Welcome to my site!

(which is still under construction)

Last updated 25 July 2010

Art in the outback ...

I live in Newman, Western Australia and make handcrafted jewellery and other arty objects.

 
My main sales outlets are the Newman Visitors Centres and the local markets. I stock different items in these outlets: the Newman Visitors Centre stocks my more arty, labour intensive items of jewellery whereas I sell my more everyday jewellery and wire jewellery at the markets. I also sell gemstone beads and other beading supplies, polymer clay and related tools (such as mini cookie cutters, blades and rollers for the clay), jewellery lucky dips for girls and whatever else happens to strike my fancy at the markets.
 
I hope to build a bigger and better online sales presence through my Artfire.com site which can be found at http://www.chantelmccabe.artfire.com.
 
I have also started painting again so I hope to have something worth showing soon.
 
I hope you enjoy browsing my site!
 
Photo below: my rendition of a Sharilyn Miller design in fine silver and copper on my workbench. Fine silver is 99.9% pure silver.
 
 

Wide variety of styles and materials ...

I would struggle to confine myself to one genre of jewellery-making or one medium. Consequently I dabble in a several different techniques and materials. Of late, I have come to realise that the following are my areas of interest and I am in a sense now confining myself to these very broad parameters:

Seedbeading - I love those tiny little glass beads! I particularly favour Japanese seedbeads such as TOHO and Miyuki but also love Czech seedbeads. Techniques used with these beads include weaving, embroidery and sometimes even simply stringing.

Metalwork - I have fairly recently started teaching myself some basic metalwork skills. Techniques include cold connections such as rivetting and fusing fine silver and argentium sterling silver. Cutting, texturing, applying a patina, etc all form part of this challenging, exciting genre of jewellery-making. I do this work using metal sheet such as fine silver, Argentium sterling silver, copper and brass. I also have plans to use Shibuichi and Shaduko (two exotic Japanese alloys) and 9ct gold. My metalwork is often combined with wirework.

Wirework - the appeal of working in wire is irresistable! Twirls, swirls, wraps and more, the sky is the limit once you start adding beads and gems to this kind of work. My metal of the moment is Argentium sterling silver which is a low tarnish version of traditional sterling silver. I also work in rolled gold (also known as gold-filled which must not be confused with the lesser gold-plated version), fine silver, copper, brass and bronze.

Metal clay - Art Clay Silver and Hadar's Copper Clay are my two mediums in this field. Working in metal clay adds all sorts of possibilites to my metalwork as these clays can be handled in similar ways to regular clay.

Polymer clay - what an astonishing medium! Polymer clay is a manmade clay with limitless potential. Don't think of it as that stuff you played with as a child ... it is way more than that!

Chainmaille - with its origins in days gone by, chainmaille jewellery is truly fascinating whether to make it or simply to behold it. I'm busy working on a "scale maille" project at the moment where my handcut copper scales will be grafted onto a chainmaille base. A truly alternative result is anticipated!

Basic beading techniques - the above are sometimes brought together by some basic techniques like stringing or wire links.

 

This all brings me to the concept of FUSION in my jewellery-making. Being versed in many different mediums and styles, I like to bring several of these aspects together in one piece of jewellery which results in an end product that is unique and truly original.