After completing the contrast assignment, some of the students went on strike. We had to do online learning since it was not safe to be on campus. The task given to us was to make a birthstone poster using Canva. The birthstones that we use must be our family members' birthstones. The stone must relate to the person in some way. Before I started the poster campus was reopened so I completed it on campus.
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| My birthstone poster |
Two weeks of manufacturing and I have finally completed the contrast necklace. The most challenging part of this assignment was soldering everything together, since the jump rings and plates were so thin it could easily melt. In the end I soldered everything without any problems. The final part of the assignment was posting the jewellery piece on Instagram. I am so proud of the end result that it has inspired me to make other jewellery pieces that is related to this theme.
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| The completed necklace. |
After making the prototype, I was given the go ahead by the lecturer to start making the final piece. I had silver leftover from my previous projects so I used it to make plates for the snowflakes. When I received silver I made wire for jump rings. With the snowflake offcuts I made a 0.3mm thick plate for the wave links. I then soldered jump rings to the waves to help link them, and I soldered jump rings together to form flowers. To make the flowers look neat I cut out circles from a plate and soldered it to the centre of the flowers. I am currently working on this piece.
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| Multiple pictures of the manufacture process |
On Monday my design was evaluated by my lecturers and my piece was not approved by them. They liked my design but not as earrings so they suggested I change the earrings into a necklace. After I changed the piece, I was allowed to start making a prototype. Paper, clay or metal were the allowed materials for making the prototype. Choosing to making the prototype necklace out of paper was effective since it took about 20 minutes to make. I could move on to the next part of the assignment.
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| Necklace prototype |
Designing a jewellery piece that is based on contrast is not complicated since there are so many factors that can differ. Instead of choosing the different types of metals to contrast in my design I choose a contrasting theme of seasons but I only used winter and spring. I first wanted to make a bracelet with alternating flower and snowflake charms but my final design is snowflake earrings with flowers that hang from the ends of the snowflake. I named this piece winter bloom.
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| Winter bloom |
The Ashanti bracelets that my class and I made is being showcased at the Wits Art Museum. The bracelets are a part of the Material Encounters Exhibition. When the Exhibition is over the bracelets will be returned to us.
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| Showcase of the Ashanti bracelets. |
Exploring the world of contrast led me to understand what it means in; art, design, poetry and jewellery. After learning what contrast means, I created a Pinterest board and saved all the pins that I thought was good examples of contrast. When I was looking at images of things that contrast I kept comparing the themes that the piece might convey. The one question I had to answer was ' What does contrast mean to me?' For me it is the difference between themes or within a theme where elements differ. The themes that I think that contrast are natural and man made and contrasts within a theme is seasons.
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| My research on contrast. |
