, but initially when I showed the former to people, they started suggesting that I use canine (sharp pointy not dog) teeth instead of molars, because “molars are just creepy.” That sorta bugged me.  . . lots. It got me thinking though, that I really don’t care if this stuff sells - I mean.. . I do . . .because I need money (lots), but I don’t because it’s just my art and I’m doing what I love.

I guess I should explain the body-parts too . . . I’ve decided to make a few art dolls. . . or try my hand at it anyhow 0_o. I’ve been sculpting the head/chest, lower arms, and lower legs out of Paperclay. I have three dolls made. See if you can see what’s odd about the picture at the top!




Happy Yule folks!

Salmony Goodness and Chilly Winds

There is a chill wind blowing through the Storylands today. With it, I think shall come something stranger than has occupied this space previously.

The shop is coming along nicely, which is most excellent - though I still have yet to procure my first sales >_<.  I am hopeful though, for with the winter come the holidays and thusly the need for awesome things for people to wear or gift.  I have a solstice sale going on in my Etsy shop - The Tatterpunk Carnival of Curiosities 20% off before shipping when you use the coupon code SOLSTICESALE.  Alright, now, enough business business is boring. I will now proceed with the glorious madness!

Today I am going to talk about..... salmon. Yes. Salmon.

I had this for brunch today. I really enjoy baked salmon, and I am sure it is relatively good for me (except for the mercury). The trouble is that I have to bake it. This would not be a problem if not for the fact that the oven takes a long time to pre-heat. That bugs me.

Salmon bear a long mythological history. Loki turned into one to escape after killing Balder... but he was caught by Odhinn of course . ..  Also they stood for wisdom in Gaelic countries - in one such tale, a young man eats but a little smidgen of the juices from cooking a salmon and gains all of the wisdom of a man 100 years old. Salmony goodness here the story is recounted in a rather long-winded but assumedly accurate way. I, unfortunately, have not managed to gain any massive knowledge from eating salmon. But it sure does taste good in my tummy.

That said, I would probably like it better if salmon were a vegetable. Though they too have feelings and should not be thought of as lesser. Respect your food folks!

The Faerielands and what one may find there

As is customary with any first blog - or first thing that I do in general. I am writing this at 2:07 in the morning. This ensures that the utterances shall be in a word - quite mad.


To begin I will tell you what to expect from this blog. That, my friends, will be my first task here. I will expound upon the future contents of this working and allow you to know its innermost secrets. . . . . or I will just babble on about that for three sentences without telling you anything useful >_>

In this blog I will post anything and everything that I deem awesome. Tatterpunk, I might add, is a whimsical, dust-saturated fashion.... like shabby chic steampunk. It is filled with desaturated colours, tattered old lace and silk, faerie-like, carnivalistic,  and frayed. I came up with the term myself and I'm hoping it catches on. . . . I will most likely post about my newest crafts on Etsy as well as about other shops or blogs that I think need to be blogged about.

I also expect that there will be strange carny lore and urban ironside faerietales within these tent-walls. I am a bit too sleepy to make much sense anymore so I will stop this post now.

Goodnight, Gentle Reader. May you awaken on a bed of moss.