When my son was young, he used to play tennis.
He was sitting next to the TV screen and updated me on any new rising star in the world, winning tennis awards.
One of these stars was Martina Navratilova from Czech Republic. She was statistically the second best female player of the 20th century behind Steffi Graf. My son knew it all. "Mom", he said, "Czech Republic is somewhere where champions come from, we must see it".
When I met the beautiful Czech Eva Susanska in Frankfurt, while demonstrating in the Creative World fair for Staedtler and later we met on Nuremberg when I gave the Brocade purses class in Staedtler's factory, we agreed that Czech Republic should be one of my future destinations.
The Czech Republic artists are slowly discovering polymer clay as a crafting medium and artists begin to emerge, seeking for advanced knowledge and higher education in polymer clay. It was the perfect timing.
Eva immediately scheduled a master class and the last weekend was the finale of those plans, 2 handsome hostesses (Eva and her husband), 2 days of wonderful weather, a beautiful country, intelligent and super professional students, good food, beer(!) and...of course, polymer clay.
After hearing so many good things about Czech Republic in general and Prague in particular, I had to visit and see all.
My other half joined me for a short 3 days trip and we toured the city left to right, top to bottom, on Segway, on foot, it was wonderful.
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| Polymer clay millefiori canes? |
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| Million Babushka dolls! So colorful! |
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| Trdlnik delights - Sweet bread/cake |
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| Me on Segway (for the 1st time in my life) next to John Lennon wall |
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| With my other half on Prague top view |
Second stop was Pilsen with Eva, her husband, Ladislav, as a devoted assistant and the lovely students.
I know I am repeating myself a bit, I taught the same subjects in Switzerland (
INKredible and
Skyscraper techniques) but for me, every teaching experience feels like a new baby being born, the discovering of new ways to use polymer (I always learn something new from my students!), the birth of a new bead, the happiness on a student's face revealing a secret, it is all so exciting even after 1000 classes.
Amazing how each and every student takes a technique to his own colors, design and style and create a completely different piece than mine.
You can see below some of the wonderful creations made by Czech Republic ladies, including some nice tricks to use on your Pearlex jars - they used a round baked clay sample (half white half black) to tell which Pearlex color is inside the jar and how it looks on the baked clay.
Why didn't I think of that?
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| Selection of final beads created by the Czech Republic ladies |
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| Demonstrating... |
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| Skyscraper beads (before resin) |
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| Skyscraper beads (before resin) |
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| INKredible beads |
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| Class is ready... |
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| Skyscraper beads (before resin) |
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| Students certificates! |
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| INKredible Sheets |
They also use a bakes clay sheet as a guide to alcohol inks - Adirondack and Pinata.
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| INKredible beads - (based on Melanie's Muir shapelets) |
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| INKredible beads |
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| INKredible beads |
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| INKredible beads - Faux silk screen sheets beads |
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| INKredible beads |
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| INKredible beads - Faux silk screen sheets beads |
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| Pearlex jars with baked samples on it |
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| Pearlex jars with baked samples on it |
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| Skyscraper beads |
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| INKredible beads |
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| Skyscraper beads |
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| Skyscraper beads |
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| INKredible beads |
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| INKredible beads |
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| INKredible beads - pendant by student |
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| Eva and myself (Eva is posing her new earrings) |
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| INKredible beads - cracked |
Last day was dedicated to tourists attractions - underground historical medieval tunnels, (an amazing experience), a visit in Pilsner Urqell beer brewery and a visit in the Jewish Synagogue.
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| underground historical medieval tunnels |
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| Yummy goulash soup inside a bread! |
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| Pilsner Urqell brewery tour |
I want to send a HUGE thank you to
Eva Susanska and her husband Ladislav for such a warm and pleasant welcome and stay, it was a pleasure to stay, teach, chat and hang out with you two and our wonderful students, I feel so blessed to have these opportunities - thank you!
I had a fantastic time and will definitely come to Czech Republic for more!
Another thank you for
Monika Tyna Brydova for taking some of the photos posted above :)
Additional pictures (98 to be exact) are published in
my Facebook account, you are welcome to drop by.
https://www.facebook.com/iris.mishly/media_set?set=a.10151689752617968.1073741831.608452967&type=1
Jewish new year holiday is ending today so I would like to take this opportunity to wish all my friends
a sweet as honey year, full of joyous events and million happy moments!
I will be back for a regular PolymeriOnline post as soon as everyone is back to school and I'll have a bit of peace and quiet around... ;)
Take care and enjoy your weekend!
Silk screens are also fresh to me. From the time I received my test set from Polyform, my fingertips were tickling to check these out.
