Jessica Beels Design

This October 26 through 28, I will be selling my jewelry at the first weekend show in almost two years!  I was honored to be invited to show at the Smithsonian’s Craft 2 Wear show at the Building Museum in late October.  It’s all wearables, so I will only have my jewelry there, but please come by and say hello and see what I’ve been up to!  I hope to post images here of a new series of geometric necklaces.  I also plan to add color to my inventory again – mostly charcoal (I know – a color??) and red – in addition to the usual natural flax and abaca colors.

Hope to see you there!!

Elyse Harrison of Studio Neptune (an amazing artist in her own right! – see link below) is blogging about artists’ childhoods, and I am honored that she chose to interview me a few months ago.  Here is the profile she published after our talk.

What an interesting experience to blab for an hour or so and then see how you turn out!  I discovered some hidden connections between my present work and my distant past.  No wonder so much of my work is about math and science, close observation, and winging it.

Thanks, Elyse, for unearthing the stories and making them all hang together.

Here is a link to Elyse’s work, as well.

I have known Molly since she was six and the younger sister of my best friend from high school.  She remains six years old in my mind, even though I know she is now a fully grown person, with kids of her own.  She has a fun and diverting blog called the Waffler in which she decides (or doesn’t) what to do about all sorts of things – what color to paint a room, where to put a rug, which shoes to wear to a party – nothing terribly heavy, but stuff that can really bog you down.  She also helps others with their waffles. Check it out!

She has a section on her blog called “No-Waffles” and I am pleased to say that she has listed my jewelry in that category.  Thanks Molly!  Glad you like my stuff.

The Beyond Garbage blog got me started fusing plastic – not the most environmentally friendly of activities.  Yes, it reuses materials, but the toxins released during the fusing are a bit frightening.  Open windows!  Mucho ventilation!  Still, I am very happy with the piece I made for the call for entries and the jury liked it too, so I got in.  The show was up for a year at the DC offices of the Union of Concerned Scientists (1825 K Street, NW, in downtown Washington, DC) and after the show was over, they bought the piece!  So it is still there.

Can’t See the Forest for the Trees

I really enjoyed making this piece.  It is a wall hanging with an element of movement and shadow.  Depending on how you light it, the material can look more or less translucent, focusing on the surface qualities or on the space around and behind the piece.

Joss paper detail

This piece is about many of the “green” issues plaguing us these days.  It is made from fused plastic shopping bags.  The tree trunks are Whole Foods bags (highlighting the irony of buying organic fruits and veggies and taking them home in plastic bags).  The colored plastic is a combination of heavyweight fancy boutique bags with layers of flimsier clear veggie bags to fuse the layers, with acrylic paint incorporated to add a metallic accent.  The fluttering leaf/squares are inspired by joss paper, squares of often gold-leafed paper that are burned for good luck (e.g., hoping for a prosperous New Year) and to venerate one’s ancestors.  By adding leaf outlines to the joss paper, I hoped to show the “free” leaves as being “money to burn.”

The frame is made from copper tubing left in my basement by the previous owners of my house, so I got to reuse almost everything in the sculpture.

This should be a lovely show. I am thrilled to be showing with Joan Belmar and Elissa Farrow-Savos, both of whose work I love.

Hope you can make it!  Or, if you are visiting the site after the show is closed, see what we are up to now….  Or go to Gallery 555 and see what Jodi has installed at the time.  Always worth a look-see.