Art Bead Scene Challenge February 2014

This month's challenge over at the Art Bead Scene blog is a riot of pinks, purples and reds... just perfect for the month when we celebrate Valentine's Day!  The painting is The Rose Garden by Paul Klee.  You can read more about the artwork and the artist over on the ABS blog HERE.  The Cubist leanings in this painting don't really do it for me, but I love the colors here and I have a hard time resisting a challenge!

The Rose Garden, 1920 

by Paul Klee

Oil on cardboard

I had already started to dig through my art beads looking for something to go with this piece when Heather Powers of Humblebeads upped the ante over on her blog.  In addition to the contest that the ABS blog does every month, Heather is running a contest for anyone who enters using her lovely polymer clay beads.  I have several of her beads in my stash, but none that were the right colors for this challenge.  What was I to do?  Go shopping, of course!

This is the first time that I actually purchased beads specifically for a challenge... but I just couldn't resist the lure of a $50 gift certificate to the Humblebeads shop!  Taking advantage of Lima Bead's free shipping in February, I picked up a great Dandelion Link and some tiny discs in magenta.  Some of the discs have a touch of green in them that I thought would work with the rose stems in the painting.  Now I just had to patiently await my package!

The pattern on Heather's Dandelion link has a starburst pattern that reminds me of some of the elements in the center of Klee's painting... and the colors are spot on!  I chose two of the discs that had a bit of green on the ends and a nice swirly floral pattern that echoes the swirls in the roses.  To round things out and bring in some of the other colors from the palette, I added some darker purple dyed quartzite rounds and dyed imperial jasper rondelles in pinky-reds.

The holes in the disc beads were smaller and couldn't accommodate the 20 gauge wire I used to make the other links so I tried my hand at making my first double loops.  Fancy, no?  I'm pretty happy with how they turned out and I'm sure I'll be trying this technique again in other designs.  

I wish the colors of this bracelet, Heather's lovely beads in particular, were a little more accurate.  I feel like my photos don't do it justice.  For some reason, I have the hardest time capturing pinks and purples accurately with my iPhone's camera.  I'm hoping that eventually Eric will be able to help me out in the photography department with his new "real" camera.  For now you'll just have to trust me that the colors are even better in person!