Ready or Not, Here I Come!

I flew to Indianapolis this morning to attend the PMC Conference at Purdue University in Lafayette, IN.  For my non-metal clay friends, PMC is a brand name for precious metal clay.  Every other year hundreds of metal clay artists come together to get inspired, learn new skills and connect with friends.  This is my first conference, and to say I’m pretty jazzed up about it is an understatement!

The past 13 months since I first got my hands on silver clay have been a time of intense study, practice and progress.  It has been truly exhilarating to discover just how this material makes my creative spirit sing.  An unexpected bonus of working in metal clay is the vibrant community of artists who support each other on line, in print and out in the real world.  Through forums, blogs and Facebook, I’ve gotten to know many metal clay friends.  Today, I get to meet lots of them in person for the first time.  So excited!

This evening I’ll attend a  social event where many artists will swap charms.  The idea is that you make as many charms as you’d like to swap.  I made 10 charms, so by the end of the evening, I will have a treasure trove of 10 charms from different artists, while my charms will be in the collections of those 10 artists.  It’s a pretty cool way to get to know people and share a small piece of yourself with them.  My charms are in my fins and spheres style that’s based on the original Blue Fin piece.  You can read more about the inspiration for Blue Fin here.