ACC Wholesale Show

Last wednesday we took a trip to the ACC wholesale show at the Baltimore Convention Center. I have to admit, I saw a lot of good work, learned about a few new techniques, and only wish I could have stayed longer. The place was pretty big and I only had a certain amount of time to stay. I wish I could have gone back for the retail sale, unfortunately, I was home all weekend working. Some of the people I spoke to there were Connie Verrusio, and George Sawyer. What drew me to Connie's work was that it showed many examples of what we have been talking about in class the last few weeks. She made jewelry from many found things such as rulers, gadgets and the like. She also did a lot of etching and texturing. She told us she has recently gotten into photo-etching which spawned a whole conversation about. She told her we were students and had been learning those types of things and she was happy to offer advice and tips. One thing she mentioned was powdered solder? She said it is much easier to work with.
George Sawyer was also quite interesting to talk to. His work showed a technique called makume. Which was originally used for the hilts of Japanese swords. The technique seems to be quite long and laborious but had an interesting end effect. It was done by lamentation different sheets or metal, then folding and cutting it open to expose the patterns inside. Then it was all about rolling out the metal and making it thin enough to eventually turn into rings. He also did work which he called Koi which is similar to fusing. He said Jewelry has to tell a story or its dead. It must speak.
Two techniques that I saw a lot of and am interested in in learning about were fusing and Kumboo ( which has an end result that looks much like solder inlay however it is much more precise and seems easier.)
All in all it was a very eventful afternoon. There was a lot of information thrown at us and all we could do was hope that at least some of it stuck. For me, I think some of it did. I am glad that I went. It was a good experience.