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Skull beads

Recently when I was procrastinating in the studio, I made some skull beads instead of doing whatever it was I was supposed to be doing.

I quickly snapped these photos with my phone as I was working and posted them to Instagram.

Once the beads had been bisque fired to 1000 degrees, I coloured them with a Red Iron wash.

I played around with the wash and really rubbed it back on two of the skulls so that they would have a more bone like quality once they had been fired to stoneware temperature.

And here they are, all finished and skull like sitting in one of my tiny salt bowls.

As all the photos I post using Instagram also go to twitter and facebook. There was a good response from you to the skull beads and so I have started to make some more using the plastic pollution I picked up this week from Dr Lavers.

I used a cigarette lighter that has come from the bellies of dead albatross on the Kure Atoll, to make the eyes and I used a balloon clip from the plastic pollution from Midway Atoll to make the mouths.

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  • Sadhana December 1, 2012, 10:13 am

    I LOVE these guys Kim! 😀
    Such quirky expressions.
    I feel like I can hear them chattering away to them selves,so noisy.
    haha they are SO alive!
    Sadh

    • frogpondsrock December 1, 2012, 10:16 am

      Yes, that is it exactly Sadhana, chatter chatter chatter. I am pleased you like them

  • Elephant's Child December 1, 2012, 9:31 pm

    And how appropriate to use the plastic pollution which causes death to make the skulls. Brilliant.

    PS: Your beautiful bowl is one of the stars of my last post.

    • frogpondsrock December 2, 2012, 8:25 am

      I saw, thank you. And thank you for the donation to the Starlight Foundation.

  • river December 2, 2012, 8:11 am

    I like the little salt bowl filled with skulls.
    These would make great Halloween decorations, just blu-tac them all over your front door and other places.

    • frogpondsrock December 2, 2012, 8:26 am

      Or you could hang them by threads so that people brushed up against them and received a fright 🙂

  • Alison December 2, 2012, 9:47 am

    Weird to find skulls adorable, but they kind of are.