YOJ09-40 Knotted Tourmaline Earrings

Knotted Tourmaline Earrings (2009)
Constructed, cold joined
Sterling silver, fine silver, tourmaline

Recently members of the Starving Artists Etsy Team did a critique of my Etsy shop.  One of the comments that came up a couple of times was that my descriptions tend to be a bit on the sparse side.  I generally give information about the piece, what it’s made of, basic sizing, etc., but only rarely is there a “story”.

My reply to one of the ladies who asked me about this was “Well, sometimes the design is the result of nothing more than “I had this idea and decided to play around with it.” ”

The truth is that I just have no talent for writing bullshit.  What I write has to feel authentic, otherwise it doesn’t work for me.  Hmmm…. maybe I need to look into a creative writing course…

Anyways… I was playing around with some scraps of wire left over from working on my Clip-on Earrings tutorial.  I tied the wire up in a small knot – not quite as tight as I would have liked, but it worked.  I have a “thing” about dangles, so I added these little tourmalines.  I love the vibrant pink – they’re just juicy!  The result is a cute pair of earrings that works for everyday wear.

The SATeam critique did confirm one thing: my photography is pretty good. It never stops surprising me how much time it takes to get the photography done. Nowadays, I’m not only doing photos for my regular record keeping; I’m also doing set up for Etsy. “Product” photography is different from jury photography – attention must be paid to angles, and multiple positions. A lot of people on Etsy photograph on elaborate backgrounds. I have yet to find one that works for me, so I’m still working with the “jurying grey”.

Photographing studs is difficult at the best of times, but these earrings were particularly challenging. There was just no good way of laying them nicely to get a straight-on shot. Finally, I decided to cut a upright display card out of an old layout board and poke holes in it. Voilà! It worked!

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