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Isabel Rucker Artist

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Drawing + Painting

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Unfurling

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I am wire forming for use in a pair of hoop earrings. First I melt silver scrap and pour it into an ingot maker, an ingot is a little bar of metal. Once I have that little bar I roll it through a rolling mill and slowly change its form into a long square wire. It takes many passes through each section of the rolling mill to proceed to smaller sizes. Once I have the wire close to my desired round wire thickness, I begin to draw it through a wire plate because that squeezes it into round wire shape. Here are just four photos of a long process that also includes softening, or annealing, with a torch to make it workable. #Metalsmith #Ingot #Silversmithing #HopeEarrings #SilverWire
Jewelry relaxation video! Prehnite from Australia set in gold on a triple silver hammered ring band. One of a kind and available on my website in the Rings category (link in bio). 🌊 #Waves #Mendocino #Ocean #beachtime #prehnite
Five new gemstone rings! Each gem is wrapped in 14K gold and set on silver hammered rings. There are two iridescent rainbow moonstones, an otherworldly green prehnite, a royal purple amethyst, and an ocean blue topaz. Sizes vary and all are available on my website (link in bio). ✨If you love one and it isn’t your size I can work with you on a similar custom made ring. ✨ #prehnite #amethyst #topaz #moonstone #customjewelry #mendo #localartist #showmeyourrings #artistmade #50ringsproject
Mini pop-up sale today! Find me in front of the Little Cup Ceramics in downtown Fort Bragg, Ca. I have a dozens of gemstone earrings and matching necklaces. ✨⚡️✨#PopupSale #Jewelry #ForBraggCalifornia @littlecupceramics @lostcoastfoundfortbraggca @larryspringmuseum
Step-by-step photos of setting a stone into a bezel setting. I am setting lapis lazuli into a gold bezel setting that I made. First photo, I am using what we call a “diamond magnet“, very soft sticky wax that you can form into a point to pick up a gemstone, it’s really useful especially when I have an itty-bitty faceted stone that I need to be moving around a lot to check a setting. I place the stone into the bezel setting which I have already measured and filed to the correct height. You don’t want it to be too short because it won’t hold the stone or too tall because it’ll cover too much of the stone. After I have placed the lapis lazuli into the setting, I began to carefully hammer opposite corners in using a bezel pusher that I made out of steel. At first I use a “setting snake”, a little strip of the sticky wax to hold it into place so it doesn’t hop out from the first few hammer blows. I hammer on opposite sides and spin it back-and-forth so that the metal moves evenly. I go around and around slowly moving the metal to pushes over the stone and holds it into place. Then I file and sand and polish all over the hammer marks to make it nice and smooth. Then it is ready for a final polish touch up. ⚒💎⚒#Metalsmith #Silversmith #Goldsmith #StoneSetting #Lapislazuli #ArtStudio #HowTheMagicHappens
Here’s a few step by steps of how I fabricate my gold and silver gemstone rings. First, I carefully measure, shape, and cut strips of gold that will wrap around each stone and set it into place. Once I shape and form those I solder their seams. Then I sand one end perfectly flat so that I can solder it onto silver backing sheet. After that, I carefully saw off the scrap edges, file and sand smooth. Then I turn my attention to the ring band that it will be getting attached to. Each band is hammered from wire and sheet. I have to saw and file the top of the ring band flat so that it will make a beautiful clean attachment to the bezel setting. After this I polish everything to high polish to get it ready for setting the stones. #Metalsmithing #SilverSmith #Goldsmith #BezelSetting #GoldAndSilver #Mendo #ArtStudio
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