Painting Floral Imagery

Donna has delivered us with some magic for her final project! Firstly I must say that there are NO paints used in this project.  This creation is constructed using only Kato Clay and a whole lot of skill and love!!

Deb, assisting our participants with some blending of clays using our very tired pasta machines.

Check out the colours achieved with the blending. Now for some rolling of canes........

 

....and tahdah...... one cane!

Donna weaving her magic with more canes.

Look at that. Not a paint brush in sight. That's Donna Kato magic and she was very generous to share her magic and techniques with us here in Mullewa. We are blessed!!

These are the creations of some very clever ladies here in Mullewa now, after spending a week soaking up Donna's knowledge and skills with Kato Clay.



Bone Pendant with Square Inset

Donna is back from a day of rest and ready to teach us the art of making a "bone pendant" from Kato Clay.  Another of Donna's clever trickery techniques she uses with her Kato clay.

 The ladies & GENT are obviously enjoying these workshops with all the laughter happening in this pic!!

 Now back to work people - Donna explaining the first few stages.

The fine art of making the square insert.

 

 

Students hard at work implementing the techniques Donna has shared with them.

 

 And WOW, here are the results of all the hard work for the day. Deb, again, has baked all of the creations ready for the final stage. This stage involves colouring the pendants to resemble 'bone'.

 

 

 

Yum Yum Earrings

...........and the colour keeps on coming!! Check these out for FUN!!  There is definitely nothing dull in Mullewa while these colourful creations are being made. These are Donna's "Yum Yum Earrings".

All that's missing is the liquorice - YUM, YUM!!

Lovely layers of clay - looks good enough to eat!

Some of the lovely ladies wearing their works of art. Thanks Donna Kato - very colourful!!

Mother & daughter team creating beautiful things here in Mullewa. 

Well Done Janine! Some more jewellery to add to your very large collection. Great work ladies!!

Send in the Clowns

This workshop sure did sound like we were in for some FUN, clowning around. Donna had us making very colourful creations using lots of stripes, dots and fun patterns.  These look amazing!! Deb worked her magic with them in the oven so we could take our creations home!!

Donna sharing more of her expertise with us Aussie's!!



Loving those circles!



Karen receiving a personalised lesson from Donna herself.

There's Deb's brilliant little hands working there magic to make sure our treasures are baked beautifully, ready for the next step. THANKS  a million Deb.

WOW these creations look amazing ladies! Can't wait to see what else Donna will have us creating!

Encased Transfer Pendant

Donna's second workshop was to teach us the art of transferring an image onto clay and then turn it into a brooch, pendant etc. I must say it was much easier than it looked and very therapeutic!! It worked much better with water than coffee as our Rachel discovered when her coffee was sitting a little too close to her work space!!



Donna sharing her knowledge & skills with the attentive ladies.

Making the 'zip' part of the project.

  

A transferred image and a 'zip' in the making.
 

Further instructions for the very keen polymer clay enthusiasts.

 Wendy concentrating on the skill of 'zip' making.

Rene & Naomi hard at work enjoying their new found skills.

Some of the completed transfer pendants/brooches.

 

 

 

 

 

Donna Kato weaves her magic in Mullewa!

One of the highlights of our Community Development project, A thousand Midwest Flowers is having the privilege to learn first hand from Donna Kato. Donna is an established polymer artist and tutor, who has authored several polymer clay instructional books and has come all the way from America to down town Mullewa to work with us. Yay!

Today we kicked off with her awesome 'Squiggles necklace'.

 

Ring Things

We got super busy making some pretty special rings today - and I have to say - some were very, very special.  Christi (in all her awesomeness) would continually demo different bits and pieces for anyone who wanted to learn more and today saw her demo one of her little curled up critters for Phil.  Check out the ring he ended up making - and when you consider this is the first time he's touched clay - it's pretty spectacular.

Wendy and her special rose ring.

A personal demo - yay!!

....and a beautiful yellow rose ring.

What beautiful colours.

and here's Phil.

...and here's his critter ring.  Awesome work Phil.