January Art Bead Scene Challenge

This is officially the first design challenge for me in the new year.  I was super excited when I saw the inspiration for this month's Art Bead Scene challenge.  It's a gorgeous textile print done by Lois Mailou Jones in the twenties.  To read more about the artist and her artwork over on the ABS blog, CLICK HERE.

Textile Design for Cretonne, 1928? 

by Lois Mailou Jones

Tempera on Paper

Since it's been negative 20 degrees with wind chills of negative-I-don't-even-want-to-think-about-it, this tropical print was a breath of fresh, almost warm air.  (Seriously, when is Eric going to whisk me off to Hawaii in the dead of Minnesota winter?)  I immediately thought of the Woodland Leaf brass pendants by Vintaj as well as the smaller Woodland Leaf charms that I had in my stash.  An idea was hatching but I still needed to find my art bead or beads.

It didn't take me long to locate the perfect focal bead in my collection of orphaned lampwork beads from Firelily Glass.  I found one with a wonderful mix of orangey-red, purple, and hints of blue and yellow.  Yummy!  There are so many colors to work with in the artwork.  That gives tons of choices, but it also made it hard for me to get focused on where I wanted to take the design.  Looking to the focal bead I had chosen, I honed in on the purples, reds, and blues in the palette.

I love this bright cluster of little flowers!

I added in some other small lampwork beads from The Spacer Bead Shop and Beadygirl Beads, Czech glass, Mookaite, Rainbow Fire Agate, and lucite.  I used a variety of Vintaj brass bead caps and other findings to finish things off for a fun and colorful long necklace.

The colors look a little off in this one, but I wanted to show it hanging.

There are no art beads in these, but I also whipped up some little matching earrings with the Woodland Leaf charms and Czech glass flowers.

So much inspiration this month!  You can see what other folks have made in response to the artwork over on the ABS Flickr page HERE.  Enjoy!

P.S.  I just made a second design based on this artwork.  You can see it HERE.