Pink Pearls by Tamara: Help, I Can't Stop Improving My Pieces!

I don't really mean the "Help" part (at least I don't think I do!), but it can almost be frustrating at times. I get a piece of jewelry or a collection finished (or so I think). I go to bed, and the next day when I look at it, I immediately see how I can improve it, or embellish it a little more, or something. I make the improvements and am happy with it. For a day or so. At this point I may or may not have done the photography. Again I see a way to take the piece to the next level. When I see it, I have to do it, so I go ahead and make the improvement, redo the photography if it was already done, and say "There, finished!" Until I see a picture of a necklace online, and it inspires me to take my jewelry to the next level again! You get the picture. This can happen several times. I'm learning not to be too quick to take my pictures!

I kind of wondered what was wrong with me. A lot of other jewelry artists seem to just make their pieces, photograph them, and move on. But then one day I was reading a book by Thomas Kinkade, called "The Art of Creative Living" (wonderful book!). He said that in his studio, in addition to the painting he was working on, he had about 50 paintings all around the room, and he would commune with them over the course of the day. He might even be on the phone when his eyes would fall on one of his paintings, and he would see a way to improve it. He would say "just a moment" to the person he was talking to, run over and put a sticky note on the painting so he would remember his idea. When I read that, all of a sudden I felt better. I immediately thought, "That's me!" I realized that that trait is the artist in me that just can't be satisfied until a piece reaches its highest potential.

So that's what has happened over the last couple of days for me again. I saw ways to improve the two body necklaces I shared in the last two posts. They're fairly small improvements, as the pieces were pretty much "there", but they needed to be done just the same, and the photography needed to be redone too.

On the "Water Violets" necklace, I had just been feeling that I wanted to create a bit more of a focal point on one of the sides, and eventually found the way to do that - by adding a bit of deeper color, and a bit more silver, in the center of the top bunch of flowers, to make it actually look like one big flower. I paint on my lace sometimes to enhance the color, or to add other tones. I also added a little bow in the center of the pendant.