Student of the Week-Jackie Bartush

: 22k gold and sapphires

Congratulations to our latest Student of the Week- Jackie Bartush. Jackie came to us from Texas for a few of our Summer Intensives and these earrings are what she made during our 22k Gold Week. She learned how to alloy her gold for granulation , mill it out properly with no bubbles or cracks and how to make her granules Here is how we do it at JAI.

After we have alloyed our 22k and milled it out we pull it to as fine as we can stand, usually around 30 gauge. Pulling very fine wire is tedious and keeping the drawing point finely tapered without breaking it off is a challenge in the small gauges. What we find is that for making consistent sized granules cutting sheet into squares just won’t do. You will never get the precision your are looking for except by using wire. Once you have your 30 gauge wire, we can wrap it around different sized dowels or center punches to get consistent, reproducible sizes. Reproducible is really important. You may not make enough granules in one sitting or you may underestimate the amount you need, which is very common. I encourage student to make a variety of sizes in silver and then tape them in their notebook along with wire and dowel size. A little time spent now will pay off for years in studio work. I find that it is much more difficult to teach students to take the long view of things rather than to teach the techniques. We make our links just as if we were making chain. We melt them on a compressed charcoal block with a little gully corralling them in in case they roll during melting. A just melted granule rolling off the block and onto your lap is no laughing matter. I have read about melting granules in a crucible full of charcoal so that there is no flat spot whatever on the granule. We find that a small flat is very helpful in positioning the granule in patterns so we just use our nice flat block. Job well done by Jackie!