"...There’s a hawk high in the heavens
A truly magnificent bird
He waits on wings of silver
To bring the glorious word
And he flies, he flies alone
Yes he flies, he flies alone"
I tried new things on this brooch. The brass stripes on the right side are brazed inlays. I carved out the oxidized steel , fluxed it and brazed brass onto it. The oxide layer prevents to a certain grade that everything around the hollow space is brazed also.
But anyway the piece has to be grinded and sanded down after brazing, until everything is even. Then it has to be oxidized again.
On the left side I plated the sanded steel with copper plating solution. Works very good on steel.
This brooch has to be changed a little bit tomorrow. Some things I realized only when I looked close at the photo.
steel and brass brazed and soldered, spinel synth. 3mm
To avoid rusting of the steel on the skin I had to think about a method. I choose brass as an inside ring for the steel outside. Brass tarnishes the skin only a little bit, and after a while it doesn`t do it almost no more at all (strange phenomenon, which is not only observed by myself. Other people describe it too.
I couldn`t find a good explanation for this up to now. It is about the same with copper. When you are sick it starts tarnishing again. This might come from sweating and higher body temperature.)
It would be too expensive in the long run to use medium or hard silver solder for joining such relatively large pieces. But the cheaper soft silver bearing solder would flow away when you try to heat-oxidize the steel later. So I came to the idea to use brass (brazing). This has the additional advantage of having the same color as the brass inside ring. It works with common brass wire and soldering flux, but a high temperature is necessary. I can reach it with a MAP gas hand torch. [combustion temperature of MAP gas 2,020 °C (3,670 °F). The surface of the sun is 5505 °C (9932° F).]
rectangular pieces of welding steel and brass were brazed together with brass wire. The resulting piece was cut in the middle, and the 2 pieces were soldered together again at one point with medium silver solder. The steel and brass were grinded and shaped with various cutting discs and grinding stones, a silver bezel was set into a drilled hole in the steel and soldered on. the steel was blackened and polished repeatedly. Then it was hammered with two different sized hammers. The brass was treated with diamond discs (ripping up the surface, producing a sparkling surface) and polished to different grades at different places. A part of the reddish oxidized brass (copper oxide) was not removed completely. The stone was set with an agate burnisher and polishing wheels. The whole ring was polished repeatedly at different times with polishing wheels, Tripoli, Red Rouge and Fabulustre.
Sunday, July 17, 2011
brooch nickelsilver, nickedlsilver and steel darkened, copper plated nickelsilver, brass bezel, Sterling and fine silver silver parts, nugold, epoxy, enamel powder, Swarovski crystals,wax and varnish coated
brooch and pendant "New York"
nickelsilver, brass, acrylic, oxidized steel, fine silver, Swarovski, emerald synth5mm, onyx10mm, gold flakes, epoxy, pen, acrylic paint, Sterling silver chain, pin on back
inside oxidized, surface additionally sealed with renaissance wax to prevent rusting
the copper parts are embossed, heat colored and riveted to the steel body
Jewelry made of lapis lazuli from Afghanistan, which was mined already 6000 years ago, meteorite pieces from outside the earth, and metals, that will corrode to dust in the earth again, from which they were once gained by human invention and work.
Metamorphoses. That`s the Cosmic Blues!
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, from "the sorrows of young Werther":
It is as if a curtain had been drawn from before my eyes, and, instead of prospects of eternal life, the abyss of an ever open grave yawned before me. Can we say of anything that it exists when all passes away, when time, with the speed of a storm, carries all things onward,—and our transitory existence, hurried along by the torrent, is either swallowed up by the waves or dashed against the rocks? There is not a moment but preys upon you,—and upon all around you, not a moment in which you do not yourself become a destroyer. The most innocent walk deprives of life thousands of poor insects: one step destroys the fabric of the industrious ant, and converts a little world into chaos. No: it is not the great and rare calamities of the world, the floods which sweep away whole villages, the earthquakes which swallow up our towns, that affect me. My heart is wasted by the thought of that destructive power which lies concealed in every part of universal nature. Nature has formed nothing that does not consume itself, and every object near it: so that, surrounded by earth and air, and all the active powers, I wander on my way with aching heart; and the universe is to me a fearful monster, for ever devouring its own offspring.
Es hat sich vor meiner Seele wie ein Vorhang weggezogen, und der Schauplatz des unendlichen Lebens verwandelt sich vor mir in den Abgrund des ewig offenen Grabes. Kannst du sagen: Das ist! da alles vorübergeht? da alles mit der Wetterschnelle vorüberrollt, so selten die ganze Kraft seines Daseins ausdauert, ach, in den Strom fortgerissen, untergetaucht und an Felsen zerschmettert wird? Da ist kein Augenblick, der nicht dich verzehrte und die Deinigen um dich her, kein Augenblick, da du nicht ein Zerstörer bist, sein mußt; der harmloseste Spaziergang kostet tausend armen Würmchen das Leben, es zerrüttet ein Fußtritt die mühseligen Gebäude der Ameisen und stampft eine kleine Welt in ein schmähliches Grab. Ha! nicht die große, seltne Not der Welt, diese Fluten, die eure Dörfer wegspülen, diese Erdbeben, die eure Städte verschlingen, rühren mich; mir untergräbt das Herz die verzehrende Kraft, die in dem All der Natur verborgen liegt; die nichts gebildet hat, das nicht seinen Nachbar, nicht sich selbst zerstörte. Und so taumle ich beängstigt. Himmel und Erde und ihre webenden Kräfte um mich her: ich sehe nichts als ein ewig verschlingendes, ewig wiederkäuendes Ungeheuer.
